Move!

So I've gotten fed up - finally and this time permanently - with the blogger platform. The updating in this annoying program is giving me just too big a headache. So... I've moved everything over to wordpress!


Follow me over there by email! Only downside so far with them is I can't integrate Google friend connect or discus unless I update to the "pro" version. Since there are only 3 of you following me right now, I figured it wouldn't be TOO big a deal.

So Ciao for now my lovelys!

Say Anything Brooke

Happy Birthday to Miss Brooke of Say Anything Brooke!
She blogs about nails, I love that she has this unique blog - it's something I'm very interested in.

Right now she's having a birthday bonanza giveaway! Check it out and enter to win some great things!

http://sayanythingbrooke.blogspot.ca/2012/04/brookes-birthday-giveaway.html#more

Day six & seven

I know, cheap of me to do two days in one post but the last two days not a whole lot happened. We decided to take it easy. On day 6 we had our spa day. We went and had massages on the beach. It was the most divine thing ever. Instead of a machine making wave sounds it was real. The breeze on your back and the smell of the warm ocean. Oh... pure bliss. It cost an arm and a leg but was worth every single second. I highly suggest treating yourself to it one day.
The last two nights for dinner we went to the La Toc restaurant. I wish we had found it earlier! It was the best restaurant at the resort. It was all local foods and they were prepared amazingly well! We're talking 5 star food, finally!
The last day we sat the shade of a beach hut. It was so relaxing. I think I did get a touch of heat stroke that day and the Burt's Bees "after sun lotion" is amazing. I've never found anything that helps get rid of heat stroke symptoms but rest - this did! It's so soothing and helps rehydrate your entire body from the outside. The only MAJOR downside to this day is that the ocean finally had a yellow flag again. So Mom and I went and relaxed in the surf. Well, while we were in it the waves picked up. So when I was trying to get out I got hit pretty badly and tossed around. I lost my hat, I had salt water in every orifice. I was still cleaning sand out of my ears a month later. I'm not kidding, I'd clean my ears with a q-tip and there would be sand particles in the wax still. It did clear out my sinuses nicely, but it hurt so badly. I don't know why people pay to have their sinuses pumped with salt water. Yes I cleared it out for about a week but the pain was excruciating!

It was a horrible trip home, we got seated next to the only kids on the plane and they were screamers. The one that wouldn't sit still kept spitting at my Mom. Stupid 3 year old. Not like he's going to remember the trip anyway. I was glad to get home to my bed and Spike but I really miss the crickets and Jim-the-frog. The warmth, the relaxing atmosphere...
Since we've returned home we've seriously considered buying a home there. The houses sit at about $40,000 for a local place, instead of the houses for Americans that are on the resorts which start at $550,000. *thhhbbbbt* I'd want to live in the towns and walk to the local markets if I were to live there. Not be isolated in a resort. I just have to find a job to which I can telecommute. Then we'd spend June-November in Canada as it's hurricane season. Not rainy season, hurricane season.

That was our trip, sorry it took me 4 months to post all of it. I've been running around getting things settled for my trip this year. I'm spending the next year testing out places that I think I want to live. Instead of uprooting everything, moving to a place, just to find out that it sucks to live there we decided to test out a few months in each place and get a feel for them. Then narrow down our choices from there.
We're in Nelson right now. I'm loving it, although the hills are quite steep which mean I would be able to ride my 3 speed bicycle much. But it's beautiful and calming.
Until next time,
H
The last of the pictures under the cut!

