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lyrical
lazyLeaving St. Thomas sucked. Big time. We woke up and tossed our luggage in the car, and sat down to enjoy our last "Wendy" breakfast, which included:
She was so sweet to print me all the recipes of the breakfasts, and even bagged up the granola she made (which I enjoyed back at home after Puerto Rico, thinking of the sound of the ocean...). We hugged awkwardly goodbye, wished both she and Doug well, and made our final return trip through town to the airport.
We fortunately checked our stuff and ourselves fairly rapidly through customs, and arrived so early that the flight an hour before ours was boarding. With the recommendations of the flight attendants, we took the earlier flight instead, after calling Cisco in P. Rico to make sure we weren't fouling up his plans for the morning. The flight was quick and uneventful. and before we knew it, we had landed in cloudy Puerto Rico.
After a long wait for our luggage, Cisco picked us up in his gigantic van (a rare, and hot, commodity in the Caribbean, as they are very useful for business) and drove us 50-60 minutes past three girls with a flat tires (yes- the guys got out and helped), past a fried chicken place (yes, we stopped and sampled), all the way to the eastern coast of Puerto Rico- Fajardo. On the way, I noticed many America stores and restaurants, including McDonalds, Burger King, Sizzler, and Chilis. Cisco also pointed out, El Yunque, the only rainforest in the Northern Hemisphere, and Luquillo Beach, the most famous beach on the island, according to him.
We finally made it to Fajardo, which was a quiet town with many bakeries and eyeglass stores. All of the buildings are made of brick and are pastel colored. There were iron fences around and over everything, giving it an impenetrable feeling. When we got to Cisco's neighborhood, all the houses were the same shape exactly, differing only minutely in color and some in landscaping. While the neighborhood held much charm, you couldn't ignore the burned out, ravaged car down the street, and the thin, hungry dogs running through the neighborhood aimlessly.
At Cisco's, there was a cute backyard, a washer outside of the house, and he had put up a hammock. The inside consisted of a small kitchen, two bedrooms, a compter room, and a combined living room/dining room. I'm sure by Puerto Rico standards it was VERY nice.
After changing and freshening up, we drove a ways to a town in the mountains in the center of P.R., called Guavate- legendary for its streetside lechón restaurants. Here we encountered many people on scooters, motocycles, and motorbikes of all kinds- all equiped with blasting stereo systems. Each restaurant seemed to have its own live band, competing for listeners with the pulsing sounds of salsa, merengue, and reggaetón. Everywhere I looked, there were crazier and crazier outfits, and the looks from the men were very appreciative.
Of course I was the only gringa walking around.
Walter and Cisco enjoyed there local beer- the Medallia- very much, while Mita (Cisco's wife) and I waited in line for the lechón.
Rather disgusting looking, but at the time it tasted great! Even better were the side dishes:
Here was the spread:
Starting with the bottom left, we had:
After eating and wandering around, listening to the band, this viejo came up to Mita and asked her if I was "Miss Puerto Rico" because I was so beautiful. They really fall for the blondes down there.
In behind the restaurant, there was an open field with wild banana trees. Mita stopped to explain to us how the bananas grow. Also, we spotted many stray dogs.
We ended up driving back to the house, stuffed and sated, resting for a little bit, and changing rifght into our bathing suits for our trip to the Luminescent bay! The port where we took a small boat to the lagoon was called La Grande Cabeza de San Juan en Croabas, Fajardo.
At 9:30, Captain Mingo pulled up his small motor boat and loaded us and some very loud, nasally-sounding people from New Jersey. Poor Walter, I tried taking his picture, but it was pitch black- he hadn't a clue which direction I was in!
He motored us through a long mangrove lagoon, under trees filled with large iguanas. I was scared one might fall on my head! Once into the actual bay, we immediately noticed streams of light shooting away from either side of the boat like shooting stars. They were fish! According to Mingo, the water in the lagoon was 3 times saltier than the regular sea water, and out in the middle where he took us for our swim, there were no fish or large menacing creatures beneath us. The bioluminecence came from the invertebrates in the water (see my link above) and if you put your ear to the water you could actually hear noises that they made.
Walter, Cisco, and I hopped in the water for a dip, and marveled at the glowing patterns we could make with our arms and legs as we glided them through the warm and extremely salty water. One man, whose rude comments had grated on my nerves through the mangrove part of the tour, contrived to bump into Walter or I at least 15 times. I swear, it was on purpose and I wanted to push his head under water for at least a minute to get him to shut up.
