Many
people have been talking about the Forest Park La Marquesa located in Guaynabo,
Puerto Rico. Most comments that I got to hear about different people were based
on the extensive area with exotic birds in which you can enter and interact
with them. I wasn’t really interested about visiting the
park but because I was supposed to act as a tourist for a day for my English
class, I thought that visiting this park was a good idea since I really was
going to be a tourist because I’ve
never been there. Because of the literature on the internet that I previously
read, the park was mostly design to entertain children, so I decided to take my
little cousins with me. They are 5 and 8 years old and this definitely was a
great opportunity to spend some time with them.
I
planned on getting there at about 10:00am but because I was with two little
kids being punctual is almost impossible so we got there at about 11:30am. I
found it was not so far from home, about 15 minutes and the road were asphalted
and covered on the sides with a lot of gigantic and beautiful trees. What
really surprised me was that since you got out of the main road to go to the
Park you can see big signs announcing the park on every light and that’s pretty uncommon in Puerto Rico. Here
for what I have seen the government doesn’t
really worried about identifying streets or main attractions, but I guess that
La Marquesa Forest park had it signs because it was inaugurated just a few
months ago.
When
I finally got there you have to identify first in what seems like a main gate,
then you straight for about two minutes when you finally got to see the parking
lot for the visitors. The parking was really packed and I think it was really
small for the capacity of the park so I had to park in the very last spot and
for me it was not a problem but I was with two small kids that started
complaining because they were tires of walking and we haven’t arrived yet.
Like
a few steps ahead from the parking lot you get to see what seems like a small
office in which you get information about the park and other main attractions
of Guaynabo. Then is a window in which a very nice girl to which I got to pay
for the entrance. The prices were really affordable I only spend about $16
including taxes for me and my two cousins. They day wasn’t the greatest one because it was
really rainy so the girl on the entrance recommended us to take the cable
railway in the first place because if it starts raining the closed it, so we
decided to take the tour the way she recommended it. The view was really
impressive you can see the mountains of Guaynabo and even the beach on the
coast of the island. At first I was really amazed with the
beautiful view but then I got to see how high we were and I started panicking
for a second but then I realized that they cables were really strong and it
seems pretty secure. My cousins were really enjoying the
ride on the cable railway and I felt really happy and excited for them, and I
transported myself instantly to when I was about their age that I had no
obligations or preoccupations. The ride to get to the other side of
the park took about 8 minutes and then you arrived to a wood platform that
leads you to the aviary and other side were they kept the monarch butterflies.
They
have only one species of butterflies and it was the monarch and I get to see
the lab where they had different specimens showing the different stages of them
and it really surprises me, because I haven’t seen it that close. The
most impressive part was too see all the exotic birds flying on top of you, it
was scary at first because I am not used to be in contact with a lot of animals
but I must admit that it was one of the greatest experience I’ve ever had. The
bird that most capture my attention was the African gray, he was so intelligent
that can speak just like humans and his grey and orange tones in the feathers
were beautiful. After the aviary we took a trolly to get to small mountain that
has on the top a wood deck in which you can see the same view that you get to
see in the cable railway but the difference was that you had to take about 500
stair steps. When you finish looking on top of the wood deck you get to go to
about 3 different playgrounds for kids, so there was not much left for me but
cousins had a really good time and I actually enjoyed watching at them having
fun.
There’s not really much that I really have
an opportunity to see my surroundings but in there I really got to see
everything that was around me, including people, animals, and things that most
of the time I never notice like the different shapes of the clouds. I am glad
that I decided to gave me an opportunity to visit the park because it was
definitely not what I expected but in a good way. If
you ask me I would recommend it for people with small kids, because I think
that the most attractive thing of the park its watching the kids playing in
their playgrounds.
View from the cable rail way
Butterfly HouseParrot
African Gray Parrot
cockatoo
Jorge a visitor to the park
Sounds like you had a good day, Lianed. How did you communicate that you were a tourist rather than a local? What are the photographs about?
ResponderBorrarNice pictures! Hope to go soon!
ResponderBorrarI've never went there and I live in Guaynabo. I really want to go now, it sound fun.
ResponderBorrarIt seems like a great place! i'm going to put it on my list of places to go.
ResponderBorrar