PART 3- CALMS SEAS AND HEADWINDS - THE WEST AND SOUTH
June 24th - Day 8
I was fortunate the tide did not reach me last night. A couple of waves came close enough for me to hear the rushing water soaking up by the dry sand.
Around midnight I was awakened by the blasting sound of Reggaeton, followed by puffs of green and red fireworks. June 23rd is Noche de San Juan when all of Puerto Rico heads out to the beaches after dark to celebrate the birth of John the Baptist. “Yes, it’s a big night in Puerto Rico, everyone parties on the beach, jumps over the waves and light up firecrackers until sunrise. Very fun times, ” my Puerto Rican friend later told me. The locals in Aguadilla were certainly enjoying their time to the fullest. The blaring Reggaeton was so loud it was drowning out the fireworks and I tried to mentally tune out the beating rhythm to get some sleep.
In the morning things had quieted down. As I packed up I only heard an odd car or two drive by in the distance blaring out more of the same numbing music that had been going on all night. The waters were calm, and I quickly covered the last eight miles to the tip of the Rincon peninsula, and rounded the westernmost point in Puerto Rico. At the very end was an enormous dome which looked like an observatory, but I later discovered it was the entombment of an abandoned nuclear power plant. I had never heard of there being a nuclear power plant in Puerto Rico, but in the 1960s, the island was the testing site for a new type of nuclear plant where the steam produced would make a second pass through the reactor, pick up extra energy and avoid condensation after turning the turbines. The project was a big deal for Puerto Rico as it would have provided all of the island’s power needs and then some. However, the reactor was plagued with operational problems, never functioned at full capacity for very long, and was eventually decommissioned. I’m sure that a few locals complaining about their cancer also didn’t help the project’s image. On my way around the cape, I saw a boat dropping lobster traps, and I wondered if perhaps the lobsters were unusually large in these waters.
After four days of camping, I decided that I could go with a one-night hotel stay. Yesterday my shorts pulled against my legs when I slid into the cockpit, and the willy hammock chaffed hard on my groin and pinched my scrotum. This hurt a lot when it happened, and the sea water made for a constant discomfort that could only be abated with a freshwater bath and a good night sleep. I looked on google maps to see what there might be in the vicinity of Rincon and found a small suburb close to Mayaguez that had a beachside hotel with a funny name, the “Yukayeke” Resort.
I located the entrance from the beach which was hidden in the bushes barely visible from the water and went in to take a look. There seemed to be no one around. No guests, no staff; the only sound was a waterfall cascading into an inviting swimming pool and the odd thunder storm rumbling in the distance but steadily getting louder and closer. “Oh, this place is very pleasant, but where could everyone be?” I thought as I walked down a footpath under the shade of overhanging trees. Eventually someone heard my calling. A old lady missing a front tooth walked out of a room where she had been laying in her bed watching a soap opera on the TV. “I’m sorry, we’re fully booked,” she said
“You can’t be serious. There’s no one here.”
“It looks like that, but we have a Quinceñera that starts today and will go until the weekend. Everyone is arriving tonight.” Quinceñeras are a girl’s coming of age birthday party in most of Latin America when a girl turns fifteen marking the transition to womanhood. It’s always a big deal, but I’ve never heard of one that went on for four days.
“You can check the Rancho Grande Restaurant next door. The lady who owns it is my sister. Her name is Lourdes, and she sometimes rents a room. Tell her that you spoke with Miranda and that you’re looking for a place to stay. You might want to go quickly; it’s going to pour.”
She wasn’t kidding about the rain. Walking outside became more like swimming; tin roofs from nearby buildings rattled like they were being pelted with stones, and the gutters were gushing like fire hoses. In twenty minutes however, it was over, and the sun was shining above dozens of brimming potholes.
I was soaked but refreshed from having the salt washed away from my skin, and my scrotum which was making me walk funny. The restaurant was a large, roofed outdoor patio facing the beach with dozens of free chickens running around. There were no customers (I think due to the storm that had just passed), the only person was a lady seated at a table tallying up receipts. She was absorbed in what she was doing and didn’t notice as I approached.
“Hi, I’m looking for Lourdes.” I said. She took a freight as she realized I was there, and I saw that she had a really big mole above her lip.
“Yes, that’s me. Can I help you?”
“Miranda next door told me you might have a room to rent for the night.”
“Yes I do, but it’s not a room. It’s a two-bedroom apartment. I’ll rent it to you for $90 if you pay cash.”
I thought that was a great deal given how expensive hotel rooms were in San Juan. I paid her right then and there. “Oh, by the way, I have a very big kayak on the beach I’m traveling with. Is there a chance you have a place to put it?”
