Picture this as you read.
You are walking down a rough cobblestone street. There is a light breeze running over your skin, cooling you on the way. Behind you, the cobblestones continue up a sloping hill and you can see the top of the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist rising above the surrounding rooftops. In front of you is the Capilla del Cristo – Capilla de Cristo – which shows its age of 240 years, but remains in good condition. Beyond the chapel, you can see on both sides of it, the Bay of San Juan glowing blue in the sunlight. A huge cruise ship passes from right to left, as it prepares to park at the nearby pier. To your left is a small museum dedicated to preserving the cultural art of the island, and to your right is a small park that resonates with the laughter of schoolchildren feeding the hundreds of pigeons that inhabit it.
Taking a few steps forward, you approach the small wall that prevents unfortunate victims from falling to their deaths. You look down and realize that it is not actually a low wall as you initially thought, but is actually the top of a fifteen meter high defensive barricade that was built almost four centuries ago. Looking down around your feet, you notice that the cobblestones don’t look exactly the same as the cobblestones in the continental United States. They are not red brick, but dyed blue and cast in iron slag. They were used as ballast on ships crossing from Spain to San Juan, to keep them balanced in the waves of the sea. After reaching the port, they were thrown off the ships and used to build cobbled streets. On what particular ship these cobblestones arrived, you do not know. But it doesn’t take much imagination to conceive of the possibility that they arrived on the same ship that carried Juan Ponce de León, or possibly even Christopher Columbus.
Turning around and walking back in the other direction, you pass tall four- and five-story buildings with intricate facades and blue and yellow paint schemes. Traveling two blocks north brings you to a park dedicated to the feral cats of Old San Juan, and if you look around you will see several of the beautiful felines lounging in a corner, intently watching the humans around them. . The park features monuments to cats, their necks craning in curiosity, and a huge tree dominates the center, casting a lovely shadow over the entire area. Sit here and relax, or go on your way. Immediately to your right as St. John’s Cathedral, and while you can’t tell immediately from the outside, you quickly realize that this is the second oldest cathedral in the Western Hemisphere and is reaching its 500th anniversary in 2021. A to its left, recently celebrating its 350th anniversary, is Puerto Rico’s first convent, El Convento. Now one of the best hotels in Old San Juan, it is home to members of high society from all over the world and also has a charming restaurant that serves breakfast, lunch, dinner and a variety of drinks in between. Turning left here, you walk down another street of aged cobblestones and through a wall. Standing on the path that crosses the bottom of the street, you look up and read the Latin inscription above the door you passed through: “Benedictus Qui Venit In Nomine Domini” – “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord “
This gate used to be the main entrance to the city and the docks were just below. Sailors knelt before the gate upon disembarking and offered a prayer of thanks to God for allowing them safe passage. Turning away from the gate, you walk up the path to your left and look at the full extent of the defensive walls you noted earlier, in the chapel. Pockmarks pockmark the walls, evidence of centuries of failed invasions. You can almost hear the musket and cannon fire from the top of the ramparts, as the Spanish defenders battled Francis Drake and a host of other English and Dutch invaders.
Old San Juan is a must-see for any history buff, whether you prefer European or American tales. Everything comes together in Puerto Rico. The Isla del Encanto is the birthplace of European culture in the Americas, discovered by Columbus in 1493. Old San Juan is the second oldest European city in the Western Hemisphere and is nearing its 500th anniversary in 2012. Although it may may not be as old as Dresden or Brighton or Rome or a host of other European cities, you can be sure that you will always be blessed with a climate only seen in a tropical paradise, plus the guarantee that the city will never be full of condominiums or high-rise hotels. . Of all the old cities in the world, Old San Juan may be the best to maintain its identity and not get lost in the wave of tourism that hits the coast 24 hours a day.