Singing Frogs, Crying Cats and Reluctant Story Tellers

Andy's Puerto Rico Trip

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It has been 10 days since I (Andy) and my five companions arrived back from a surfing trip to Aguadilla Puerto Rico. Six guys, and not one of us jumped at the opportunity to blog our story. I have been pondering that for a few days wondering why men seem to be reluctant to “tell our stories,” something that seems to come so naturally to our wives. It was a great trip. Why would I not want to “talk about it.” (More about that later). Now the moment that you have all been waiting for, ladies: “The Puerto Rico adventures of Andy, Tom, Jake, Jordan, Tim and Scott.” I was invited to go on this escapade by my son-in-law Tom (may his tribe prosper). (I always said he was my favorite son-in-law.) “Are you sure you want your “Old Man” on your first ever overseas surfing trip,” I asked. “Sure, dad,” he said. I have visited at least 10 different countries, but I had never been on a tropical island. I was pumped! (Can you imagine Phyllis saying, “I was pumped”!!)

Puerto Rico is a hot surfing spot for avid surfing enthusiasts. The name pops up often in the surfing magazines as a place to go if you want big surf. My entire life’s experience on a real surf board (boogie boards are not surf boards) was on a trip to Ocean City with Tom. My total time in the water consisted of about 3 rides on 1 – 2 foot waves. Given the opportunity to embellish upon that experience, I’m sure that I, in classic macho style, could have conjured up a pretty rough surf with waves that would terrify mere mortals.

Back to the story. The funny thing about this trip for me is that even though I was excited about going, I really didn’t even think about surfing. Considering my propensity to hurt myself in novel ways by engaging in risky behavior, that was a good thing. Besides, they don’t have 1 – 2 foot waves in Puerto Rico. That certainly wasn’t true of my testosterone driven, risk taking friends.

Our place was right on the ocean. It looked like paradise island.

We could hear the waves all night long and feel the gentle tropical breezes blowing across our bodies as we slept. But even paradise is not perfect as we were reminded by the incessant chirping of the tree frogs. They sound cute chirping in the trees (for about an hour), but after about 4 hours you think you’re going to go mad. Kind, gentle grown men turned into tree frog killers. They do stop eventually, seconds before you fall asleep in total exhaustion. I would be fine if I never heard another tree frog in my entire life. The tree frogs had nothing over the whining cats. I slept in one of the two bedrooms that isolated me somewhat from the night noises, but no one could miss these cats. If there was a cat Richter scale it would have measured an 8.5 for sure. We had an American family staying next door to us with twin girls and a small baby. I woke up in the middle of the night to what sounded like a baby crying. Having held a few crying babies in my arms in the wee hours of the night, I felt pity for the poor parent. It wasn’t until morning that I found out that it was not a baby, but two cats.

I found out that surfers like to ride around a lot looking for the perfect waves. They all looked good to me, but I discovered that there was a big difference in waves. Waves are measured in more ways that just height. Unless you are totally ambidextrous, you are very interested in whether the waves are breaking left or right. Height was a factor, but so was the pipe or tube. And then there was on shore and off shore winds that had to be reckoned in. There was organized and disorganized surf, choppy surf, clean surf, beach breaks, reef breaks, the curl, lip, pitch, long board, short board, body board, I’m bored etc. etc. I was exhausted just talking about the waves and we hadn’t even started yet. The old adage is often true – “There is no place like home” which is where we ended up spending quite a bit of our time. Some of the biggest and best waves the guys found all week were right out our back door.

That’s where the surfing magazines told us they would be, but you know, we’re guys, we don’t believe that. We have to find out for ourselves.

We had more rain than they had seen for a few weeks, but it didn't last long. Each day had plenty of sunshine and plenty of surf. We had as much sunshine as we did rain.

We enjoyed eating out at the local restaurants in the evenings where there was plenty of good Puerto Rican and American food, tropical ambiance and ocean front views.

I thought it was interesting that in spite of how little we knew about each other, (apart from Tom, I did not know any of the guys that went on the trip), we enjoyed one another's company, got along famously, and had a great time together. We're already talking about going to Costa Rico next year. Sorry I don't have any good pictures of all the guys. That's another guy thing isn't it? We don't like to pose for pictures.

Even though I didn't surf, I did enjoy the water and spent plenty of time in both the pool

and the ocean. I found out that you can't safely crawl across a live reef after I tried it and discovered numerous needles from sea urchins stuck in my fingers and toes. I also enjoyed the solitude and the opportunity for quietness, rest and reflection.

The last day there, we spent on a beach that was less than a mile from the house. The sun was out in all its glory, the beach was mostly deserted, the water was warm (83 degrees) and the surf was mild. Tom tubed out on one of the waves and never left the water until it was dark. He walked home along the beach carrying his surf board. He was happy. We were all happy. It was a great time!

Male rules for story writing;

Never tell the whole story because you won’t be able to embellish it later on.