“A kayak, yes. My husband runs a kayaking business. He takes people out on the lagoon just behind us. You can leave it in our yard. It will be safe there. We are still serving lunch for the next 30 minutes. The only dish right now is mofongo relleno with chicken.”
I was hungry enough to give the mofongo a second chance at a first impression.
June 25th - Day 9
Yesterday afternoon I had a chat with Lourdes’ husband who runs the kayak business. He was an American with a Nordic Scandinavian appearance that would stand out in any crowd in Puerto Rico, but he spoke fluent Spanish. He’d lived here for over twenty years. “I won’t lie to you; I never liked the cold winters up in Minnesota. I was born there, but I wasn’t born to be there. I came here once on a summer vacation and decided that the next time I came I would not be leaving. Life has a different pace here, it’s much more peaceful.”
“When you go out on your kayak tomorrow, be a little careful when you pass the mouth of the Añasco river just south of here. When the fisherman clean the fish there, they will throw the scales back in the water and the sharks go absolutely livid. Don’t fall in the water there.”
In the morning, the sea was flat like a mirror. The West coast of Puerto Rico is in the shadow of the trade winds which get held up in the central mountains. However, yesterday’s afternoon noon downpour seems to be an almost daily occurrence. Around 1:00pm I noticed very heavy clouds gathering over the land marching steadily towards me. I checked the forecast on my phone, and it showed an amoeba blob of orange and red just East of Mayaguez soon to be on top of me. I decided to quicken the southward pace hoping that the storm would miss me.
I stopped at a small island for a rest where I met with two snorkelers who had swum in from the Mainland. They pointed out to me the beach where they’d come from and that not far from the road was a supermarket. Although I still had food and water for a few more days, I decided to stop for supplies. I found the one thing I like to eat but was missing thus far on this journey; canned ravioli and meatball pasta from Chef Boyardee. To me it’s one of those adventure foods I would never eat at home as it’s really boring food, but after days of eating nothing but canned tuna, cold pasta with generous amounts of powdered cheese was a welcomed variety on the menu.
From North to South, Puerto Rico is only about forty miles. In the late afternoon I reached Boqueron bay which is the last bay before rounding the South West corner. Up to now the journey has been the easy stretch. With the wind in my back, I’ve covered one third of the whole distance around the island in less than a fifth of the time I’ve given myself. Tomorrow however, the tough part into the wind begins. On the last two miles today I got a taste of what’s to come. Gusts whipped up short pounding waves that made forward progress almost impossible. I gave up on the intended campsite on the beach at the back of the bay as I would have had to paddle directly into the wind to get there; instead, I decided to cross the bay by going due South taking on the winds from the side. I saw a stretch of sand with a couple of boats anchored nearby and some swimmers. It seemed good enough to camp for the night.
June 26th - Day 10
The two boats on the beach last night were day campers as well and made for some afternoon company. They set up a barbecue grill and shared some of their chicken with me, which was a welcome change from the canned fish. They were good folks, but they sure enjoyed their salsa and merengue songs late into the night.
I left at sunrise while my friends were still asleep and rounded the southwest corner of Puerto Rico. The cape is a double headland separated by a small white sand strip. It was dead calm at 7:00am, but I can imagine that on a stormy day, the breakers here would be as tall as the cliffs.
After the incredible clockwork downpours from the past two days, I was surprised that this corner of Puerto Rico is almost a semi desert. Here the trees are short and stumpy, the grasses are brown and scrubby, and there are open plains that roll down to the shore where they are rimmed by mangrove swamps. All the rain, it seems, falls over the hills near Mayaguez just 10 miles to the North. The water was crystal clear, and I could see large coral heads just below the surface.
The headwind was punctual for our appointment. At 9:30am a light breeze picked up and by 12:00pm it was gusting very hard. I switched from using the euro blade to the wing paddle which slices more easily through the wind, and my pace improved considerably. The Euro blade, even when feathered at 60 degrees, still catches a lot of the headwind and makes the strokes slow and forceful. The wing paddle, however, is much easier to slice through the wind.
There are a few mangrove islands along this stretch, and the coastline meanders a bit, so it’s possible to find bays hidden from the worst of the headwind. There were also no large swells here as those normally come from the Atlantic.
I made it to a small town called Santa Ana. There looked to be a secluded beach where I could camp, but unfortunately, even though the map called it “jungle beach” it was more of an urban jungle with every inch of sand claimed by weekend trippers grilling pork playing a mixed ballad of salsa. I kept paddling thinking I would need to go past the town, however, just one beach further was an isolated pocket of sand in view of the town but with no one there by me. This was the perfect place. I pitched the tent and paddled to the town to get lunch.
