“San Juan isn’t known for its restraint, but La Concha is as over-the-top as they come: a nonstop beach party in the guise of a hotel.”
DETAILS, DETAILS: La Concha Beach Resort 1077 Ashford Ave., San Juan (787) 721-7500 laconcharesort.com Hotel El Convento 100 Cristo St., Old San Juan (787) 723-9020 elconvento.com La Taberna Lupulo 151 Calle San Sebastian, San Juan (787) 721-3772 facebook.com/tabernalupulo JetBlue flies direct from Logan to San Juan's Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport several times daily. (800) 538-2583 jetblue.com
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<<< CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS PAGE First, the new: Sure, La Concha’s rooms are sleek and polished, with all-white furniture, cloud-soft beds, and drop-dead views of the ocean from its balconies. But the heart of the hotel is the lobby, which bleeds off into a casino on one side and into the terraced pool area on the other. The lobby is all-white too, with leather banquettes for lounging and a bar in the center. In the afternoon, it’s filled with women in fulllength ball gowns and men in pressed linen shirts. As dusk hits, a DJ sets up shop and begins spinning pounding drum and bass, and the lights dim except for undulating fluorescent colors on the ceiling. In the past few years, the hotel lobbies of the high-rises in Condado and the nearby neighborhood of Isla Verde have become the center of San Juan’s nightlife, with La Concha the center of the center. Women in four-inch stilettos and microskirts begin filling in alongside men with muscles bulging out of their T-shirts (and the odd feckless tourist thrown into the mix). Waitresses in white bring cocktails and $16 sushi rolls to guests, and it’s not long before couples are dancing in the middle of the lobby, or stealing off to find a quiet corner in the dimly lit pool area. It’s worth it to stay up late watching them all, as we did, and then recover the next morning with a couple of lounge chairs on the abutting white-sand beach, one of Puerto Rico’s nicest (which is a little like saying one of Monet’s Water Lilies is one of his prettiest paintings). The next afternoon, we cross the city to a second hotel— El Convento—and find a scene that couldn’t be more different. Coincidentally, another wedding is getting out, this one at the cathedral next door. The bride is dressed demurely in a flowing white gown draped around her feet, while bridesmaids in purple strapless dresses and sensible heels stand by. They stride into the hotel for the reception, crossing black-and-white tile floors past potted palms, antique wooden chairs with backs of tooled leather, and a gigantic faded tapestry depicting Columbus departing for the New World (the explorer first sighted Puerto Rico on his second expedition in 1493). As its name suggests, El Convento is located within a 359-yearold convent building, which seems more museum than hotel. In its own way, El Convento is the heart of Old San Juan as much as La Concha is the heart of new San Juan. Inside, live piano and muted trumpet play while tuxedoed waiters circulate in a giant open-air courtyard ringed with darkened balconies above. Rooms here are just as romantic as the rest of the hotel, all of them individually decorated with exposed mahogany beams and antique Spanish furniture. While it may not have the kind of sublimely excessive nightlife of La Concha, El Convento has its own version: an allyou-can-drink wine and cheese reception every evening at 6, and a 24-hour plunge pool and Jacuzzi located on a balcony overlooking San Juan bay and the old city walls, studded with the city’s trademark sentry boxes. It all overlooks Paseo de la Princesa, a pedestrian street beneath the city walls that bustles with street performers and puertoriqueños of all ages, who pull up chairs at outdoor cafes. Walking past them, we stumble across La Taberna Lupulo, a cheery beer bar that spills out under Christmas lights into the plaza next door. Inside, the high ceilings and dark wood interior seem ageless, but the DJ set up with a laptop in the corner spinning highenergy remixes of Latin jazz and R&B injects a note of modernity… as does the beer list, a multi-page affair full of the best American craft brewers and rows of Belgian varieties. Taking a seat, we lean back and drink in the scene, musing that while sometimes we may prefer Old, and sometimes New, it’s always best when the two blend seamlessly together.