Carnival of Cities

The Traveling Mum blog has been included in this week's Carnival of Cities over at the Traveling Mamas blog! There are some awesome blogs listed over there - go take a look!

Carnival of Cities

Museo de Arte de Ponce

On our last day in Ponce we headed to the Museo de Arte de Ponce, located near the University of Puerto Rico, Ponce. I’ve got to say I was pleasantly surprised by the collection.

I was particularly surprised to see a painting by one of my favorite artists, a painting that regularly makes appearances on posters, greeting cards and calendars, Frederick Lord Leighton’s “Flaming June.” It seems that the painting was up for auction back in the sixties,but since Victorian era painting was unfashionable at the time it didn’t meet the auction’s reserve price and the Ponce museum picked it up for $140. Today it is considered by many to be Leighton’s finest painting.

There were other paintings by well known artists like Rosetti and fine works by lesser known talents. If you enjoy art museums, Ponce’s is well worth the visit.

While visiting art museums is not my children’s favorite activity when on vacation, I try to make it seem less like torture by turning it into a game. In every room I ask them to choose the one painting or sculpture they would like to take home if they could. Somehow the idea of owning one of the paintings gets them to really look at the paintings and decide which one they like the best. Then if they’re good, we end each museum visit with a trip to the gift shop where they can choose one or two little things. This gives them incentive to behave and something to look forward to. And I swear, art museum gift shops are the very best ones. We wound up with a couple of kaleidoscopes, a Shakespeare refrigerator magnet/ finger puppet, a vejigante magnet, some Ponce pencils and a couple of other little gewgaws.

Bioluminescent Bay

The next night we decided to see the bioluminescent bay. The bay is known for its plantlife, which glows when it is disturbed. It has to be viewed by night, of course, otherwise you wouldn't be able to see the glow.

My father remembered seeing boats heading to the bioluminescent bay from La Parguera on his last trip to Puerto Rico, so we decided to head there after dinner. By the time we actually left it was after 8, and La Parguera wound up being farther than we thought it would be, so we rolled in to the little town around 10:00, thinking we'd probably come all that way for nothing, that the boats wouldn't still be running so late. But they were.

Before we boarded the guy taking tickets suggested we pop into a nearby bar to grab a drink for the ride. A small pinacolada, a beer and a coke came out to around $5.

We boarded the boat, a large ferry type thing with open sides and benches for the passengers. There were a good number of passengers, but few enough that we could all find a place to stand along the railing once we reached the bay.

My son became best buddies with Mark from Maryland in the space of twenty minutes in the way that only a pair of six year olds can. “Dude, you HAVE to come to my birthday party!”

When we arrived at the bay the boat cut its engine and turned off its lights. Two young men in wetsuits dove off the side and swam about next to the boat, so that we could see the pale green glow of the luminous plants that their movements churned up. I tried to take photos, but they all came out looking like ordinary water.

Hiatus

Okay, I've kind of been on hiatus for a while, but I'm back. I'm useless around the holidays - I get no writing done at all. But I plan to write more regularly this year, for sure. No, really.