We headed deep into the mountains the other day in order to meet a woman who sells plants from her farm in Las Marias. We are planning on expanding our tropical flower farm business and most of these exotics must be found at private farms rather than in viveros (nurseries).

It was here that we could really feel that the hurricane was still only very slowly being dealt with (and the coincidence of name). The damage from Maria to Rincon was severe, especially at the coast, but in the mountains they confronted different issues such as landslides off of cliffs and intense winds in the higher levels. Not only that but it is much more difficult to fix the electrical lines through the thick mountainous jungles and therefore most of Las Marias is still without power.

We had to take a detour through the cemetery in Anasco because the road had washed out

A horse in the road is fairly common here

Huge boulders in the road usually are not!

A whole house had been engulfed in mud

And another had collapsed along with the roadway

This road was painted to, I assume, FEMA workers when Las Marias locals were blocked completely from the rest of society. The tick marks may mean the days they waited.

There is still such a tremendous beauty to the interior of the island!

We celebrate life! We will rise up!

When we arrived back in Rincon, we stopped by a little chinchorro for a drink and stumbled upon a birthday party. It was a perfect little Puerto Rico scene complete with lechon, dominoes, karaoke cerveza y tragos.

Lechon, lechon, lechon