A Brand New World

Kylie and Tim's wedding. (Photo by good friend Rodney Corey)

Kylie and I are doing more than great!

Many have asked if we were going to continue with this blog, and if we are going to post pictures from the wedding. Yes, and yes.

In fact, we were planning on posting pictures and stories of our honeymoon adventures WHILE we were on our honeymoon. However, internet was hard to come by. And we were so busy that we were too tired during those moments to write anything up.

A sampling of our honeymoon:

Old San Juan (2 days):

• Tried a bunch of local restaurants. Some really interesting flavors, but definitely not what Tim expected. He loves spice (as does Kylie), yet Puerto Rican food really isn't hot spicy. In fact it isn't spicy at all.
• Visited El Morro at sunset and got some incredible pictures
• Walked a majority of the cobblestone streets in Old San Juan...lots to see! (It isn't a big area, so it didn't take long to walk it.)
• City Wall: Walked outside of the city wall. (LOTS of cats!)
• Early morning run along the waterfront
• Shopping at some of the local stores

Fajardo (7 days):

• Rented a car in San Juan and drove to Fajardo.
• Stayed at Fajardo Inn. Great place, with a fun pool and miniature golf course. We played in the pool twice (briefly) and there were never more than two other people in the pool with us! (It was the slow season in Puerto Rico, which was perfect because there weren't many tourists and so the beaches and adventure trips were empty.)
• Catamaran snorkel trip: 45min catamaran ride to Icacos Island where we snorkeled and had lunch. Then sailed to Palominitos Island and did some more snorkeling. Swam in a huge school of jellyfish! (They were to young to sting.)
• Biobay tour: We went with Pure Adventures which had marine biologists as tour guides. (One guide native to Puerto Rico was telling us how excited he was that he was going to be moving to the exotic location of Newport, Oregon to do marine biology work!) Incredible experience! The water really glowed, and we had the additional pleasure of enjoying it under a cloudless sky full of stars AND a lightning show off in the distance.
• Hiking through El Yunque rain forest: We planned to hike more, but ran out of time. We laughed as we asked others about long certain trails were. Their reply often was, "Oh it is really far, it'll take you around 30 minutes!" We just chuckled, since a 30 minute hike in Oregon is the distance from the car to the trailhead! ;)
• Ziplining above El Yunque rain forest: This was Kylie's first experience with ziplines, so this group was perfect to teach her "the ropes." Got her excited to sign up for a more intense zipline trip (see below).
• Playing on the beaches of Luquillo and Seven Seas. SO WARM!

Culebra Island (day trip):

• Ferry ride to Culebra Island. An experience in and of itself, and only $4.50 round trip!
• Snorkeling in Tamarindo Bay. We only encountered two other people snorkeling, as well as four kayakers who were only there briefly. INCREDIBLE snorkeling! We saw (and got underwater footage) of sea turtles, sting rays, and lot of tropical fish.
• Swimming in Flamenco Bay, which the Discovery Channel calls the second most beautiful beach in the world. We agree! White sands (we brought some back; texture is like corn starch), light blue waters, plenty of coconut trees for everyone to sit under, and even an old tank that got stuck on the beach!

Arecibo (1 day)

• Drove at 4:30am from Fajardo to Hatillo to make it in time for the caving trip.
• Caving trip with Aventuras Tierra Adentro: ziplining 350 feet above a sinkhole, then rappelling 250 feet into the sinkhole; climbing 3 hours through the cave involved a lot of swimming in a rushing river that was going through the cave; jumping from cliffs into the river, once IN PITCH BLACK 20 feet into the river; floating through a section where there was only a 8 inch gap of air above the river; running (twice) through 50 yards of thick pasty mud that went up to your shins; climbing over terraced limestone formations that look like they belong in Yellowstone National Park; climbing back out of the sink hole via monkey bridges, ziplines, and using via ferrata. An INCREDIBLE experience, HILARIOUS tour guides. A must for any adventurer traveling to Puerto Rico. The bus ride there was half of the fun because the tour guides comedy schtick was so hilarious!
• Touring Arecibo Observatory
• Stayed at TJ Ranch. Their website doesn't do the place justice (it is a mom & pop resort). It really felt like it was right out of the movie "Avatar" or "Jurassic Park": the plants, the hills, the views. By this I mean views like THIS and THIS except the hills aren't floating.

More stories to come, along with pictures and videos. (Be patient, though...we seem to be busier now than before the wedding, as if that is possible!)

And we had so much fun we are thinking of going back in a couple years and doing it all over again!