Let's Travel: Aguada, Puerto Rico

Hello again, 

I will finish a long day of road trip with this post. :) 

On the very same day, after Rio Camuy Cave Park (the post is here), Arecibo Observatory (post: here), and Heladeria Lares (post: here) we arrived at Aguada, the place where we spent the night. 

Aguada is a small seaside city with friendly people and many stray animals (mostly dogs, but also horses, cows, goats, etc.). Actually, at some point, it was really difficult to drive because of the dogs hanging out on the driveway. Well, animals are as relaxed as locals in Puerto Rico. :)

Our long road-trip route is marked on the map below: 

We arrived at our hotel (Columbus Hotel) around sunset time. The view was breathtaking.
It was a bit difficult to find the hotel as the name was not clearly marked and Google maps/GPS are not very reliable in this area. However, the restaurant ("Atlantis Restaurant") of this hotel is clearly marked, so you can use it as a landmark.

Hotel owner is a very decent person, he was quite helpful. I guess we were the only guests at the time, the hotel was very quiet. Rooms start right where the sea ends, luckily we had this amazing view from our balcony:

Plus, we get to sleep with the relaxing sound of waves.

When it was time  for dinner, we tried to rely on Yelp and Google maps to find good local restaurants around but most of the addresses were not accurate.
Thanks to my hubby's excellent navigation skills, we managed to dine at very good restaurants.
If you want to try good local food, your best bet will be Guayabo's Tropical Sunset Restaurant or El Galeon Restaurant.
We highly recommend both. Service, food, ambiance were all perfect.
Below is the view from El Galeon. After a while a horse walked by (alone) and said hello to diners. :) He was just having a casual evening stroll.

If you go to El Galeon, do not leave without trying their delicious Lobster Mofongo.

Hope you enjoyed this post. Next post will be on Rincon and diving. ;)

Short lashes? Don't worry, the solution is here :)

I wrote this post in Turkish a year ago (here is the original post). I decided to re-write it in English when I noticed on stats that it is still the most popular post. It is just translation.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Until 3 weeks ago, I was spending a lot on designer mascaras and placing trans-Atlantic false lash orders from Amazon/Ebay (I was living outside US then) in order to make my short and straight lashes look a little bit longer.

During my online lash extension medication search, I came across to some products: There were prescription medication like Latisse as well as extra expensive online cosmetic products such as Revitalash, Idollash, etc. I reviewed the consumer comments and learned that:
* Revitalash doesn't work at all.
* Idollash is really good but it has lots of counterfeit, and it is really difficult to find the authentic product.
* Latisse works but it is both too expensive and getting it prescribed every single time is very annoying and pricey. Also, one container lasts only for a very limited time.
I already couldn't find them at the time.

Then I started looking for the common active ingredient, in all the products that work, which was "Latanoprost". It originally is used to cure Glaucoma (high eye pressure) but, by chance, they discovered that it lengthens and strengthens weak lashes, even grows lash on a bald region.

I immediately asked my doctor friend if it would really work and if it is safe. She said "Buy it immediately if you can find it!".

The most common version is "Xalatan". It costs around $30 for a 2.5 ml bottle. 

A bottle should be good for 2-3 months.

First I used a clear mascara brush to apply 1-2 drops of  Xalatan on both my eyelashes. Then purchased a Body Shop clear mascara, emptied half of the bottle and poured the medicine in it, since this was more practical. My lashes are 50% more stronger and longer in after 2 weeks of use.

You must be very careful:
* Don't let it touch your eye like all other cosmetic products. Just, be more careful with this because it is a medicine after all and it hurts a lot even with a little touch.
* Never apply it on your lower lashes, since they will get extremely long. I saw some Google images and they freaked me out. :/

For the continuous success, you need to use it regularly. Because it just modifies the existing lash. The lifetime of a lash is around 6-8 weeks, when it falls the effect will be gone too if you don't continue using it.

In case you cannot find Xalatan in Turkey, there is an alternative: Glokoprost. The price is around 20-25 TL (according to web search). Concentration is same, so must be the effects.

Xalatan is widely available in USA, however with prescription. Price is around $35 per bottle. Generic Latanoprost treatment is a bit cheaper, around $30.

If you use it, let me know of your experience. :)

Let's Travel: Heladeria Lares, Lares, Puerto Rico

Hi again.
Here is the next post of the "Let's Travel" series with a tiny delay.

After leaving Arecibo Observatory the same day (post is here), we were ready for our next stop: Heladeria Lares. Most probably you heard of this place before if you watch the Travel Channel's Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern (here is the video). This place is internationally famous for their unusual flavors, like garlic, chicken and rice, corn, etc.

Road was nice. It took around 45 minutes to get there.
You will drive 9 miles back to Rio Camuy and drive 7 more miles to reach this place. Watch for the exit signs. Lares is a small town and the place is not well marked.
We needed to circle around for a while and ask cops where this place is. They don't know English but they are very friendly and did their best to help us. Luckily, my hubby knew the proper pronunciation of the Spanish words.

There is no parking spot near the ice cream parlor. Streets are narrow and crowded especially near the parlor since it's popular among locals as well as tourists. So, you may need to park your car in one of the side streets like we did and navigate on foot. In this way you will also get a real feeling of the town.

We reached the parlor luckily before 4pm.
4pm was critical because we heard that they close at that time. In fact, you can never be sure of working hours in Puerto Rico, life is so relaxed there.
When we arrived, the line outside was not long but it got more crowded while we were inside. We took this picture after getting out of the store.

