That is not the road to Cartajena from the film romancing the stone, that is road you take to Abonitos Puerto Rico. I get this call, outta the blue from a guy I served with, ” hey man, you busy?” Holy shit, haven’t heard from you in 20 years, thought you was dead. “Na man, not dead, I bought a banana orchard, you gotta come see it, plenty of room in the villa”.
Where the hell are you?. ” I’m on Puerto Rico, just outside of Abonitos”. You know how you get when you are heading out somewhere for a vacation, you kinda get all kinds of excited, going on an adventure. The plane ride was shaky at best. Arriving at San Juan, paying no mind to the automatic weapons held by federales, found my friend. Bout 15 minutes from the airport, I see a bloated dead horse on the side of road, covered in flies. I’m used to seeing roadkill, but not horses. That road, 300 to 500 drop on one side, sheer mountain on the other, trucks don’t slo down, it’s narrow road….. very narrow . if you like mist, you’ll like Abonitos
He took me to a friends of his, very nice fella, offered me drink, a white looking, vanilla scented. What is it?. It’s Poncho, ” ok, what the hell is Poncho?. Well, it’s homemade Puerto Rican moonshine, he just dug it up 2 days ago. After 3 maybe 4 half glasses, coulda been 5, ohh yeah, the Indian was coming outta me. Just because I don’t drink, don’t mean I don’t know how.
There’s these frogs, they mostly start their racket at night, all night long, their sound sounds like ( coo kee.. coo kee). My friend was right, drinking the Poncho helps you sleep through the frog noise. I’d share more, not wanting bore you, I did want to share this, ever see a line a cars in the Am at a fast-food joint waiting for coffee or something to grab an go, 7:30 in Am, I feel a kick in leg, ” get up” were going for breakfast, apparently I fell back past out drunk on the ground from the Poncho, soaking wet from the mist. Drinking Poncho for 3 days will have an effect on you. Back on the road, we get line, here is this guy and his wife, they been out there all night roasting pig, people pay money get a plate of pig and a cold Michelob beer, just what we got as well, ice cold beer. I will say, that was some of the best pig I’ve ever eaten anywhere in the world. Reason I mentioned all this, here’s something you have to try
About his banana orcherd, ohh yeah, I seen it, laying on the ground, I didn’t know spiders love to lay their eggs in bananas. Lots and lots of spiders. Poncho helps to ignore the spiders.
Went seen a friend of his, he made saddles, beautiful saddles, his son of 10, maybe 12 was applying the decorative conchos, watching that kid reminded me of myself, tying lead weights on nets, sewing nets at the dock.
What is Life?
It’s a collection of memories