Ghost Isle Brewery
17684 US-12Holy crap I turned 40 this year.
My birthday was in the middle of the week and my parents wanted to meet for lunch. I had plans the weekend after so I asked if they could do the weekend before.
We typically meet in the New Buffalo/Michigan City area. I usually find a place to eat we haven’t been to and hope it works out alright. That’s kind of how I roll.
Both my parents and I noticed a new brewery on the north side of New Buffalo on separate trips to the border town. I’m always open for a new brewery so I asked if they’d like to meet us there at noon when it opened.
Ghost Isle Brewery is fairly close to the I-94 exit on the north side of New Buffalo. The new construction restaurant sits off US-12 about half a mile from the Red Arrow Highway intersection. Read more…
Taco Bob’s (S. Westnedge)
1502 S. Westnedge AvenueSo, yeah, it’s been about a month since I blogged about a place in Michigan and even longer than since I’ve had a Southwest Michigan blog post…my apologies, but again, this blog is my journal so I blog when I travel.
It took a while to get back in the swing of things once we returned from Puerto Rico but we had no choice but to jump back in. Our plane got back to AZO at a little before 10:00 on Monday night and both J and I were back at work 9 AM Tuesday morning.
We didn’t really eat out much that week because we had eaten out a lot on vacation. I was ready to stop eating leftovers by Friday though so I ventured out at lunch time.
I really could have taken the easy route here and just walked to Taco Bob’s on The Mall but there’s a new Taco Bob’s…and I needed a new blog post. So here we are.
Taco Bob’s recently moved down Westnedge to the old Dairy Queen building near Westnedge and Crosstown Parkway. It’s right across the street from Happy’s Pizza if that helps for reference. This is a walk-up location with no inside seating but it does have something I don’t think any of the other Taco Bob’s have…..a drive thru. (Yeah, this was wrong. Portage Street and Centre Avenue both have drive thrus.)
Air Margaritaville (San Juan)
Avenue Aeropuerto, San Luis Munoz Marin Airport- Terminal B
- Carolina, PR 00979
- (787) 791-0300
- Website
- Menu
Alright. This is it. Last of my blog posts from Puerto Rico. If you’ve stuck around…thanks! If I lost you as I drug this out over three weeks…sorry, but as I’ve said many, many times, I use this blog as a journal so that’s why I blog about our travels outside of Michigan.
Our final day in San Juan was Monday. We got a late check-out at our hotel because our flight wasn’t until 2:30. Our car to the airport picked us up about noon and it’s only a fifteen minute drive out to Luis Munoz Marin Airport in Carolina.
We were pretty early for the flight and getting through check-in, USDA inspection, and TSA went pretty quickly. We still had over an hour and a half before our plane started boarding so we decided to eat at the airport.
There are not a ton of options at this airport but there was enough to choose from. We pretty much went for the biggest place with the biggest menu of bar food…it was also pretty close to our gate.
Air Margaritaville is an extension of the Margaritaville chain of restaurants. The Luis Munoz Marin location is in Terminal B not too far from the TSA check-point. There aren’t any walls separating the restaurant from the rest of the concourse but it’s pretty obvious by the change of color in floor tiles.
Below Zero (Condado)
1106 Ashford AvenueWe didn’t plan on getting dessert after dinner but sometimes it’s just too tempting.
We had just finished up with dinner our last night in San Juan. A few doors down we spotted a rolled ice cream place. We actually debated about whether we wanted it or not…mostly because we were so stuffed from dinner.
Eventually we did come to the conclusion that we needed to stop.
Below Zero appears to be a chain of rolled ice cream shops in Puerto Rico. The one we stumbled upon is in the Condado sub-barrio of San Juan on Ashford Avenue near Avenida Magdelena. It’s a very time space that’s marked by a very bright sign above the front door.
Cafe del Angel
1106 Ashford AvenueSo, we’ve eaten a lot of typical American food on this trip. That’s perfectly fine with me. I had some really delicious burgers and J still says she had the best pasta she’s ever had.
We needed to try some Puerto Rican food though. J and I both had a dish we wanted to try.
We walked to brunch that morning right past a place that had people standing outside handing out menus. We already had a plan for lunch but I grabbed one in case we wanted to walk back for dinner…..spoiler alert, we did.
Cafe del Angel is on Ashford Avenue right across the street from the La Concha Hotel. The restaurant has a pretty large patio out front with a bar. There’s an inside area that you get to by walking through the patio like area but it was a decent evening out so we just took a seat near the bar. Read more…
Casa Bacardi Distillery Tour
Carretera 165 KM 6.2- Catano, PR 00949
- (787) 788-8400
- Website
If you’re going to be a tourist in San Juan, there are certain attractions you just have to hit. Castillo San Felipe del Morro and Castillo San Cristobal are two obvious ones. The third can be seen from El Morro across Bajo Tablazo in nearby Catano.