Day five: LOTS of pictures

About damn time right! ><'
I've been, not busy so much as lazy.
(Photo bomb will follow the diary entry. I'm tired of fighting with the blogger platform for layout. I'm also not putting them in any order.)
Day five in St. Lucia was our day out. We went on a tour. We drove around the west side of the island. Trust me when I say that the east side is straight in comparison. West side is mostly switchbacks. It was an interesting tour. It would have been better had they not over stuffed the bus. Of course our resort was the last on and I ended up with the jumper seat out in front of me. Like I couldn't move one seat up and then I would have had leg room? I'm not asking for much when it comes to leg room, I can cram in with the best of them. But the jumper seat, when it was out, came 2 inches further back than the rest of the seats. Making so I literally could not sit. I also had sunburn on my knees so the seat pushing violently into my legs was not fun. So I made the best of it (complaining the whole time of course) by kneeling and looking out the back window. [We were in the very back bench of the little bus.] This made for some amazing, clear photos of the island. It also allowed me to see things that no one else on the bus got to see.
The first stop was at Anse La Raye. It sounded like the tour guide was saying Ansillery the whole time, it was quite funny. It's a lovely little fishing village. We were told to stay near the bus and not go into the back streets... it was a little sketchy. That kind of was a bummer because Mom and I wanted to see more of the town, not the tourist shops. We met crazy Robert there. He started talking to me randomly. Looked homeless to boot. He has no teeth and made it very difficult to understand him. But I'm polite and smiled and nodded. He did tell me that he is 75 and has never left the island. Been here his whole life. He knew about Toronto and Montreal when he found out I was from Canada, but that was about it. There was a family of chickens in the road, very cute as there were babies with mom and pop. There was some beautiful handiwork on the houses there as well. It was a quaint little town. Oh right, the stilt house! Most of the houses in Anse La Raye are built into the mountain side. To make them level they built them out on to stilts. This not only helps keep the local animal & insect population out of the house but it makes it easier for hurricane winds to just blow underneath the houses without ruining them. Anse La Raye had the most amazing one we saw on our trip, the stilts had to be 3 stories high!
We stopped at a banana plantation. So amazing! The one we saw was a 1,700 acre plantation. Now in that 1,700 acres there are 213 farmers! It's not a corporation that own the place, which is nice. Bananas took over the sugar cane fields long ago and is the only good exported from St. Lucia. Bananas are really neat, they have a 9 month gestation period just the way humans do. The farmers will cover the bananas in blue plastic when they first emerge from their flower form. They do this to, not only keep out animals and pests, but to allow the bananas to grow without them ripening. The bananas if left on their own will ripen right away and not come to maturity if they aren't protected in the blue plastic. It was really neat to learn all of that!
We stopped for lunch in the town of Soufriere. It's the town that houses the famous Twin Pitons. They're really beautiful mountains. And the way the ocean hits them is divine. Lunch was local fare which I was overjoyed about! We had a lovely spiced chicken, dasheen and green fig salad. Dasheen is a local vegetable that is similar to sweet potatoes. It doesn't taste like them, but is kind of sweet and has the texture of them. I loved it! I also fell in love with the local hot sauce. I ended up getting some of it to take home with me. It will take a LONG time to get through the bottle as it is SPICY! You only use 1/4 tsp at a time. But I love the flavour profile it has.
Right, the first first stop, it was a very quick one for a view... The view was beautiful but the important part of it was that we got to sample banana ketchup and banana barbeque sauce. I bought both... they are amazing. Banana ketchup isn't sweet like out ketchup, or the name suggests. It's does have a sweetness to it but it's like a cross between mustard and ketchup... very unique, very very yummy! The banana barbeque sauce has a smokiness and flavour unrivaled by anything we can get here at home. It is wonderful.
We stopped at the Diamond falls botanical garden. We got to see a bunch of beautiful flowers and learned that most of the ones we were seeing weren't native to the island. *sigh* But it was cool to see a nutmeg tree, an avocado tree and the diamond falls really are beautiful. The mineral spring running through the place is very dirty and smells from the minerals but it was beautiful too. The highlight of that part of the trip for me was the board they put up talking about the devastating hurricane in 2009. It was amazing to see the photos of how everyone banded together to rebuild and how quickly they did it. During the drive late we got to see what's left of the devastation.
After lunch we went to the "drive in volcano". This is not what you'd think. The whole city of Soufriere is actually a volcano bed. So it's not drive in a cavern next to magma kind of volcano the way the name suggests. We had a choice of visiting the "drive in volcano" or going to the mud baths. We, and three others (out of 25 people?) chose the baths. Good choice once we found out what they had! *laugh* We got SO dirty! It wasn't what I was expecting. You get in this initial tub of water which is fed by the volcano. It was SO HOT. It hurt my sunburn so badly. You then get out and walk to this little stream and cover yourself in the mud from the stream bed. The stream is feeding the pool and is steaming hot. You then let it dry in the blissful sun and return to the first pool to wash off... Wash off. That didn't go so well. The mud does not come off easily. That being said your skin feels brand new after the mud. So soft, so supple. Worth every minute. The bath when we got back from the trip was hard as it took three times the amount of soap to get my skin back to the right colour!
The last part of the tour, which I took no pictures of, we rode back to the resort on a giant catamaran! We sat at the front and got soaking wet in the splash of the bow. It was so much fun! I couldn't stop giggling. The only reason we ended up leaving the front of the boat was the salt water got a bit much in our eyes. It was so nice to be outside all day.
When we returned to the hotel we got to our room and found that our butler had drawn us a bubble bath that was topped with rose petals! It was such a wonderful surprise!!

