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The Legend of the Devil's Garita"
Centuries ago, Puerto Ricans were subjected to pirates attacks. For that reason they expend a lot of time guarding the island. The capital was and is still rounded by walls and castles. In this walls we can find several small towers, called "Garitas", were soldiers guarded day and night. During the night the Spanish Soldiers (sentinels) screamed loud between each others so they didn't fall asleep.
-One sentinel scream to the other: "¡Centinela alerta! (Alert Sentinel!)" -The other sentinel responded: "Alerta esta! (I'm Alert)"
Between all the garitas one was quite far and solitary from the others. It was located over a deep cliff on one side of the San Juan's Bay. During the night due to the extreme silence the sea produced noises like if spirits were mumbling to each others. A soldier which everybody called "Flor de Azahar" (Azahar's flower) was on guard in this solitary garita. The real name of the sentinel was Sanchez end everybody called him "Flor de Azahar" because this flower is really white just like the skin of the sentinel Sanchez. As usual, every night the signal screams between the sentinels were heard between garita and garita. But the night that sentinel Sanchez was on guard, nobody answered and the only noise coming out of the garita was the whistle of the wind.
The fear start taking over the rest of the sentinels only thinking what may happened to "Flor de Azahar". At dusk, all sentinels went running toward the garita that stayed quiet all night. Estrange was to them, when they found the rifle, wallet, and Sanchez' soldier uniform and Sanchez has disappeared without clues. The sentinels who were really superstitious starting to say that a demon surprised him and took him thru the air. That was it was believed by the Spanish soldiers and the rest of the habitant in the island.
From that day on, the garita were sentinel Sanchez disappeared is known as "La Garita del Diablo" (The Devils Garita)
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