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You can live in place for a long time, but still know very little about it. I think I finally began to discover Puerto Rico in this past year. I finally began to understand a tiny little bit of what this place is about, and delved into some little-told stories and mysteries. New things popped up in front of me, right through the final day. They’d been there for years and years, but I hadn’t seen them...I hadn’t known.

If you come to Puerto Rico, you will probably go to the beach. That’s what I did. For years, there were periods when I went to the beach almost every day. I’d go after work, on my way home. On Saturday morning, during Spanish class intermission, I’d walk down to the end of the street and stand in the sand. On Sundays we’d take our children, or alone I’d stroll around Condado Lagoon, and hit the city beach at sunset.

Once a week, I made it a policy to disappear from the office for a two-hour lunch. Nobody knew where I was, except Maua. I drove to my private beach on the Caribbean shore, went for a run in the sunshine, and took a swim. Then I headed back to afternoon meetings, flushed, with grains of sand in my ears. It was heaven.

But there are mountains too, and very cool little mountain towns. In this past year I have loved them more and more, and spent more and more time in them.

Puerto Rico is covered with little towns, like a more-rugged central Pennsylvania. In both cases, it’s as if someone took a handful of dots and sprinkled them over the folded landscape. A central Pennsylvanian town always has at least two roadside bars and a church. A Puerto Rican mountain town always has bars too, with old narrow streets wedged into impossibly small spaces, bordered by either steeply rising or falling hills, centered on a plaza with a church.

There is also a surprising amount of open space, moody forests and soaring green hillsides which sometimes mix with pitch-black clouds, where it will rain like you would never believe. Then the sun will come out, and the color green is so intense, so vivid, that almost burns your eyes.

Then there are the coziest looking colorful houses tucked away here and there and everywhere, sometimes in the most improbable spots. Some are run down; many are immaculate. As I drive by, I imagine living in one. In a little 3-roomer, with little desk in a spot just off the kitchen, in front of a window looking out across the hillsides.

One of my favorite places to stay in Puerto Rico is nestled in the National Forest in the center of the island, not far from the highest point, a ways above the interesting town of Jayuya. Except for summer weekends, it is usually deserted, with only a warden down the road to speak to. There are gorgeous flower-filled rainforests, creeks with waterfalls, and wonderful hiking trails. I can’t say it is silent because the air is filled with nature noises (and maybe the occasional sound of a truck driving around a bend in the distance). The price is $4 per night per adult, $2 per child, and it’s called the Toro Negro Campground.






You need a permission slip to stay at Toro Negro, obtained at the San Juan office of the Department of Natural Resources. I know, I know, what a hassle. Most people don’t have the time or desire, let alone the knowledge, to get through this arcane procedure. This is probably why you will share the exquisite Toro Negro Campground with only a day picnicker or two, if anyone at all. But it really isn’t that bad. Here’s what you do:

In San Juan, in Rio Piedras, go to the place where Highways #1 and #3 intersect. Not far from the turnoff to the Botanical Gardens, opposite the elevated train, is a distinctive, green-checkerboard government building. The DRN office is in here on the ground floor, and there is visitors' parking.

Take a breath, relax, and just decide to spend 45 minutes in here. It’s not that bad, and it’s worth it. The camping permission slip office is well-staffed, but not much patronized, so the employees are usually off doing other things. Someone will attend to you though, and they will be friendly. Their first question, always accompanied by a worried expression, is “When are you going?” They always seem pleased when I wave my hand and say, “Oh, not until next week.” But I don’t see any reason why they can’t give you permission for the same or next day regardless. The tricky part comes when you have to pay at the adjacent window. Here it is really difficult to find someone quickly. But someone will come, eventually, and they will take your money and give you a receipt. You take this back to the first window, where hopefully they will be expecting you, and get your beautiful hand-signed, stamped camping permission slip to take with you to the rangers’ station at Toro Negro Forest!

Why not now get into the mood a little bit with a visit to the adjacent Botanical Gardens? This is another quite un-visited and beautiful place, and it is right in the city. Don’t be fooled by the near-full parking lot, those are employees of the nearby University of Puerto Rico. You can get McDonalds, or bring your own lunch, and spread a blanket on the grass in the shade near the stream. Then you can go on a bird-life-filled nature walk, along the creek through the jungle-gardens.