Ah yes, this day five was the 27th. That's my Dad's birthday. So in celebration we had planned to go to the butler only restaurant [at the grande ><']. It was also the night of the street party. Our dinner reservation wasn't until 845 (groan) so we decided to pre-snack at the party. OH. MI. GOD. Greatest food of our whole trip. It was ALL local foods. We had fresh crawfish, lobster, fried plantains, curries goat, curries chicken roti, christophene au gratin, pumpkin custard... I was in heaven. This food was so flavourful, robust, unique. I want to go back just for that food! Christophene is a squash like food that they cook coated with cheese. It is divine. We were both VERY happy we checked it out. Oh yeah, there was a steel drum salsa band playing as well - I couldn't have had more fun.

Dinner was... disappointing. As all of our experiences at the Grande were. We had to wait for the damn shuttle again at the end of our night. It was annoying and the food really wasn't worth it. Although it was neat to dine over the water on a pier.

It was a nice day to celebrate my Dad. We both miss him very very much.
Now, the pictures!

Lolita Cuteness

I've been following this adorable darling for a while now on blogger. She's a true blue Lolita and a great inspiration to me.

She's currently holding a giveaway on her blog: ♥ Like Candy Floss: A princess's ramblings

If you adore cute things like I do and are interested in the Lolita lifestyle she's a great person to follow. Check it out!

For Sherry

Day Four

 Day four (finally right?!) of St. Lucia.

Day four we decided to use our "stay at one, play at 3". On St. Lucia there are 3 different Sandals resorts. After our jaunt to visit the others, we picked the right one! We began our day by just missing the shuttle. And I mean just - like 5 minutes! So we waited around the hotel for 2 hours... it was so long! We had to stay near the entrance in fear that we wouldn't make it on the shuttle, that it be too full, or that we miss it again by 5 minutes because we didn't have a clock - we were on island time man!
This was the only day it rained. It only rained for about 10 minutes early in the morning just as we were waiting for the bus to leave! Then the sun came back out and beautified the day! The trip out to the Grande was amazing. We stopped in quickly at the Halcyon - very small, lots of old people got on the bus... decided to skip seeing it. The trip up was great because we got to see the island. We drove to our hotel in the dark so we didn't get to see much. The Grande is up north and you watch as the island gets dryer and dryer. It's strange. We got off the 1/2 hour bus ride and it's much hotter up there too. The entrance to the Grande is huge! Beautiful, but huge. We walked around the resort a little bit and decided that we were hungry. We visited the buffet lunch to find that it was local creole day! The best part of our day actually. The food was _amazing_! Got to try the national dish of green bananas and salted codfish, green fig salad, fried plantains... and the fruit. Oh god, the fruit!! There was so much fresh local fruit. Starfruit, melons, papayas, passion fruit... oh it was so LOVELY!