June 27th - Day 11
The rain drizzled throughout the night. I had to wake up and bring down the rain fly, but once the rain stopped it got very hot and humid, and I would wake up again to open the rain fly. This happened at least three times. The one silver lining was that all the rain put an end to the rowdy reggaeton music in the town.
It was very windy from the get-go. The morning brought a torrential downpour at the Guanica bay inlet, and I had to wait until it passed before making the crossing. The bay entrance is very narrow, maybe only about a thousand feet wide, and is rimmed by tall steep cliffs like the mouth of a fjord. I gave it a very wide distance. I did not want to find out how strong the tide races can get there and be sucked into the narrow passage like a cork in a draining bathtub.
At midday I made a rest stop at a very pleasant barrier island. It was the quintessential Caribbean postcard of white sands, clear turquoise waters under the shade of lush green palm trees. To make things even better a group of fishermen there offered me ice cold water which I could not pass up. I considered calling it a day and spending the rest of the afternoon here snorkeling and relaxing, I had already done 15 miles, all against the wind and I was tired. However, I was encouraged when the fisherman told me that there were several more islands further ahead that were equally good places, and so I kept going. That was not the right decision.
The next island, which ironically was named Isla Caribe on the charts, was only two miles further, but when I got there the beach was rocky, the water was turbid with the Sargasso seaweed, and there was no good rest shade. I considered going back but backtracking and quickly giving up distance that has been so hard to wrest from the headwind is always physiologically difficult. I concluded that perhaps this island was just bad luck, and the next island, Isla Ratones, would be much better. The fishermen had even told me that many weekend boaters from Ponce go there, and the aerial image on google definitely showed a large stretch of white sand. “Only three and a half more miles.” I concluded from the chart. I decided to keep moving, mentally strengthened by the expectation that I would soon be camping on a little paradise island.
Unfortunately, this next island was even worse. More rocks, more seaweed, trash everywhere, and an unpleasant smell of dead fish hung in the air. It was a terrible disappointment for all the additional effort against the wind to get there.
A fisherman’s boat stopped to drop a few lines in the water, and I approached them, “Hey, how come this place is so ugly? I thought there was a nice sandy beach here.”
“Oh, you must have been looking at pre-Maria pictures. Yes there was a beach here that went all the way to those mangroves, and it was quite nice back then, but the hurricane took it all away. Yes, it’s really ugly now.”
On the mainland was another beach. “Anything will be better than this place,” I thought as I pushed back out into the water.
Hurricane Maria really devastated this part of Puerto Rico. After I set up camp, I took a walk to see what was around. I found that the building complex behind the beach was an abandoned water park complete with a wave pool and giant water slides that meandered down from a tall central tower. It had definitely not been working for some time. The wave pool was half full of stagnant green water, some sections of the slides had crumbled and what remained looked ready to collapse in the next strong breeze.
June 28th - Day 12
Yesterday’s paddle exhausted me. Not just physically, but mentally as well. I’m disappointed that the majority of the places I stop at are covered in trash, rotten seaweed is everywhere and there is no reprieve from the repetitive salsa and merengue drum beat.
I had planned to make today a short paddle and stay a night at the Ponce Hilton resort which was only 5 miles further. I was looking forward to staying there. The beach was manicured and picked clean of trash and seaweed, there was a pool with a hydro-massage jacuzzi, and decent food. Best of all I could leave my kayak by the beach gate, and it would be an easy launch from there the next morning.
Unfortunately when I arrived and walked through the lobby to the reception desk, they gave me the bad news.
“We’re booked.”
“Seriously? But it’s a Monday and it’s not even a holiday.”
“We are booked all the way until August.”
I would have thought that summer was the low tourist season in the Caribbean, especially with the hurricanes and excessive heat, but perhaps things are different now with the Covid pandemic and people everywhere really want an end to their quarantine and go somewhere.
It was very unfortunate to not stay at the Hilton. The next day I had hoped to get a very early start and make a crossing to Isla Caja de los Muertos which is only about 7 miles south from the mainland which the guide book noted was a little paradise with clear blue waters and fine white sands. But it has to be done in light winds, or I would risk drifting too far to the west and miss the island entirely. I considered camping on the Hilton beach, but I think the hotel guests would have issues seeing what I do every morning on almost every beach. Isla Caja de los Muertos will have to be for another adventure in another time.
Having been kicked out a second time, and not knowing when my next shower might be, I decided to take a dip into the hotel swimming pool, kayak clothes and all, and wash off the salt, and then relax for five minutes in the jacuzzi. It was going to be another day of hard labor against the wind.
