Dodging squalls

We were undecided as to where on the Puerto Rico west coast to stage our departure for the Dominican Republic. However, several cruisers that we’ve met over the last month all had great things to say about Puerto Real, so that’s where we headed. We left early from Ponce knowing we had a full day of sailing, but the winds were in our favor, we were under our usual poled out jib run, and in fact we had to reduce sail to slow down once we rounded the coast to avoid a squall moving through the Puerto Real/Mayaguez area (passed by the time we anchored).

Puerto Real is nothing more than a fishing village and a marina, but it’s a great little spot to sit for a few days waiting for the right weather window. It’s an anchorage that’s nearly empty (three boats total anchored the entire time we were there), and it experiences much less wind than just outside the coast. The marina was kind enough to let us take on water for free, use their dinghy dock, and do laundry despite not taking a slip there. Laundry in itself took up a full day since it had been a while and I don’t care what anyone says about not needing many clothes on a boat – you do NOT want to re-wear a Tshirt that you’ve sweated in and is covered in salt water and/or sunscreen for more than one day.

Puerto Real docks

Full circle on the anchor confirmed by GPS

We walked into town to get breakfast sandwiches at one of the local markets and then ducked across to the other to do a little provisioning. Here I ran into my one and only problem with bugs. Turns out the box of milk I bought (think Parmalat in the tetra paks) was covered in ants. I didn’t discover it till we were back on board and I was putting things away, so it got dunked immediately in salt water and thrown away – whew, infestation avoided.

There’s only one restaurant in town so we ate lunch there twice – Bresas del Mar, just a few doors down from the marina. Puerto Real is known for their small boat fishing industry and you should see the red snapper and lobster that are brought in on a daily basis. I treated myself to a lobster stew in a baked plantain bowl (mofongo) and red snapper filet in a garlic sauce the next day. Neither disappointed. We also made our way to one of the local corner bars where Trip made friends with the bartender and all 3 of the patrons. We were invited the next day to Marina Mondays – an excuse for the locals and any marina transients to hang out for a few hours.

sunset

Monday night was fun – we hung out with the locals as well as some of the new cruisers we met. Of course yet again we came across two Amel ketches in slips – seems I’m destined to continue running across these boats!