After lunch we looked a little bit more in depth around the resort. The beach there is very lush with brilliant white sand and the ocean? It's so calm there. We took off our shoes and strolled in the ocean, it was nice and warm... there were two docks at the Grande. One with a neat little Gazebo at the end, the other was were the butler-only restaurant: Gordon's was. But Gordon's is tomorrow's story. We meandered down to the end of the property wandering out of the Grande and into the provincial park. I saw a mound of sand and collected some in an empty bottle for my collection back home. Some sand from the north part of the island and the middle! As I was doing so some of the local taxi drivers were sitting near by just chillin'. One of them commented and talked to us a little bit - it was awesome. We learned that the Grande and the stuff near it was actually man made. The brilliant white sand was brought in from South America for the tourists. They had decided to join the old fort and the mainland and when they filled it all in they sold the land to developers.

We walked a little further in the park to the Atlantic side of the island. OH WOW. That was heaven. The sound of the waves crashing on the rocks was soothing. And loud! We had to have stood there for 20 minutes just enjoying the air. We went back to the public beach so that I could pick through the shells that had washed up on the shore. You see at Sandals they comb the beaches so that their fussy tourists don't tread on sea shells. For those of us that collect them it makes life very difficult. When I was in Jamaica we found that the best place for shells was on the public beach between my resort and theirs. I spend probably a 1/2 hour, 45 minutes just picking shells. It was WAY too much fun. When I was finally done we decided to go back to our resort and relax.
...
Not going to happen. We'd missed the shuttle by 5 minutes, AGAIN! Sadly the shuttle runs three buses every 2 hours. Not a bus every hour... *sigh* So again, we waited. I ran around the lobby taking Chu on a safari. It was fun, for about 15 minutes.
This day really felt like a whole day of waiting. It really felt like a crappy day. Looking back on it now, it was really great because it wasn't at home.

Dinner was kind of cool. I had mentioned in passing to Roger that I had stayed at Sandals last year. He set it up so that we could go to a special cocktail party and dinner for returning guests. We stood around talking with some pretty cool people from Edinburgh. At dinner we met a great newly wed couple from Kansas. After everyone at the dinner were awarded their special "I've stayed a ridiculous amount of times" game we got a free bottle of rum and a drawing from a local artisan. It was kinda cool.

Lots of photos after this! Keep going! All of Chu's jungle adventures and new friends. Plus the one thing that made our day really great!

After dinner we came back to our room to find a plate of chocolate (dark!) covered fruit with a special guardian making sure Chu didn't eat it all before we got back.

Minor Interlude

A minor interlude from my St. Lucia recounting. Also, apologies for falling behind on updating about the trip, I've been so busy and tired recently!

I just finished perusing the Maclean's magazine's school edition. The rankings are always interesting to look at. At the end of the magazine there is an article about women chefs. Right up my alley so, of course, I decided to read it to see what others are saying. The article is pretty good to start with. It talks about the percentages of women entering culinary school vs the percentage of women who are in the industry. The numbers are staggering for those not in the industry. Those of us in the industry see it first hand everyday and are aware of the numbers. Needless to say it was reaffirming to see the actual numbers to know that I'm not crazy and we really are a giant minority. The article also talks to a male chef about why this might be. Luckily he's one of the chefs that believes that women are fabulous and really should be hired more. I've had a chef like that - it was great. He preferred to hire women because we work harder and care more about the food. This article does say that as well which is great.
The article then goes on to speculate about why women leave the industry. Their reason? Pregnancy.

EXCUSE ME?!!!

Granted, yes, some women do leave the industry for that reason because maternity leave isn't the same in the food industry. A lot of the time if you go on leave, you loose your position in the kitchen (if you aren't an owner/head chef) or you loose your job all together.