After about 30 minutes in the water, we rreturned through the lagoon, to the dock, and towelled off, before driving back to the house. Once back at the house, we showered and got into bed, exhausted from all of our adventures.
At some point that night, Montezuma had his revenge on me! I have never been sicker in my life- I must have sat in the bathroom for hours, shaking with nausea and dizziness. I'll think twice before eating all that food again- lechón might not be for me. Finally, I fell asleep, exhausted and completely emptied.
August 21st
THe next morning I woke up feeling not so fresh, but tried to rehydrate with water and put on a happy face. We headed out to a local fast food restaurant, where I tried to eat an egg sandwich and mostly ate three plain pancakes. Today we were going to see El Yunque, the beautiful rainforest inhabited mostly by tourists and parrots, apparently. For most of El Yunque, you can drive through. There are various places to stop and take short hikes, which we did a couple times, much to my roiling stomach's consternation. I felt my blood pressure dip a few times, but toughed it out.
This photo kind of gives you an idea of what I was going through.
Here's the view though:
We hiked to a couple waterfalls... at this one, when climbing down, Walter caught a bad one, and kind of rolled down:
This one we had to hike down about 30 minutes to, and the guys were so hot that they waded in the frigid waters. These people were nuts to swim in it- it was ice cold!
When we had had enough of nature, we headed back to the house to change, put on bathings suits, and hit La Playa de Luquillo for a while. It was quite beautiful, but not, in my opinion, as nice as St. John.
You could see El Yunque in the back...
We had lunch, which for me consisted of a hot dog and a coule bites of a rello de papa, Walter's favorite.
There were men walking the beach with ice machines selling piraguas, which are shaved ice with syrup poured all over it. Walter loved them, but they were too sicky-sweet for me.
Once the hot sun was too overwhelming, we again headed back to the house and changed for an excursion to Old San Juan. This city is both beautiful and menacing in parts- with sections too dangerous for even the police to traverse. Near the old fort, we saw this interesting old cementery.
Walter was entraced by the richness of the fort and its surroundings.
As the sun set, my stomach grubled, and we headed into the city to find some good old fashioned Italian food, and something sweet for the queen of the Sweet Teeth. We found a very funky new Italian restaurant, and enjoyed both the food and the atmosphere.
Capped off with this...
Dinner finished too soon, and we drove back to Cisco and Mita's house, lost in our memories. We had such an amazing honeymoon, but it was time to pack up our belongings and head back to the real world. Thank God for Mita and Cisco, who helped us explore a huge portion of the wonders of Puerto Rico. What an amazing ride it was...
irritated(I'm only irritaed because this is the second time I am writing this out!)
Okay, this morning we woke up a little later because of the crazy gun battle the previous night. After dressing, we went out into the kitchen and chatted with Wendy about the excitement of the previous night. Apparently, shots heard are par for the course, but Wendy did say that it was good that we didn't hear sirens. No sirens means no deaths.
Breakfast was delicious and unique:
After breakfast, Wendy snapped this very tired looking shot of us:
Today we decided to pack up for one last trip to Megan's bay, where we spent the morning swimming, cuddling in the water, and relaxing in the sun. By noon, we were tired of sunning, so we hit Udder Delite for one last Jamocho milk shake. We did save room for some leftovers, though, which we enjoyed on the porch back at the inn.
This little guy was very curious about what goodies we were eating.
The afternoon was spent lounging by the pool, resting in the room, then changing up for our last shopping "adventure" and trip to Virgilio's. We just HAD to pick up a stuffed iguana for DeShaun, since we failed last time to fulfill our iguana quest. Dinner was relaxing and scrumptious yet again:
As nervous as I was after last night to be anywhere near donwtown, we still had to fill up the rental's gas tank. When Walter was pumping the gas, I must have looked absolutely ridiculous, watching in all directions for any suspicious people. If I had to, I would have thugged anyone who tried to run up on my husband!
