Puerto Rico Tourism Company | La Princesa

depar­ta­men­to-de-tur­is­mo-de-puer­to-rico

Puerto Rico Tourism Company

Almost as you reach the “Raíces” foun­tain, at the end of “La Prince­sa Prom­e­nade” you’ll reach the main office of the Puer­to Rico Tourism Com­pa­ny, a beau­ti­ful colo­nial build­ing paint­ed in gray and white.  Don’t let the invit­ing looks of this recent­ly restored struc­ture fool you.  In colo­nial times this was actu­al­ly “La Prince­sa”, one of the nas­ti­est and most feared pris­ons in the Caribbean.

The build­ing was con­struct­ed in 1837 and oper­at­ed as a pen­i­ten­tiary until 1960.  More than 240 pris­on­ers spent their ago­niz­ing days behind bars at “La Prince­sa”.  And many were exe­cut­ed by hang­ing right there.

After the Unit­ed States invad­ed the Island in 1898, the jail­house held many famous Puer­to Rican nation­al­ists includ­ing world renown poets like Juan Anto­nio Cor­ret­jer and Anto­nio Matos Paoli. Nation­al­ist leader Pedro Albizu Cam­pos also did time at “La Princesa”.

Today “La Prince­sa” has a beau­ti­ful­ly restored lob­by and court­yard, as well as mod­ern art exhi­bi­tions that you’re sure to enjoy. There are three cells at the bot­tom right cor­ner of the build­ing that were left in their orig­i­nal state just so future gen­er­a­tions could get an under­stand­ing of how mis­er­able this place real­ly was.

You can also find brochures and maps most­ly pro­duced by the Puer­to Rico Tourism Company.

Learn More About Puerto Rico

OLD SAN JUAN Enjoy an adven­ture through cen­turies of history
EL YUNQUE NATIONAL FOREST Explore the only trop­i­cal rain­for­est in the U.S.
LET’S HIT THE BEACH Have fun at one of Puer­to Rico’s world renown beaches.

Orlando Mergal buys all his photo equipment at B&H

Dis­clo­sure of Mate­r­i­al Con­nec­tion: Some of the links in this post are “affil­i­ate links.” This means that if you click on a link and pur­chase an item, I will receive an affil­i­ate com­mis­sion. Regard­less, I only rec­om­mend prod­ucts or ser­vices that I use per­son­al­ly and believe will add val­ue to my read­ers. I am dis­clos­ing this in accor­dance with the Fed­er­al Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Con­cern­ing the Use of Endorse­ments and Tes­ti­mo­ni­als in Advertising.”

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