RINCON, P.R. -- If you really want to help people in the Caribbean after the most devastating hurricane season on record, visit their islands.
Puerto Rico wants tourists to come back, and it is ready for them.
Its beautiful beaches are clean and the water is safe. More bars and restaurants are opening every day. The Puerto Rico Tourism Company says that 122 hotels are now operating. Some may be generator-powered, but they are open nonetheless.
The boutique Villa Herencia hotel in Old San Juan is up and running. © TW photo by Johanna Jainchill
In fact, progress is moving so fast on the island that the PRTC has declared it will "officially open for tourism" tomorrow, Dec. 20.
This is not to say that the island is not in turmoil. It is. About 65% of people still live without power, traffic lights still don't work island-wide, and many establishments won't be open for a while.
If you want to help them, visit. They need the income, they need our tips, they need our support.
"While progress continues throughout the island, visiting, especially during the festive holiday season, is very much encouraged because tourism is a vital contributor to the island's economy," the PRTC said in a statement.
The experience won't exactly be as it was before the storms. The popular El Yunque rainforest is still closed, there are many damaged buildings and debris is still piled up around the island. Some beaches are not nearly as wide as they once were.
But tourists I met on a trip there last week told me that overall, the experience has been as good as ever. At the Harbor restaurant on Rincon's beach, people sat around the open-air bar on a Saturday drinking beer and eating grilled fish as people lounged and swam on the beach below.
Vanessa Dejesus of Omaha, Neb., was there with her daughters and husband nearing the end of a weeklong vacation they had booked prior to the hurricanes. They didn't even consider canceling.
"I didn't want to turn our backs on them," she said, adding that she and her family visit Puerto Rico every couple of years. "They need us."
Dejesus brought an extra suitcase full of toys to donate to local children, which she gave out along with Home Depot gift cards. As far as the tourist experience, they were enjoying the island as much as they had in the past.
"We've had no problems doing anything," she said, saying they'd been to the beach almost every day. In places like Isabela, especially, she said that there was a lot of evidence of hurricane damage but that the restaurants and bars were open and the locals were thrilled to serve them.
"The media is only showing the most damaged areas and not what else is going on," she said.
Tourists at a scenic lookout over Crash Boat Beach in Aguadilla. © TW photo by Johanna Jainchill
Brian Page, who moved here from the mainland United States and lives near Aguadilla's Crash Boat Beach, also lamented the lopsided media portrayal of the island.
"It's still a beautiful place, the sun is still shining, the water is still crystal clear," he said. "We are recovering and we need tourist dollars."
Page and his wife swim and kayak here every day and say it's perfectly safe. They are among a group of locals that started doing beach cleanup before the authorities did.
He said that there is at least one activity that is even better post-storm: scuba diving. Apparently, many shipwrecks that had been buried under sand are now exposed.
Susan, snorkeling with her daughter in Rincon and happy to be missing the snowstorm in Delaware, said they had visited the nearby Bioluminescent Bay in La Parguera the night before and had a great time. She had some trouble finding a jet ski operator because some businesses were closed due to the lack of tourists.
Juan Carlos Rosario, owner of West Paradise Tours in Aguadilla, is one of those operators that needs people to come back to Puerto Rico so he can run his business. He spent Saturday helping to get Crash Boat ready for tourists and said he is able to run his snorkeling tours, fishing charters and boat cruises from Crash Boat beach. "We just need tourists," he said.