We drove back to the inn, realizing that we had to pack our bags and leave paradise- for another paradise! Although it was hard to say goodbye to this beautiful place, we had more honeymoon to look forward to thankfully.
accident proneThis morning it was such a gorgeous morning that I just had to enjoy it on the deck overlooking the harbor... after an hour or so, it was breakfast time:
Yum! We got dresses to take our day trip over to St. John. We ended up on the 11 a.m. ferry from Red Hook, and just chilled out in the car until we made it over there. OUr first stop was Mongoose Junction, where I just had to get my cocnut body cream from the Body Deli. I added a mint julep cream and a coconut lip balm this time to to pile and gushed to the owner about how much I adored the store- and she gave me a nice discount and held my purchases until we got back later in the afternoon so that the creams wouldn't melt in the car. We bought a slice of chocolate chip banana bread and an absolutely sinful slice of apple strudel at The Grotto Deli for our trip to Waterlemon Cay. Great way to start our day on St. John :)
We drove along the North Shore Road (encountering some road work along the way) all the way to the Annaberg Sugar Mill Ruins, where we parked to hike the Leinster Bay trail. We first passed the famous Trunk Bay, seen below:
Then we passed "OUR" bay, Francis bay!
It was a rather buggy, rocky 20 minute hike to Leinster Beach, and then we walked a little further on to an easier (i.e. closer) place to enter the water to swin around Waterlemon Cay, where we were expecting to see many beautiful sights- starfish, sea turtles, colorful fish of all kinds, etc. While hiking, we ran into this family who had alraedy snorkled around the cay. The father warned us about the jellyfish, saying that a jellyfish the size of a dinner plate had clamped onto his arm! It worried me, but I thought, "That would never happen to me! I'd see a jellyfsih that size coming from a mile away!" We finally entered the water in a shallow area, and while we were adjusting our gear, a small nurse shark about 3 feet in lenghth passed us by our feet. I should have known right then it was not going to be a good day.
Right away we saw many beautiful sights- colored fish like on this poster:
We started snorkeling counterclockwise around the island and saw a cool sea turtle about 3 feet in length eating seat grass on the bottom. It looked like this one, a Hawksbill turtle:
While I was entranced watching the sea turtle, Walter was being stalked by a 5 foot long baracuda!
I kid you not. Thank the Lord I did not see that myself! We stayed close to each other after that, and in fact, when I finally did see the large blob of jellyfish over my right shoulder, I smacked right into him in my efforts to get the heck out of dodge! When I was hightailing it outta there, I swam directly into a "school" full of baby jellyfish- all about the size of a large grape. Sort of like these, but smaller and more or them- they were EVERYWHERE!
At first I was okay, just swimming a little closer to the small island to avoid them, but they were even MORE of them closer to shore! We swam into deeper water, but they were there! As our arms brushed past them, we did feel some stings, although it wasn't excruitiating, I started to hyperventilate and I could feel my heart pounding harder and harder. It was beating so fast I thought surely it would bust right out of my chest. Much to my dismay, I started crying and freaking out inside my snorkel, until Walter told me, "Enough baby, you are okay...lets swim to shore...you can do it! Swim Jamie!" I swam as fast as I could, and it took us about 10 minutes of solid swimming for us to get back into shallow water and almost 30 minutes for my breathing to get back under control! I ran out of the water and sat panting on the shore, pulling on my clothes and drying off, while thanking God that it was only tiny jellyfish and marveling at my first (and last) panic attack.
On the hike back to the car, I felt so sorry that we hadn't made it around to the side of the cay where the jellyfish were, but by the time we had driven down the road to "our" bay, I had mostly fogotten my disappointment.
How could I not forget with this beauty?
Our bay was beautiful, practically deserted, and we wished we had just gone there to relax the day away. We did make one more stop on the way at a beach I wanted to check out, Hawksnest Bay. Truly gorgeous as well:
On our way back to to catch the ferry back to St. Thomas, we stopped again at the Grotto Deli for:
We also bought a few goodies to enjoy back at our BnB and picked up my creams from The Body Deli. We saw two cuties lurking around the Deli- they must have gotten lots of attention from tourists because they were very friendly:
Once back in Charlotte Amalie, we showered, dressed, and headed out to a local hangout called Bella Blu. We got:
After we finished up, we drove back to the hotel. As we were walking in, this guy was walking up the hill from town. I didn't know it, but Walter was watching him the whole time, but I didn't see him until we were right at the door to the villa, where I said "Oh!" and Walter, jumped, thinking the man had made some kind of threatening move towards me. We both rushed in the villa door and locked it quickly behond us, and then Walter turned to me exasperated, and said, "What did he do?" I laughed and said, "Nothing, he just spooked me!"