Try to count all the turtles, and remember, those gigantic iguanas are harmless, even though they appear to be everything otherwise.

I like to take the mountain route to Toro Negro. You can also shoot along the coastal superhighway before heading inland, but it is just so much more fun to drive the mountain roads all the way from the city. You start out by going down a street I drove hundreds of times, to and from work and Baraka’s school. At an intersection, instead of going straight, make a turn on Road 833. I was so surprised the first time that I did this, after all these years. Immediately, you exit the metro area and are in a forest on a curvy road, and you are heading up into the mountains!

So, leave the city on Road 833, and then take road 174 to the town of Aguas Buenas. Then get on Road 156 going west, and take it all the way through the groovy mountain towns of Comerio and Barranquitas (expect traffic congestion in town when school lets out). In Barranquitas, be careful get over to the famous and magnificent Road 143. Road 143 is also called the Ruta Panorámica, and it zigzags all the way across Puerto Rico’s interior spine from east to west (or vice versa). You will have a brilliant drive westward along this amazing road, and be at Toro Negro Forest before you know it.

Stop at the ranger station, give him your permission slip, and get him to unlock the gate to the road to the campground. Make sure you get there before 4 PM, or he might not be around. Pitch a $49 Walmart family-size tent and enjoy! There are six sites, each with covered dining and cooking areas, and individual spigots of fresh potable water.

The setting is lovely, with a stream bubbling alongside. It will rain, but don’t worry, that’s why the dining areas are covered. If you’re lucky, and we always were, there will be long stretches with no rain, and bright sunny periods tempered by moody clouds.

And if it just rains, what the hell. Bring a big umbrella and be one of the very few people to enjoy this beautiful rainforest. One good thing is that this is the tropics. You won’t get cold as long as you have a pullover.





In the near-center of Puerto Rico, in the mountains just north of the island’s apex, is the town of Jayuya. I became infuriated here once, while on a run for ice, milk, and hamburger meat during our first camping trip to Toro Negro. I was trying to negotiate the confusing, narrow, congested streets, and was so happy to finally find my way out.

But this time I was a little more prepared to get lost in here. I was ready to know a little more about what lies a just bit deeper beneath the surface in this town.

On the way down to Jayuya from Toro Negro, a few kilometers above on Road 144, you pass the township of Coabey de Jayuya. Here stands the house of the Canales family. This unassuming 1940s wooden structure is set in a beautiful spot, looking out to a field and the sweeping green mountainside. This little house was also the headquarters of an armed revolt in 1950, a little-told chapter in the little-known and ardent struggle for an independent nation of Puerto Rico.

Rosario Canales Quintero was one of the founders of Jayuya. He began living here in the 1880s, when the cultivation of coffee prompted people to move to this isolated valley. The town was incorporated in 1911, and Rosario was its first mayor. He was also a member of the Unionist Party, which advocated an independent nation of Puerto Rico. He and his strong-willed wife, Doña Consuelo Torresola, raised ten children here. Among them were the writer and lawyer-politician Nemesio Canales, and his little sister Blanca. It was Blanca Canales who was a leader in the 1950 revolt.

On the night of October 30, 1950, a group of about 20 men gathered at the Canales house with Blanca and her cousins Elio and Doris. This is where the guns were stored. Blanca was then 44 years old, a social worker by day, and lead a double life as a key planner for an armed revolt by the Nationalist Party, headed by Albizu Campos. The Nationalists had the conviction that an armed insurrection was the only way to get the world to take notice of the Puerto Rico situation, and begin to back the cause. Albizu Campos selected Jayuya as his secret planning base due to its isolated location.

The Nationalists targeted November 1950 to start the revolt. This was when the US Congress was set to vote on a “Constitution of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico”, which would change the status of Puerto Rico from “colony” to “Free Associated State”. The Nationalists saw this as nothing more than cheap window dressing to the world, an attempt to mask continued US imperialist subjugation of what should be an independent land. In this view, the US had illegally taken control of Puerto Rico from illegitimate Spanish rulers during the Spanish-American War of 1898.