But the real reason that the majority of my graduating class left the culinary industry, as well as the women that I've worked with, is due to the fact that the kitchen is a boy's club. The men in the kitchen, for the most part, don't want women there. They either feel that they're better than we are or they're old fashioned and believe we have no place there or they feel threatened because we're more determined and make them look bad, at least in their mind. Remembering that I'm speaking in a generality here - there's been a lot of guys I've worked with that are pretty great people but for the most part they act like this. The men in the kitchen do everything in their power to push us out of the kitchen. They harass us sexually - usually verbally more than physically although there is the occasional bum slap - or they're downright discriminate. They're rude, crude, irritating and sometimes incompetent to the point that we have to clean up after them and they get the promotion because of it. You know the movie "Waiting"? That's really what the kitchen is like. Granted we don't spit in your food or drop it on the floor, but the whole "game" they refer to. I've seen more male genitalia out of the bedroom than I'd care to admit. They make jokes at our expense. They make their mistakes look like ours when a supervisor is present. A lot of the time they get promoted over us. It just becomes too much to handle and women drop out of the industry. A lot of the time during our practicum. In Culinary school we have to do a 150 hour practicum in the industry. For the majority of the girls in my class that's what made up their minds not to continue in the industry after graduation. All of the girls graduated the program because they didn't want to quit half way through but they didn't go into the industry at the end. Out of my graduating class of 50 - I think 60% were women - 4 of us stayed in the industry. As of last year 2 of us remained. I'm out now due to injury not due to idiots. I was lucky and learned quickly how to fight back. The only good thing to have come out of my childhood being filled with bullies.
 For the most part any of the women that I know that have been in the kitchen for decades don't get pregnant. Women chefs are head strong and focused on their careers. We're hell bent on proving the stereotype wrong. We're concentrated on creating the best food we possibly can. We really don't have an interest in family. We have siblings for that. Most women chefs, there are exceptions to every rule after all, really just want to cook. That's all we want to do, that's all we think about. Executive chefs are so busy all of the time, we're on a 24 hour shift for the most part, that we don't even have time to think about children. There are people who want to have a life outside of the kitchen and so many do. It's just that the majority of women chefs don't think about anything but food. When they do it's usually later in life when they're ready to retire from 24 hour days and settle into a more stable work life. Either that or it's when they've discussed it with their husbands and it's paternity leave not maternity leave. Women do have lives outside the kitchen but it's not the reason we leave the industry. We leave because we get tired of the politics, harassment, long hours, and instability of the industry.

Thank you for listening, I'm much calmer now. ^.^

Ready for a day on the beach!

Day Three, St. Lucia
January 24, 2012

Woke up to beauty surrounding us once again. We ate breakfast and suited up for a day on the beach. While we ate breakfast we had asked Roger to set up a beach cabana for us. When we'd finished breakfast and were slathered in sunscreen Roger arrived to escort us down to the beach. He'd set up two lovely chairs, a cooler filled with beer, juice and ice cold water, we had towels and a pristine view. We laid down to enjoy a day at the beach. The flag was yellow so we planned on floating about in the water once the day warmed a bit more. As we waited we dipped our toes in the surf. Well dipped is a relative term. As we stood there the surf engulfed our feet and tore the sand out from beneath it. I didn't fall as I stood there but slowly sunk. Mom came back from a brief jaunt along the beach to find herself 4" taller than I - normally she's 3" shorter! We had a good laugh and laid down to enjoy the shade our cabana provided us and the warm breeze blowing.

Failed sandcastle

We played with the sand beside our chairs, raking our fingers through the soft grain. It was very zen and relaxing. Sure enough I drifted off for a brief nap. A gentleman of the resort came by and offered us drinks, we happily accepted them and continued to enjoy our bliss.

No more feet!