That was the second terrifying even of the day, but the worst was yet to come. I fell asleep rather quickly, while Walter watched TV in bed next to me. The next thing I knew, it was 2:15 a.m. and shots were being fired right outside our hotel! We heard several rounds of gunfire back and forth for the next 15 minutes, and then it quieted down. Of course, it wasn't really right outside our door, but down in the town. It just sounded like it was right outside the hotel. Another barrage of machine gun fire erupted around 3:30, followed by a deathly stillness, then around 4 we heard yet another round. I tried to sleep, but it was a nervous, fitful sleep at best. Th worst is that we heard no sounds, no voices, only a single dog barking. I lay there quietly in Walter's arming, while he lay there plotting what we would do if "something popped off." The thoughts of experience. Things never "pop off" in the small town I grew up in. Hey, thank goodness for that.
energeticThis morning, we were exhausted from our very busy day...but we dragged our butts out of bed for an amazing breakfast with Wendy! THis morning, we had:
We decided that since it was a "no cruise ship" day, we wanted to take a walk around town and pick up some ST. Thomas Virgin Islands Fire Dept. shirts for Walter's coworkers. We stopped there first, and of course, Walter had to pose with the piece.
After chatting a little bit with the firefighters, we browsed a bit in town, and we chased down by a woman over three blocks! She ran and grabbed us, trying to drag us into her store. I wanted to resist- somehow, grabbing me doesn't make me feel very friendly and eager to shop- but of course, Walter felt bad for her, and we ended up checking out her store.
When she led us into the store, there was one woman and one man, and the man immediately started tring to decorate me with this necklace, that bracelet, etc. He was actually rather repulsive- he had grubby hands and an eye that was dripping! Not to mention VERY pushy, telling Walter, "Your wife deserves this. Can't you afford it?" It was very insulting, but we knew that he was trying to prey on Walter's (nonexistent) insecurities. The jewelry he showed us was actually quite poorly made, and some of the "diamonds" were brown! Have you ever seen a brown diamond?
Finally, we were able to break away from slimy man, and kept on wandering through town. We stopped in this passageway named Palm Passge, and bought a really funky blue glass necklace for me, and as we exited the passage, we encountered a very strange man.
Thin, greasy, with shaggy blonde hair, maybe about 5"11", and smoking a ciggie, he said, "Hey, how you doin'? I heard that you were in one of my stores. Are you having fun out here today?"
What do you say to that? I immediately became nervous.
He went on to mention a few great restaurants, ask where we were staying, suggest a few fun activities, and recommend his favorite beach. Meanwhile, I am holding my left hand behind my back, wishing I were miles from there. The kicker was when he suggested we avoid a certain section of downtown- "Don't go over there, that's where the crackheads are. A taxi driver was shot there last night by one of 'dem coke fiends."
You don't need to tell ME twice! I was just wondering...was he one of the crackheads? He sure seemed like one. After we broke off that conversation, we took a very loopy way home, to make sure no one was following/watching us, and hurried back to the safety of the b and b. I ran through those locked gates and told Walter to "hurry and lock them!"
We relaxed a bit around the pool, and ate the leftovers from last night's fiesta, and took a mid day nap. This was probably the most gorgeous day by the pool! Much more relaxing!
Wendy had made us a dinner reservation at the Old Stone Farmhouse Restaurant, and we made our way over there, trying to catch the sunrise at Secret Harbour, which is supposed to be the best place to watch the sunset on the island. No such luck- we couldn't find it, and it was clouded over by that time anyways. By the way, here I am in my new necklace:
(please excuse the gratuitous booby shot- lol..)
Dinner was phenomenal- my favorite of the week:
The perfect ending to the day? Lying on the couch, chillin' with my husband and watching As Good as it Gets. Ah....
chattyThis morning, we woke up super early at 5:30 a.m. in order to drive over to Sapphire Marina for the departure of our day sail. Wendy had put together a yummy "to go" breakfast including homemade granola, fruit cup, and yogurt. We drove over to the marina, parked and stood in line signing wavers, applying sunblock, and meeting our tripmates. One lady looked just like Briggite Nielson, and kept sneaking away from the group with her obviously much-younger lover throughout the whole day.
On our way to the British Virgin Islands, we motored by some amazing homes on St. John. Can you imagine living in this "house?"
First stop for this powerboat was a stop in BVI customs, where we disembarked, hit the loo, and bought Walter a much needed pair of sunglasses. We say a family of two baby and one mommy dolphins! Here we are waiting while our first mate checked us all through Customs:
Once finished, we hopped back in the boat and made our way to The Baths, a geological formation that is absolutely gorgeous, and unable to be captured fully by a mere photograph! We took a bunch of photos while on this hike/trek through the caves, but these are all on our underwater camera. We had to swim to see them, and here I am just before I jumped in:
After the Baths, we stopped for lunch on Marina Cay, a small island where a fairly famous restaurant, Pusser's, is located. This restaurant was not the best food-wise, but had an amazing view:
Walter is loving it! Our boat is on the right.
