Amazing what a difference a 70-mile channel will make. We've been in Puerto Rico since Monday morning and it's like night and day between here and the Dominican Republic. There we had donkey-drawn carts in the capitol city; here we have freeways, endless fast-food outlets, and mall after mall after mall. Puerto Rico might as well be the 51rst state as it's already just like the states here. Yesterday, for instance, we drove to the suburbs of San Juan to find a CompUSA, since we needed expert assistance with Maryann's Macbook Pro (slight case of salt water intrusion when it rolled off the dinghy dock in Luperon). We zipped across the island on a major freeway, ending up in a mall that was indistinguishable from those in the states, though with a bit more Spanish. We shopped at a Costco along the way and ate at a Chilis. It's nice to be back in the land of decent infrastructure (nice roads, ubiquitous ATMs, credit-card accepting establishments, good cell-phone coverage, etc), but we also feel we've kind of dropped out of the cruising life for a bit - or maybe returned to what we experience on the east coast of the US. Of course, we're still in shorts and tshirts and it's the middle of March, so that's nice.

The guy at CompUSA opened the laptop, only to discover extensive corrosion. Even a few drops of salt water do a number on electrical components! We managed to save the hard drive, so no data was lost. We also saved the RAM, but otherwise everything inside was toast.

We ended up replacing the laptop at a considerable discount, but I'll let Maryann tell that story.