Then it was time to enjoy the surf for real. Mom ventured out first, laughing it up the whole time. It looked like so much fun I just had to join in. Sure enough, it was! The waves were gentle enough and the salt water buoyant. Just lift your feet and enjoy the ride. The tide wasn't very heavy that day so we didn't get moved very much in or out from shore but stayed in the same place just relaxing. It was really a lot of fun! Then when the surf got a little chilly, I exited leaving Mom giggling away to enjoy some more of the sunshine. Man did that sun shine! It was warm and soothing and I kept having to tell myself that this was January! August warmth and it's the middle of winter!

 We decided to enjoy the buffet for lunch, this day's theme was Chinese. *laugh* "Chinese." Caribbean folk should stick to their own cuisine, after all it's so tasty! The buffet wasn't half bad actually, the shrimp crisps on it were really addictive! Over indulged, of course, I mean an open dessert table and a sundae bar?! They were really trying to kill my waistline! I forgot! Last night we attended the beach party and sampled some local fare. We only tasted as most of the buffet for that really wasn't what we enjoy. But that was our first taste of the choux-paste swans, lemon meringue tarts and festivals. So of course on the lunch buffet we had to have more!

After lunch, it was a late lunch - just before they shut it down at 3 actually, we decided to take it easy and relax in our pool. Around 5 we went back up to our room to enjoy our balcony for a while. We returned to the room to find a wonderful cheese plate! We snacked and drank champagne. At 6:30 we went to meet our butler for our escort to the Piton restaurant. It is the Caribbean fare restaurant at this resort. Our butler sat us at a table adorned with flower petals.

Our drinks arrived. I had asked for something with banana. It was devine! Smooth, creamy... oh so perfect. We later learned that this was called "The BBC" standing for Bananas, Baileys and Coconut. It's made by pureeing 1 banana with a shot of baileys, a little ice and coconut cream. I'm excited to get some coconut milk and start making them at home!

Enjoying Mom's Champagne

Oh BBC how I love thee.

 We ordered our meal. I started with the ackee (the national fruit of Jamaica: a mix between a squash and a melon, very very lovely!) and chicken puff pastry. It. Was. Amazing. Such a great mix of sweet and savory. We shared a bowl of the pea and bacon soup. I learned in Jamaica that peas in the Caribbean are actually what we call beans. They're like a mix between red kidney beans and black beans, I love them. I ordered jerk chicken for my main, mom had pulled pork. This jerk chicken is the way it should have tasted in Jamaica. It was spicy and savory. Oh the flavour indescribable! I ordered the trio of desserts: a fruit cake, coconut ball (pictured, I don't like dried coconut so I left it), and a piece of spice bread pudding. All very good. So far that had been far superior to our meal the previous night at Armando's. Although the risotto was perfectly cooked it needed some flare. Overall this day was perfect: relaxing, calming, zenful and fulfilling. It was off to another night of sweet dreams. ♥

Soooooo full!

Day 3 Delays

My apologies, there will not be a day three posting today. Google's [insert copious amounts of swears here] blog system doesn't want to cooperate. Apparently it doesn't listen when you attempt to place formatting in. It doesn't listen when you attempt to move pictures around and won't let you do a [insert more swears here] thing with it. [insert a very large amount of expletives here]! Google once again proves how it was conceived by the minds of technical [and here] who have obviously grown up with the user unfriendly winblows and continue to want to make everyone else's life a living hell.