After lunch, we had a short stop at a reef for a snorkel stop at Iguana Island- where we saw squid, a jellyfish (!), loads of beautiful fish, and a lot of beautiful coral and sea fans. After ths snorkeling, we were hot, tired, dehydrated, and really ready to go back to the hotel. However, we had forgotten the final stop at the Soggy Dollar Bar, the most popular, famous bar in the Caribbean. Its on the island of Jost Van Dyke, and frequented by many famous people including Kenny Chesney, supposedly. People pull in and anchor close to shore, then swim to shore to get a Painkiller, thus the name "soggy dollar." While we were there, it poured raina few times, but down there as in Florida, it rains for just a few moments, and then the sun comes out as gloriously as before!
After the Soggy Dollar Bar, we had to stop briefly on St. John to go through Customs again, and then made our way back to Sapphire Marina. Since we happened to be going by the St. Thomas dairy again, we made a quick pitstop for another delicious milkshake from Udder Delite:
Please excuse my very messy appearance.
We went back to the villa and showered and changed for one of our favorite restaurants, Craig and Sally's. On our drive over to Frenchtown, we really noticed how everyone was STARING into our car. In Massachuesetts, we all sort of ignore each other. I guess we were interesting looking. We also heard alot of people making animal noises...and we wondered, were they signalling each other? I kept my car windows rolled up after that. It made me nervous!
For dinner, we had:
After that meal, we HAD to hit the hay- but not after we decided to cancel our second day trip that we had planned for Friday. The day sail is great for one day, but it is a LONG day on the water. Tomorrow...a relaxing day, we hoped...
brightThis morning, we woke up early yet again, but how can you dislike waking up early in this paradise? I think if I lived on St. Thomas, I'd be an enthusiastic early riser everyday! Breakfast was amazing, yet again:
We dressed in our favorite beach gear and headed to Megan's Bay for the morning. It was only a little crowded with cruise ship passengers, but we found a nice spot in the shade to relax. Several people congratulated us on being newly married, mostly because everywhere we went, Walter was telling people!
After an hour and a half, we left and stopped at Udder Delite, a St. Thomas dairy for a delicious milkshake. We got a virgin Jamocho- chocolate and coffee ice cream together (normally people order it alcoholic with Kahlua). That thing was amazing!
Coki Beach... normally it doesn't look like this, but here it is:
Probably the best snorkeling at any of the beaches on St. Thomas can be found here. Walter bought a million dog biscuits and fed them to huge schools of fish. Predictably, I stayed far away. He made friends with this group of young Brits, who asked him all kinds of questions about American rap.
We left Coki after two hours mostly because Walter was starving! While on the way back, my car loan company called my cell about a mixup with my pyaments- I was like, "Dude, I am on my honeymoon. I'm not dealing with this right now!" They were so pushy and annoying!
The Shipwreck Tavern in Havensight (near the cruise ship dock) had great burgers last time we went, but this time our burgery was burnt to a crisp (we asked for medium well). Our appetizer platter was great though! No pics of that food...sorry :)
After lunch, we headed back to Bellvista to shower and relax before dinner. Only one day did we share that bed and breakfast, and the couple we shared it with stayed maybe 12 hours total, so that was nice. We met them relaxing by the pool, then got ready for dinner at Oceana, which incidentally was closing for the season the following day! We got there just in time! Great atmosphere and great food...not to mention great service. We had:
After that mega meal, we needed sleep, so we headed back to Bellavista for an early night- day sail tomorrow starting at 7:30 a.m.!
hungryThis morning, I randomly woke up at 6:40. Guess I wasn't in vacation mode quite yet! Walter and I showered and dressed, meeting Wendy in the kitchen for tea and breakfast around 9:30. First, we did a little exploring, and here's what we saw:
Gorgeous, huh? Breakfast (because you know how much I love my food) was fantastic. We had:
Here we are enjoying everything thoroughly:
The food looked decadent, and it was- decadent-tasting, but nice and light in the belly!