Pretty much everyone knows the name Bacardi. Heck, when J and I first started dating, her go-to drink was Bacardi and Diet Coke. I’ve never been a huge rum fan but I do like factory tours so our last full day in San Juan, we grabbed an Uber and headed out to Casa Bacardi.
Desilleria Bacardi is just off of PR-165 in Catano, Puerto Rico. It’s about a 20 minute drive from San Juan or you can take a ferry across the bay which drops you off about two miles away. The main gate is guarded but tell them you’re there for the tour and they’ll let you back to a parking lot near the tour check-in.
Semilla Kitchen & Bar
57 Cll DelcasseOne more full day in San Juan. We still had a lot we wanted to do on this vacation but we also wanted to start with brunch
Our hotel had a weekend in brunch with Bottomless Mimosas but it was $50/person. I’m sure it would have been worth it but that really felt like a lot. J wanted Mimosas though so I started looking around the area to see who did the Sunday Brunch thing.
I found a couple of restaurants nearby so that wasn’t going to be an issue. The issue was actually picking which one.
I ended up picking Semilla Kitchen & Bar. It was a couple block walk from the San Juan Marriot Resort & Stellaris Casino where we were staying but it was an easy walk.
The restaurant is really kind of hidden on Cll Delcasse about a block off Ashford Avenue in Condado. The restaurant is around several buildings that are still under construction or being rebuilt from the Hurricane a couple of years ago. Semilla was already under construction when the Hurricane hit so they were in a pretty good place to get back to work and ended up becoming one of the first restaurants to open in the area once the rebuilding got underway. A hip restaurant almost looks out of place on this street but the outdoor patio and accents around the door make it stand out
Ocean Lab Brewing Company
7000 Carr. 187 RR2J nailed it. Leave it to me to find the brewery whenever we travel.
It wasn’t actually me though. J noticed a sign for Ocean Lab Brewing Company when we were walking back from lunch at Punk Burger Bistro Bar on Ashford Avenue in Condado. She thought at first that sign she saw was the actually brewing but it was just a sushi place that served the beer….but that did set me on the path to figure out where Ocean Lab is.
The brewery is actually just outside on San Juan on the outskirts of Carolina. Ocean Lab Brewing Company is part of Vivo Beach Club on PR 187 in the Isla Verde area of Carolina near the airport. We grabbed an Uber from our hotel. It took about 15 minutes to get out to the club. The parking lot is gated and there is a charge to park there. Our driver told them he was an Uber driver and they let him pass so he could take us right up the entrance to the club.
LaVerguenza Puertorrican Chinchorro
280 Bulevar del ValleWe didn’t rent a car in San Juan because we figured it’d be cheaper not to. We were pretty right on that. Uber’s were cheap. I don’t think we ever paid over $10 before tip anywhere we went in the city.
Most of our drivers were quiet, which is fine with me. I don’t always like small talk. On Saturday morning, we got a pretty chatty and knowledgeable driver who gave us a quick history lesson and pointed out some places to visit along our route.
We were driving up Calle Norzagaray on our way to the Farmer’s Market. He pointed out the La Perla barrio where the music video for Despacito was filmed then across the street, a bar he liked that had great ocean views.
La Verguenza Puertorrican Chinchorro is a multi-level bar on the corner of Calle Norzagaray and Calle Tanca in Old San Juan. The address for the bar is Bulevar del Valle and I don’t know if that’s just another name for one of the streets or what but that name doesn’t show up on maps….but if you put the address in Google, it gets you to the right place. Read more…
Chocobar Cortes
210 Calle San FranciscoSaturday in San Juan was another pretty lazy day. Our plan was to get up, go to the Farmer’s Market and walk around Old San Juan again.
The Farmer’s Market was pretty disappointing. We spent about five minutes there and moved on. There really weren’t many vendors and we didn’t find the street food we were looking for. Turns out, we should have went to the piers. There were several food trucks lined up there but we had no idea.
We started walking Old San Juan again just appreciating the old buildings and brick roads. It was about brunch time and I had accidentally found a place that looked delicious just a few blocks from where we were at.
Chocobar Cortes is a 4th Generation farm-to-bar chocolate manufacturer in Old San Juan. Their shop is Calle San Francisco and the corner with Calle San Justo. The building is a couple of different store fronts with a bar and cafe along street level and an art gallery up a flight of stairs. Read more…
SW Michigan Dining 