Sincerely and pissed off,
Me

Breakfast ♥

January 23, 2012
Day 2 - Official First Morning

Anticipating breakfast

We wake up to surf and sun! Last night when we checked in we were told to call our butlers on this cute little cell phone they gave us. We do so and meet our daytime butler: Roger. Silly me, never did get a photo of either of our butlers. He comes to the room so we can meet him and he is SO cheerful! Especially for first thing in the morning. He introduces himself and we start to get to know one another. He's so nice. He asks us if we enjoyed the crickets last night. We mention that yes we did and the frogs so much more! "Those aren't frogs." Oh? "That's Jim the frog." We laugh. This is very important - my dad's name was Jim. A very poignant coincidence. He asks us our plan for breakfast and offers to bring us breakfast on our patio. We think that's a great idea. We ask for assorted pastries and local fruit expecting mango, pineapple and assorted tropical fruit. After breakfast he promises us a private tour of the resort. When breakfast arrives, Roger runs off to get us some fresh coffee as the stuff room service sent us was not good enough for us. We were disappointed that fruit meant melon, which I'm not the biggest fan of. Turns out that all the melons were local and super fresh. I've never had watermelon or honeydew that tasty! Goes to show what it means for fruit being picked off of the bush when fully ripe.

Mmm... Breakfast

We enjoy breakfast - which was actually a lot of food. Oh, the Banana Bread was AMAZING. They do not undersell the bananas of St. Lucia. Let me tell you - a banana that's been fully ripened on the tree is like no other. They were one of the best parts of our trip!

The beach with a view of the bluffs - where our room was

Viewing the resort in style

Roger takes us on a tour of our resort. We see another group of people on a tour - but ours was private! Way cool. We explore the property, see the gifts shoppes, the spa, the different restaurants and most importantly: the beach. It's a beautiful stretch of pristine sand with waves crashing to it. We learn about the three flag system for the ocean: red - don't go in the water, it's too dangerous (a fact we learned about later but that's another day, another entry) yellow - only strong swimmers should go in & green - safe for all. The entire time we were there we never saw it green. It's not like Jamaica [where I went last year] the beach here isn't protected by a reef. Then again the whole resort is nothing like Jamaica. It's just so much more elegant. I felt the whole trip that the staff were just that much nicer and there wasn't as large a difference between the resorts and the rest of the island. In Jamaica you didn't feel safe leaving the resort. It's so desolate. Beautiful, but very poor. All in all I just enjoyed my stay with Sandals La Toc so much more.

 We settle in next to the main pool while Roger goes and fetches us some drinks. He brings Mom a Piton beer and Chu something pink in a martini glass. It was luscious! The flavour was strawberry and something with rum. It went down so smoothly! I asked for another one later in the day and asked about the name so I could ask for it at lunch. Roger wouldn't tell me. He said that it was a bad word and felt terrible saying it to a lady. Mom and I then nicknamed the drink the blushing bride. Felt it was fitting.

Mmm... so good.

While we enjoyed ourselves by the pool for a little while Roger went up to our room to unpack our bags for us. Yes, that's right. Unpack. ^.^ We return to our room to change into swimwear so we can walk the beach and get wet. We enjoy ourselves for the day finally wanting lunch at 3:30pm - well after the restaurants have closed. We call our butler and he brings us lunch in our room. We enjoy local mahi-mahi in a spicy hollandaise; with local fresh zucchini. Oh it was great. Again, so much better than the food in Jamaica. The food there really felt like it was shipped in frozen from Florida. Here everything was local and fresh. It was like night and day; making the food just that much better.

We then settle in at the pool near our room for after the peak sun to enjoy the outdoors. We dip our toes in the pool and decide it's too cold. So when the pool bar closes we're not sure where to get our drinks. We test out what our butlers and do for us. Sure enough our butler brings us drinks! By this time it's our other butler, Ficus. He's just as bubbly and fun as Roger. He's our evening butler. We have them from 7am to 10pm.

Smoothie Bar

Our first sunset

Getting ready for a night out

For the night we decide to visit the Italian restaurant: Armando's. It had a decent menu. The seafood risotto I had was actually amazing. It had shrimp, mussels and baby scallops (baby as in small) it was really tasty. I wrote in my journal that night that if I were writing on a computer my "!" button would break. The whole day was just bliss! It was the perfect temperature all day long, and all night. Perfection is being able to wear a light sweater and never sweat. Of course for my Mom it was being able to wear no sleeves at all. We have very different temperature zones. We fell asleep to another chorus of crickets, surf and Jim-the-frog. ♥