It is true that Puerto Ricans were US citizens, made so in 1917 as a result of the Jones-Shafroth Act. But the main purpose of this act, honestly, was to enable Puerto Ricans to be drafted as US soldiers to fight in World War I. To-date, Puerto Rican residents can carry US passports, but cannot vote for the President of the United States, and do not have voting representation in the US Senate nor the House.

On the night when the group gathered in the yard of the Canales house, things were happening fast. Albizu Campos was in the eastern town of Fajardo, and had learned that his house in San Juan was surrounded by police. He ordered the revolution to begin, earlier than planned. As coquís chirped, the group gathered around the Puerto Rican flag. Blanca administered an oath to defend the country and the flag, with their lives if necessary (since 1898, it had been illegal for a civilian to possess a Puerto Rican flag).

Then they got into cars and drove down into town. Simultaneously, uprisings broke out in San Juan, Ponce, Mayaguez, Naranjito, and Arecibo.


Most of the cars turned left and headed toward the police station and city hall. Here they met with little resistance, once the police realized they were serious. However, one policeman was killed and three others were wounded. The post office was set ablaze.

Blanca turned right. She drove to the telephone station and cut the lines. Mission accomplished, she headed to the plaza, where the crowd was assembling. She got up onto a second floor balcony, and the flag was unfurled. Blanca then shouted, “¡Viva Puerto Rico libre!” and the Free Republic was proclaimed.

It took two days for the United States National Guard to arrive in Jayuya. Martial law was declared throughout the island, Jayuya was shelled by US bomber aircraft, and soldiers marched down the streets on November 1.

News of these events was curiously absent from the airwaves in the United States. When pressed by someone on October 31, President Harry Truman dryly stated that there had been an “incident between Puerto Ricans”. Blanca’s cousin, Griselio Torresola, was in the United States at the time and learned Truman had said this. Outraged, and desperate to draw world attention to the events unfolding in Puerto Rico, Griselio and fellow nationalist Oscar Collazo attempted to assassinate President Truman the next day, at the Blair House in Washington, DC. Griselio was shot and killed during the attack by White House policemen Leslie Coffelt, who also died.


Blanca Canales was sentenced to life imprisonment plus sixty years. Although she did not fire a shot, and was not at the police station during the skirmish, witnesses accused her of killing the police officer. She was also accused of wounding the three other policemen, and of burning down the post office.

In 1951 she was sent to Alderson Federal Prison Camp in West Virginia. In 1956 she was transferred to the Women’s Jail in Vega Baja, Puerto Rico. Here she remained until 1967, when she was granted a full pardon by Puerto Rican Governor Roberto Sanchez Vilella.

After the 1950 rebellion, a stronger Independence movement emerged in Puerto Rico. Independentista candidates began to receive more and more votes in the elections. Today, however, the Independence movement is marginalized. Puerto Ricans are largely split between the competing ideas of (a) continuing as a "Free Associated State", and (b) seeking full statehood with the US.

Through her seventeen years of imprisonment and long subsequent life, Blanca Canales retained her conviction for independence. “We have to keep working, even if it takes 100 years,” she said. She spent much of her later years living in a housing project in San Juan, phone tapped, under surveillance by a woman undercover agent. Of course, she’d always go back to Jayuya. She died there in 1996, at the age of 90.

The Canales House is now a museum, operated by the municipality of Jayuya. It is a delight to visit. The rooms, appointed in furniture and antiques from first half of the 1900s, commemorate this time period in Puerto Rico. There are exhibits and photos to memorialize the various members the Canales family: Rosario and Consuelo of course, Nemesio, Mario (another mayor of Jayuya, for a short time, in ’44),…and, of course, Blanca. The most interesting room by far, for me, is the one devoted to Blanca and the Revolt of 1950. There are pictures, including one of The Flag. Here, beneath glass, are her American Red Cross card, issued in 1950, and her social worker certificate from 1949.

In June of 2003, the portion of Road 144 that runs outside the house was given a new name by government decree. It is now called, "Ruta de la Revuelta Nacionalista de 1950".







If you follow Road of the Nationalist Revolt of 1950 a little ways down past the Canales house, you come to the Piedra Escrita, or “written rock”. This is a white boulder sitting in the river. Its top is covered in inscriptions of life-forms, vortexes, and symbols.

