Traveling to Puerto Rico: A Points and Miles Adventure

Puerto Rico with Points and Miles

We just got back from our trip to Puerto Rico. I’ll detail where we stayed and what we did. Puerto Rico has been on our list of places to visit for a while. It’s so close to the eastern side of the United States, only about a 4 hour flight for us. And I’ve seen some really great deals to get there as well-in cash and points. So when I decided that I wanted to find a short-ish trip that took us somewhere not far away and that felt like a different country, I started looking into Puerto Rico.

To find out how we booked the trip using points and miles, you can check out my previous blog post here. It details the exact numbers so you can see what we spent!

Flying with Southwest via Baltimore

Baltimore has a large number of non-stop flights on Southwest to many places across the U.S. and outside including Aruba, Belize, Turks and Caicos, Costa Rica and of course Puerto Rico. If we can help it, we fly non-stop to avoid getting stuck somewhere so we were willing to drive to Baltimore for a direct flight. It takes the same amount of time for us to get there from where we are in Pennsylvania as it does to get to JFK.

We drove down the night before and spent the day of our flight with family. We stayed at the Hyatt Place Baltimore Inner Harbor and had a nice tiny view of the water. The location was really nice and walkable.

Day 1-San Juan and Rio Grande

Our flight was delayed and we ended up arriving in San Juan around 12:30am. It was a little rough on the kids traveling that late, but we powered through and crashed at the Embassy Suites San Juan Hotel and Casino.

In the morning, we spent time by the pool area (which seemed really nice for an airport hotel!) and then ventured into San Juan for brunch at Cafe Berlin and headed on to the Hyatt Regency Grand Reserve. It was about a 45 minute drive east to get over there.

Our room wasn’t ready when we arrived, so we were given free drink coupons and we walked around the resort. We got completely soaked by the rain storm that moved in (very quickly). Once we got into our room, we realized something wasn’t right. We had reserved a 2 queen room and had confirmed with the front desk 3 times that we would have a pull-out sofa. Our room only had a chair with the 2 queens. After 45 minutes on the phone, we were told that the rooms with pull-out sofas were being renovated so they were moving us to a villa. That was a nice upgrade! It was massive with 2 queens, a living area, kitchen area, jacuzzi tub and huge walk in shower. I was so grateful there was space for us to move into!

We had a dinner reservation at the Sand Trap for Top Golf and we all enjoyed playing together. For the kids and I, it was our first time experiencing Top Golf. We capped the night off with some swimming before bed. How we were functioning at this point is beyond me. We were definitely a tired bunch!

Day 2: San Juan and Pool Time

We needed some down time, but first, I had us booked for an 8am photoshoot with our Flytographer, Karlota. She was amazing, but what was I thinking?! We rushed to get to San Juan in the traffic and it was a bit hectic getting up in time and getting there, but I’m really happy with how the photos turned out. I really love Flytographer and the ability to choose a route in a number of cities and know that the quality is there. Use my link for $25 off your first photoshoot!

After the photoshoot, we rewarded the kids with gelato from Anita Gelato Old San Juan – at 9am. Who cares, we’re on vacation! We grabbed an early lunch at Chick-fil-A Plaza del Sol which was pretty cool to visit and see the differences from Chick-fil-As here on the mainland.

After that, we headed back to the Hyatt Regency for an afternoon of leisure and pool time. From our time traveling as a family, I’ve learned not to overpack a trip. We all function better when we have leisure time built in-whether it be a pool, downtime in the room or just not having anything planned and we do what we feel like doing. I know we won’t see all Puerto Rico or whatever the destination is. But we can always come back and continue our adventures.

Day 3: El Yunque Rainforest and Fajardo Bio Bay Kayaking

After a good night’s sleep (and really, they were all good because we were so tired from each day), we headed out for the rainforest. I didn’t book a tour. I looked, and they all seemed amazing. But I was nervous about the hiking required for the kids on the tours to get to the waterfalls. I found a trail on AllTrails that took us on a shorter hike to the Mameyes river and it was perfect for our family. It was the Angelito Trail. We parked on the side of the road and hiked down. We all wore water shoes and it was definitely needed. El Yunque was beautiful and lush and it felt like a different world from the beach/city areas we had seen so far.

The visitor’s center was definitely worth it for us-so much information about the history of El Yunque, activities for the kids, lunch and a short movie. They also had an art trail set up. We spent a good bit of time exploring here.

We needed some downtime so we headed back to the resort for the pool. The girls and I were heading out later in the afternoon to Fajardo for a bioluminiscent bay kayak tour. Bear was too young to do this, but I thought it would be fun for the girls and I to do together.

I booked through Viator with Pure Adventure. We kayaked out through a mangrove forest to 1 of 3 bioluminiscent bays in Puerto Rico-Laguna Grande . The bioluminescence is produced by a series of phytoplankton, which glows blue when agitated. It was such a cool experience! And then we kayaked back to the starting place in the pitch black. I don’t normally kayak at night, but this was definitely worth doing!

Day 4: Switching Hotels and Sunset-ish Cruise

On our last full day in Puerto Rico, we spent time at the pool again. We had a late checkout with my Hyatt status but we left around lunch time to go to La Parilla in Luquillo. It’s a seafood restaurant right on the beach and the food and service were outstanding. Check it out if you’re in that area.

We journeyed back to San Juan to stay at the Hyatt Place to be close to the airport for our early flight the next day. We got settled and wanted to do some swimming. The Hyatt Place had a really cool kids pool, which was maybe too cool because when we went down, there was a kindergarten graduation party happening and the pool was closed to hotel guests, which was a bummer because I booked that hotel for the pool! It was a madhouse there. But we were able to go across the streeet and use the Hyatt House pool. It was definitely quieter and worked out fine for our kids.

I booked a sunset cruise through Viator, hoping to capture sweet views of San Juan on our last night, but right before the tour it started pouring and it was cloudy the rest of the evening. So while I didn’t get those sunset views, we did get a boat ride, drinks, snacks and history of the buildings we saw along our route. The girls got to drive the boat and honk the horn which was kind of the crew! Pulling in, we could see the Hyatt Place and Hyatt House lit up in rainbow colors. It was like a light show and the kids thought it was really cool.

Day 5: Heading Home

We had a super early flight out of San Juan at 6am on Southwest back to Baltimore. Thankfully it was a relatively smooth travel day and the kids were troopers getting back home.

Final Thoughts

We really enjoyed our time in Puerto Rico. The sun, the warmth, the adventure-it was a nice reset for us. I’m so grateful we got to experience it and explore a new destination. But I love that we didn’t have to spend much to do it. By spending less on flights and accomodations using points and miles, we were able to say “yes” to other things-tours, restaurants, etc.

If you’ve been to Puerto Rico or would like to someday, let me know! I love talking about travel and hearing about trips that other people are taking so don’t be shy to let me know what’s on your radar or in your plans!

The world is waiting-go explore it ✈️

Lauren