There are many different ways to experience Old San Juan and get a feel for the city and it’s history. There are self-guided walking tours, guided night-time walking tours, Segway tours, museums and even a trolley. But, most of these can be less than exciting for those more active visitors.

If you’re looking for something that’s a more exciting way to see Old San Juan, you can get a tour of the 400-year old city from a different angle — on a Jet Ski. Aquatica offers a Jet Ski Pirate Tour that is wet and wild, and combines some history and a lot of fun. We did this a few weeks ago and it was a blast!

Our Tour

The day we went, we were joined by a young, honeymooning couple (Matt and Erica). Ray and I had wanted our own jet skis, but due to some mechanical problems, we had to ride double on one. The jet skis are large and can hold 3 adults, if needed. It turned out OK, since you can switch drivers halfway through (so we each had a chance to drive). They give you life vests, a brief "how to work the jet ski" talk and then you are off.

The tour we took was called a Pirate Tour — it was part educational and part just crazy-fun jet skiing. The tour guide/owner Ivan was a character. His "canned" patter throughout the tour, with his bad jokes and puns, made the "educational" part of the tour entertaining.

He had us stop a number of times during the tour to point out various historic features that we were passing, like the Capital, the City Wall, the Old San Juan Gate, the Bacardi Factory, El Morro and Fortaleza. He also used those times to take pictures of us, which when he showed them to us later, turned out to be really good.

Out Into the Ocean

I think we all did really well driving our jet skis. I was pretty happy just tooling around really fast in the bay. But, after riding around in the bay for a while, we headed through the inlet into the open ocean. That was something else!

Ivan said the waves that day were only like 3-4 feet high. But, honestly, they looked huge to me! We were jumping them — it was wild!

We couldn’t help smiling or laughing (or screaming) during this time, so we ended up swallowing a lot of sea water. At times, it was like someone was just throwing buckets of water in our faces. It was like nothing I have done before.

Amazingly, we all lived through it, too! Ivan mentioned there are times when there are waves 12 feet or more — I am glad we didn’t have those. But I bet waves like that would make for an even more exciting tour!

After our wave jumping, we went back into the bay and tooled around some more, speeding here and there. Now this water seemed flat and calm in comparison with the ocean! And then we headed back to dock.

Back on Land

All in all, we were on the water a little over 1 hour. It was really a lot of fun. And, just as Ivan had joked, the next day our leg muscles reminded us of the fun we had. But I would do this tour again, no problem. Ivan mentioned that, for people who know how to drive a jet ski, he offers other tours that are just jet skiing around (no historical information). That sounds like a blast!

When you get back to the dock, there is a fresh-water hose to use to rinse off. Then, Ivan takes you to their office to view the photos he took during the tour. Ivan sells the pictures on a CD for $25 for all the photos he took, about 40 pictures or so. We thought it was worth it, a nice reminder of the experience, so we bought the CD.

Ivan mentioned their 5pm sunset tour and showed us some great pictures from previous tours, it looked like a nice time to go.

Reservations Required

It was a lot of fun riding the jet skis, but it was not a lot of fun trying to book a tour. I tried to contact Aquatica a number of times over a period of a couple months — emailing, calling, and leaving messages. They never returned my emails nor calls. It took a lot of patience and perseverance, but I finally got through to a person to book our tour. And, even after all that, there was a problem with our reservation!

Here are my suggestions: Don’t bother emailing — it takes a long time to get a response, if you ever get one at all. Call. Often. I would recommend calling in the evening.

When you finally talk to them make sure you receive an email "reservation confirmation" from them. I never received one of those, and it turned out that they didn’t have us down for a reservation — even though I had talked to them on the phone, given them my credit card info, and had other email correspondence about our tour.

Luckily, we were able to get on a later tour the day we reserved, so it worked out for us. But it could have been a problem if we were on a cruise and we had only allotted a couple hours to take the tour.

The Details

Make sure you have adequate protection from the sun. I recommend a rash guard shirt to keep the sun off your back and arms. We were wearing waterproof sport sunscreen on our faces, but it still ran down into our eyes and stung. I am unsure how to avoid that problem because the sun on the water will burn your face quickly, and a hat will fly off in the wind/water. We wore sunglasses with a safety strap, which kept some of the water out of our eyes. I was glad to have them — lots of water in the face on this trip!

The cost for a single person on a jet ski is $110. The cost for 2 people on a jet ski is $155. They prefer cash, but will take a credit card.

They offer tours at 11am, 1pm, 3pm and 5pm. Reservations are required.

They allow anyone over the age of 5. Drivers must be 18 years old to ride alone. Drivers can be 16 years old with an adult passenger.

They can handle groups of up to 15 people, with people riding double.

For safety reasons, they do not allow cameras on the jet skis. Besides, you camera will get soaked and there’s the chance of dropping it into the water with all the bouncing around in the waves.

Allow about 2 hours total for the tour.

You can contact Aquatica at 787-531-3593 for more information or to make a reservation.

They have a web site, but it’s broken.

If you’re taking a taxi, have them take you to the San Juan Bay Marina, which is located behind Sizzler. If you’re driving, park in the Sizzler parking lot at the Route 1 / Route 26 bridge that crosses from Condado into Old San Juan. You have to walk through the marina work lot to get to the dock (kind of under the building). There is a bathroom located under the stairs near the SCUBA shop.

You can locate Aquatica on our Interactive Island Map