I followed the coastline to the east in a narrow gap between the mainland and some barrier island close to shore rimmed by a reef. The swells were considerably bigger beyond the reef, and I had hoped to stay protected, but the path between the breakers and the mainland got progressively narrower and I soon ran out of both depth and width to paddle in.
I looked south and thought I saw a gap on the reef where the water was deeper and would allow me to pass into the ocean side. I turned right and started paddling towards the breaker zone, but I soon realized that was a big mistake. When the first bigger wave came at me it pulled the water from under my kayak revealing several dark coral heads like a denture full of cavities. The kayak bow bumped hard on a rock and screeched to a halt. When I paddled backwards, then the rudder hit the rocks as well. For a second I thought I was pinned in place, and that would have been catastrophic. I would have had to get out of the kayak, scrape myself on the sharp coral, free up the loaded kayak, while not getting hammered on the next wave which would probably pick up the boat and toss it into another rock. Who knows how many cracks I would have on my hull, and how much time I would need to fix it.
Fortunately, none of that came to pass. The wave broke gently, lifted me up, and I just slowly drifted backwards to freedom. I later looked for any scuffs on the hull and they only seemed superficial, mostly only scraping the paint protection tape and the keel strip. Thank God, I thought, disaster averted. I paddled back the quarter mile and went around the reef on the ocean side. This was one of those situations you get in once and learn never to take the risk again. Why not paddle an extra fifteen minutes for peace of mind?
With the Hilton out of the plans, I started looking where else I could stay. About 12 miles further I located another hotel close enough to a beach that I could dolly the kayak with the gear. When I arrived at the beach, I was distraught. The landing was full of boulders, and there was a three-foot nearly vertical escarpment where the waves were breaking and it would be impossible to drag the kayak with all the gear inside. I bobbed on the water for a while thinking what to do. I got out of the boat in waist deep water and then scrambled as far as I could up the escarpment with the boat in toe before the water rushed back leaving the boat pinned at both ends which didn’t do the section hinges and favors. I emptied the hatches by throwing the gear farther up the beach to get out of that untenable position as quickly as possible. I have no idea how I’m going to launch from this place tomorrow.
The dolly is a really bulky item that takes up valuable space in the stern hatch, but I have found it to be essential when kayaking alone. I placed most of the gear inside the cockpit section so the weight was balanced over the wheels and slowly pulled everything along.
This roadside hotel I found was a really strange place. For a start, the price of $33 per night was suspiciously cheap. When I walked in through the gate there was no reception or anybody there, and the rooms were parking garages with a phone number on the door. I called, and a lady answered the phone.
“Walk into one of the garages with an open hangar.” She said.
“Ok. I’m inside number 1.”
I heard a bell ring and a door inside the garage unlocked.
“Ok now at the end of the room there is a small trap door with a bell and a cup. Put your payment in the basket and ring the bell. Cash only please.”
I opened the trap door and saw there was a small crucible with a string attached. I put two $20 bills in it and rang the bell. A little hand pulled on the string and lifted the crucible up a small shaft. A minute later the crucible was lowered back down with the change and a receipt.
“You’re good.”
“What about keys?”
“There is no key. Just don’t close the garage door if you walk out. Otherwise, you need to call and speak to whomever is staffing the graveyard shift.”
I looked around the room and saw that the walls were made of bathroom tiles, all the furniture was bolted to the floor, and there were giant mirrors everywhere, including one on the ceiling.
“Oh, this is a shag motel…” I realized. Well, I don’t care as long as the bed sheets don’t have anything sticky, and the shower works. I slept well this night.
June 29th - Day 13
Something tried to bite my kayak today. I was paddling in the early morning when suddenly I felt the stern hit something really big with a loud thump and the boat fishtailed. Hitting something in the back while moving forward would be really unusual. For a second I thought the hinges were coming loose and I would soon be left with two thirds of a kayak. But after the initial shock I looked back and saw that everything was still there, and concluded it could only have been some hungry creature from the deep thinking I was an easy meal. I later looked at the rudder blade and saw that it has some weird looking scratches, but I couldn’t say for sure if they were fish bites or scratches from yesterday's close call with the coral reefs. It’s probably for the best that I never find out the answer.
I paddled only as far as a little town called Salinas. The forecast for the next few days is very uncertain. Conditions are still good for tomorrow, but after that a tropical storm will be skirting Puerto Rico, the winds will pick up to 40 miles per hour, and the waves will be 10 to 15 feet. I found a hotel in the harbor marina, so I plan to stay out of the water until conditions improve or, as the receptionist noted, “You can stay up until July 1, because after that is independence day weekend, and unless someone cancels, which I doubt, we are sold out.”