It was really exciting to sample some of their "too weird-to-me" ice creams. Honestly, I had  prejudices about garlic ice cream. It was not scary though when I finally tasted it, but I don't think I will be able to finish a full cup because of the strong garlic taste (and smell). But hubby loved it.

It is not a small store inside, but it was packed with people. All tables were occupied and there was not much place to stand and eat inside.

There is a nice public park right across the street where you can sit back and relax under the trees while having your ice cream.

The staff is friendly, they give as many samples as you request. Of course you will have to wait a little bit because of the crowd. They understand English, hence we didn't have a communication problem.


We sampled potato, garlic, corn, and strawberry cheesecake. They were all nice. We decided to get corn (yellow, in the picture) and strawberry cheesecake (pink, in the picture) at the end.
They put cinnamon inside and on top of the corn ice cream, I never thought of them together but it sure is a nice combination. You can see grits of corn inside the ice cream and feel its freshness.
Strawberry cheesecake was so fresh and had a perfect creamy consistency. We loved both.

You can see six different flavors on the right side. This is only a fragment of their selections, there were 40-50 different flavors offered I guess.
Here is what they are:
Dulce de Ajonjoli --> Sesame seed candy
Batata --> Potato
Tamarindo --> Tamarind
Zanahoria --> Carrot
Pana --> Breadfruit
Calabaza --> Squash (or pumpkin)


After Heladeria Lares, we walked on Lares streets a bit more and shopped in one of the local pharmacy shops (more like a small scale Rite Aid).

Next stop on the itinerary was Aguada, where we would spend the night. On the way, we saw this scenic spot on Route 111 which was too beautiful to pass by. So, we stopped to take pictures. Lush forest and the lake is just so beautiful.

Hope you enjoyed this post.
Next post will be on Aguada and Aguadilla, PR.

Let's Travel: Arecibo Observatory, Arecibo, Puerto Rico

Hello All,
As promised, "Let's Travel" series continues with the famous Arecibo Observatory. Haven't heard? Maybe you will remember it from the James Bond movie "Golden Eye".

Right after our visit to Camuy River Cave Park (the post is here) we headed to the Observatorio de Arecibo in Arecibo city.
It is a short drive between these two attractions, 10 miles (or 30 mins) to be precise.
This place is the home of the World's largest and most sensitive radio-telescope.
It is not only an attraction, but also an active scientific facility where radio-scientist from all around the World can schedule to use it for their research.

Once you pass the security gate, you will drive up to a parking lot. After parking your car, you will climb up a little bit to reach the observatory.
Starting from this point, you will start seeing warnings about turning off your wireless device, cell phone, etc. I think it's wiser to leave them somewhere safe in your car/hotel and just keep the camera and wallet with you.
The walk from parking lot to the observatory entrance is really nice with the planetary information plates along the road like this one on the left (this was for our beloved planet Earth).

There is a snacks shop midway where you can stop by on the way back and get a cup of coffee. We wouldn't recommend their pina colada, it was bland but their coffee was nice.

When we arrived at the ticket booth we were pleasantly surprised by the nice ticket-lady. We asked for two adult tickets and she gave us discounted student ones. Well, special thanks to her. :)
Regular admission fees: 10 USD (adults) and 6 USD (children/students/seniors).

After the ticket booth, there comes the Angel Ramos Foundation Visitor Center. There are exhibitions, informative tools, videos, interactive mini-experiments, and bilingual (Spanish - English) observatory information presentations provided in this center.
These are especially good for school children. There were a lot of children at the time of our visit and it was nice to notice that they were amused by this newly gained knowledge.
When we visited, there was a temporary NASA exhibit with items used in real space missions.

Our suggestion is to first ask when will the next observatory presentation (in your language) take place then try to cover as much of their information tools as possible. They are fun!

The observatory presentation in English was in two parts: The first part included a short movie on the history of the William E. Gordon Telescope and the observatory while the second part was a presentation given by one of the guides in there. Both parts were fine.
After the presentation guides took us to the platform where we can view the telescope and the huge reflector. Guides told us to ask them any question we might have in mind, but when we looked at the telescope and turned back with questions they were all gone, disappeared, vanished. :/

The picture above is showing the telescope secondary reflector (hanging white ball), line feed (long rod next to it), service bridge, one of the three poles holding the telescope up there, and the giant primary reflector on the ground.
Actually, the primary reflector is not really touching the ground. It is made out of thousands of flexible metal pieces elevated from ground.
Below the reflector is full of vegetation, even some of them managed to grow above the reflector plates. Picture on the right is a close up of the reflector.

After you enjoyed the view and appreciated the smart design of the telescope, you can visit the souvenir shop for some treats/gifts. They sell similar stuff to any Marbles (the brain store) or online (like ThinkGeek.com). They don't have many "observatory specific" souvenirs and I found them a bit over-priced. But still you can get some space food as we did and feel like those cool astronauts on a space mission. :-P

This observatory is one of the important places to visit in Puerto Rico. Especially if you are a scientist or have children, you should definitely visit there.
Here is one nice photograph of the whole observatory grounds from the official NAIC website (for more you can visit their photo galleries: http://www2.naic.edu/public/about/photos/photogal.htm)

Hope you enjoyed reading this post.
The next one will be on the famous Halederia Lares.