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Published: April 14th 2010
Kayak Adventure
Jay on a kayak adventure thru the mangroves of Salinas- fun!It was time to start our long trek back to the States, so we said a tearful goodbye to the Virgin Islands and set sail for Puerto Rico. We stopped for a couple of days in Culebra and Viequez along the way, to re-visit some of our favorite haunts before pushing on to Salinas. Salinas is a quiet fishing village and weekend getaway located about halfway along the southern coast of Puerto Rico. We didn’t get a chance to stop here on our way down to the Caribbean, so we were excited to explore this new town. It is a very protected anchorage and in fact one of the best hurricane holes in the islands. The only way in is to wind around through the reefs and mangroves, and the entrance is very narrow and very shallow. But once you have run the gauntlet, so to speak, it opens up and you are rewarded with a peaceful and calm anchorage, perfect in all conditions.
The result is that you find yourself anchored amongst many mangrove islands, which are filled with wildlife and a great variety of birds, perfect for kayak exploration. In fact, that is what Salinas is known for
In the Heart of the Mangroves
Jen working her way thru the heart of the mangroves, not able to paddle any more, just pulling herself along. and hordes of people flock here on the weekends to get out on the water. Luckily, we have our own kayaks and even though they are seldom used, we were excited to do some kayak exploration of our own. We spent one afternoon paddling around the mangroves, exploring the different channels and circumnavigating some of the smaller islands. We saw tons of different birds, white egrets and blue herons, all kind of fish and crabs, and even a wild cat. But the highlight of our kayak tour was when we found a secret path that goes deep into the mangroves. It was so narrow and overgrown that at some points we had to stop paddling and just pull ourselves along. It was little buggy and we got a couple of scrapes and scratches along the way, but it was worth it. The mangroves are bustling with activity and it was fun to be in the heart of it all. It was so thick that we couldn’t even see where this path was taking us, but we had come this far and decided to push on. We were quite surprised when it opened up on the other side of the island,
Salinas
The anchorage of Salinas, tucked into the mangroves. flowing into a channel we had explored earlier. So we considered our adventure a success!
After all of our kayaking, we had built up quite an appetite. Luckily the town of Salinas has lots of great restaurants to choose from. It had been a while since we had enjoyed Puerto Rican food and we forgot how much we liked it, everything from the empadillas to the tostones to our very favorite, mufongo relleno (which is garlicky fried plantains stuffed with delicious fish, seafood, or meat). And we had read in our guide book that the town of Salinas is known for its mojo sauce, which is a tomato based sauce with carmalized onions and peppers and olives- muy deliciouso! We had it on everything: camerones el mojo, dorado el mojo, empadillas and tostones dipped in mojo, and mufongo relleno el mojo. What can we say, we are crazy for the mojo!
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Gran
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An Interesting Story
I was interested in how you sounded like you were lost, then came out on the other side of the island!!! I would have paniced and turned around. Also, the food there sounds like something that I would like. Are you collecting recipes???