Coqui's Hideaway Rain Forest Villa
El Yunque Lodging in Rio Grande, Puerto Rico
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Post-MARIA Bounce-Back Special (24 April 2018) To celebrate surviving the hurricanes, we're offering a 15% Discount to all guests who stay with us during May 2018! Discount is off of our regular rates. Discount cannot be combined with other offers.
We are concluding another adventure in Puerto Rico while staying for 10 days at wonderful Coqui's Hideaway, our 5th time at Coqui's. Even a couple of days when the grid shut down were fun. Ray fixed things so that, during the daytime outage, we had power from solar for internet, computer, and the refrigerator. While we were here, the battery backup for the solar system was installed, so future power grid outages should be of little consequence. Most businesses have generators now, so we had no problems at stores and restaurants. With the interesting solar installation going on, we had even more time to chat with Ray and Gwenn, and to hear about their 5 dogs that let us pet them and get kisses from them.
Out and about, there was some sadness in bent and broken road signs, blue tarps, and a few abandoned businesses. Road 191 into El Yunque is still open only to La Coca Falls, and El Portal is closed. But Puerto Rico will rise.
El Verde BBQ is there same as ever, and on Sunday the band next to El Verde drew hundreds to the party, and cars were parked all over. The Puerto Rican people were friendly as ever.
We had some good local food (well … sandwiches) at Panaderia Don Nico (SW corner of Rt 3 and Rd 958), and at Puertorrican Bakery in Palmer. We love the open-air, and always cool bar area of El Convento Hotel in Old San Juan. It is nice for chatting with friends while dawdling over drinks or nice food from a brief menu. They don't seem to mind if you sit there all afternoon. Many of the kiosks on Rt 3 in Luquillo seem to have Puerto Rican food from the same kitchen. For something different, try kiosk #34, Revolution Pizza. They have much more than pizza, and service is excellent.
Gwenn and Ray have spent months cleaning up the property after hurricane Maria, and it is as beautiful as ever. One day, we had a real downpour of a shower. I posted a short clip on YouTube, "Beauty in a Tropical Shower", with a description "Beauty Falling on Beauty". It was so beautiful here that we changed our plans and stayed 3 more days.
Louise & Gordon
Syracuse, NY
23 April 2018