This rock is among the few written documents left behind by the long-gone Taíno Indians. The Taíno culture began on the island known to them as “Borikén” around the 7th century, and lasted up to the arrival of the Spanish.

Jayuya gets its name from a Taíno chief, or cacique, named Hayuya. Hayuya lived during the time when Christopher Columbus was welcomed to Borikén, during his second voyage in 1493. Hayuya was cacique of the region during the tumultuous period of 1511-13, when the Spanish had thoroughly worn out this welcome and the Taínos were in revolt.

The Taínos initially thought that the visiting white Spaniards were gods, and revered them. But soon the gods began enslaving and torturing the Taínos. Legend has it that, in 1511, Taínos captured a Spaniard named Diego Salcedo, and drowned him in a river to see if he would actually die. When he really did die, and did not resuscitate, the Taínos realized that the Spanish were not gods. The story of Diego Salcedo is well-known and often stated as fact in Puerto Rican history classrooms, but it could have been invented by the Spanish to raise fear and anger against the Taínos. At any rate, a wide-breadth rebellion by the Taínos ensued. In September and October of 1513, Spanish troops were sent into Hayuya’s domain by order of Governor Juan Ponce de León. They raided, killed all the people they could find, and burned Hayuya’s village. This type of thing happened all over Puerto Rico, and Spain’s enslavement, torture, and starvation of Taínos continued along with death by disease. Within a few decades, very few Tainos remained alive in Puerto Rico, a similar story to what happened on the much larger islands of Hispañola and Cuba.



The Taínos were wiped out, but they left behind this mysterious, indelible mark in the river. This bleached rock, with its swirling lines, faces, and patterns, represents stories…stories that we do not know...stories that we will not know.

Back in Toro Negro Forest, there is plenty to do. One of the best things is to take a walk up through the forest to the tiny tower called La Torre Negra. I don’t know how far it is, maybe two or three kilometers, and it is gorgeous the whole way. Nia Kombe-Jarvis, age 4, walked up and back all by herself (well, Baraka and I came along too). It is a little tower just the right size for a princess.

If you drive a little further west along the Ruta Panorámica, you come to Cerro de Punta, the highest point in Puerto Rico at 4,390 ft (1,338 m). The turnoff is obvious only if you know exactly where to look. Pay attention…it is a little road branching north at kilometer 40.

I dare you to drive up this road, right to the top! Believe me, you will hesitate, you will doubt that you can. But I suggest you do it anyway…I’ve done it several times, always in my little normal cars. I even did it once during a legendary Puerto Rican “aguacero”, or downpour, while lightning flashed. It is funny how this word for a torrential rainstorm translates directly as “water-zero”.

And if you want to go to the beach, just drop down Road 151 to the south! I bet you could get there in 30 or 40 minutes.




Sometimes when I am preparing to say good-bye to something, I find out that I am really only beginning to say hello. The other day I went for a walk, in another rainforest, up on the side of El Yunque in the island’s northeast (I have a secret path there, always deserted, even on Sunday).

On my way home, on a beloved drive on Road 186 through the El Yunque National Forest, I decided not to branch as usual onto Road 956 to drop down to the metro area. Instead, I continued on up through the forest on Road 186. I’m sure I’d been through that way before, years before.

Within a few kilometers, a roadside Lechonería appeared out of the woods. It was perched up on the hillside with a sweeping view of the sunset. There were a bunch of parked cars, and the music was playing. Three or four tables of dominoes were packed with people and in heavy play. The pig and chicken were cooked, and freezing Medallas were on special, 75 cents. As a brand-new arrival, I was warmly greeted and conversed with.

I went back there last Sunday, two days before we left. The same people were there, and they wouldn’t let me buy my own beer.

It was October 12, the anniversary of the day Columbus first made landfall in the Americas, somewhere in the Bahamas in 1492. This is celebrated as a national holiday in the United States and in Puerto Rico, on the second Monday of October.

Only in the last decade have we stopped saying “celebrate” so much when talking about Columbus Day; instead we we usually say “observe".


I wonder what Blanca Canales, and Cacique Hayuya, would have had to say about that.