Cueva Ventana – Spectacular sight !

Cueva Ventana is one of the most beautiful place and must visit site in Puerto Rico. This was not in our original checklist and was an accidental internet search during our stay in San Juan, PR. Thanks to the forums and people who shared their experiences about this place that triggered an interest to visit this place.

Cueva Ventana is also known as Window Cave that resembles the shape of a window overlooking the most beautiful Arecibo valley. The cave is located in Arecibo that is very close to two other attractions in this area : Rio Camuy cave park and Arecibo observatory tower. Rio Camuy is an underground cave tour that is similar to any other caverns but cannot beat the Window Caves experience. The Arecibo observatory tower is supposed to be the world’s largest single-dish telescope

How do I get to Window Cave ?
It’s very easy to get lost in Puerto Rico. Our GPS never had right directions including google maps. We got lost multiple times and stopped using GPS at one point. The local maps and getting help from gas stations helped to reach many attractions within Puerto Rico.This cave is located on Route 10 – If you are travelling towards northwest direction on PR-22, take PR-10 route and you should be hitting the Cueva Ventana within 15 minutes. The site entrance is right next to Texaco gas station on the left side. This is managed by a private owner and you’ll see the ticket counter right next to the gas station. There is also a free parking space that you can leverage which is near the entrance of the gas station.

Entrance fee
The fee is slightly higher than what we expected. It’s 10$ for local Puerto Rican residents and 20$ for outside states. The 20$ cost comes with a helmet, flashlight along with a tour guide. You will also need to fill a waiver at the entrance for all individuals hiking the cave.

What is the hike time?
The hike is ~20 minutes and the trails are pretty easy to hike. From the entrance to the tour meeting place, it’s less than 10 minutes where you collect your gadgets from your guide and the tour starts from there.

Cueva Ventana is the cave on the left and there are steps that you need to climb down to experience the inside of the cave. Once you climb down, the tour guide hands over the flashlight and navigates you into the cave. The tour is less than 15 minutes and as you walk through, the guide narrates the history and formation of the caves, life of bats inside the caves and you’ll need to keep the flashlight pointed down all the time. It’s pitch dark and pointing the flashlight towards the ceiling disturbs the bats. The pathway to the window cave has small tunnels and I kept asking myself ‘When do I get to see the window? :-)”. I was looking for the passage of light and as we entered the final section of the tour, I observed the light filling up the place where we were heading towards. It’s such a spectacular view of the valley !!.

This is one place that matched the same expectations I read about it in the forums. Cueva Ventana is definitely one of my favorite attraction and worth the visit.