After breakfast, we walked down to town to shop a bit. For some reason, I decided I wanted a fancy watch- to match my new wedding bling! We encountered some very interesting sights:
I ended up buying a Citizen watch with 28 diamonds, and of course, was draped with all other manner of bracelets, necklaces, and earrings in order to get a "combined bargain." It was fun, but lets get real. Here's my new watch (and my new wedding band!):
After shopping, we walked up this mammoth hill and swam and relaxed by the pool, before dressing and getting ready for dinner at our favorite St. Thomas restaurant, Virgilio's. We had an absolutely amazing dinner, including:
Here we are enjoying everything:
After dinner, we hit the Pueblo for Doritos, wheat thins, and peanut m+ms- all the vacation foods you need! We then hung out in the living room and watched the pre-season game of the Vikings verses Raiders...and the Raiders won! Time for bed...
chattyWe had to haul ass to the airport this morning after hastily showering, packing up the car, depositing wedding gifts so that we had enough money to enjoy our honeymoon, and snatching a quick bite to eat. I was still suffering from some unknown stomach ailment, so a quick stop to a B King and a couple tablets of Pepto from my ever-so-prepared ex-boyscout leader father was a must. Fortunately, by the time we got to the airport I was feeling much more like myself.
We ended up waiting over an hour in line in the International flight section (because we were flying through P. Rico- which confused me as P.R. is a U.S. territory)... but I noticed the "Just Married" flip flops on a girl behond us in line, and we had fun talking shop with them.
Mistakenly, we thought we weren't allowed any Ipods or cell phones, so we ended up buying $30 worth of magazines (some of which I STILL haven't read) and sitting for over an hour waiting for our flight to leave. Most irritatingly, we noticed EVERYONE had their cells and Ipods on. We had to listen to announcement after announcement: "Do not bring any water or liquids on to the plane. Liquids of any kind will be confiscated."
Of course, two rows in front of us we had some bonehead gulping a bottle of water right in front of a flight attendant and laughing! The F.A. was not impressed, saying firmly, "I don't find this funny, sir! You are violating a federal regulation," or something like that. He had that bottle snatched away as quick as can be, although he did put up a bit of a fight. I was so surprised they didn't kick his ass off the plane!
We were so hungry, we committed a fatal error- we bought the $4 "Snack Pack" from the flight attendants, which consisted of a slippery summer sausage, a few water crackers, a flavorless, highly-processed cheese, the most delicious Lorna Doone cookies I have ever eaten, some rather tasty mixed nuts, and some dried fruit (which I skipped, giving my intestinal peculiarities). Not the most hunger-relieving combination.
We finally arrived in Puerto Rico, having bth slept through most of the in-flight movie, Over the Hedge. Unfortunately, we ended up waiting yet again, as our flight was somewhat late. Going on that midget-sized plane to St. Thomas was half a relioef, half a nerve-wracking situation. Those things feel like you are on a school bus, rather than a nice, large, sturdy-feeling jet.
In St. Thomas, we breezed through the rental car line, snatched up our luggage, and drove through the town towards the Bellavista Bed and Breakfast! We met the owner/innkeeper, Wendy, who is as nice as they come, and she showed us to our rooms so we could change. While we got ready, she made us a dinner reservation at one of the only restaurants open on Sundays in the off-season, the Banana Tree Grille. We had an amazing Bushwacker and Strawberry Daquari, with a yummy salad and Tuscan loaf to start, followed by "chicken under a brick" for me and "grouper tower" for Walt. Dessert was on the house- very dry brownies (they need me to bake) and ice cream.
Here is Wally enjoying both drinks:
And both of us- see how the room was all open? This is why Walt needed his bug spray. Incidentally, this is my "2nd wedding dress."
And here's what we came back to! Ah, paradise!
celebratoryMy first morning as a wife. Of course, it hadn't sunk in yet. We woke up, showered, and changed for the beach. Breakfast was amazing yet again- creme bruleé French toast, bacon, and Kashi cereal with green tea. I wish I could eat that every morning.
Around 11 we headed out to P town for our beach trip with Tim. Traffic was horrific, but eventually he got us all out there on the beach (it was 4WD accessible only, so we took turns getting shuttled out there). Mostly I just remember laying there, talking to Santa's daughter Pinnie, and EATING! I ate EVERYTHING! After three days of nerve-induced starvation, I was ready to get back to my normal self.
Walter, of course, spent most of the time fishing.
Coming off the beach was somewhat easier. We drove back to Orleans, changed and cleaned up, and headed to dinner at The Beacon.
Note how Sarah and I look like twins!
I had some weird scallop and past dish- not too yummy, actually. My scallop and bacon appetizer was amazing though! We headed back to the hotel earlier than the rest of my family because we had to completely repack our bags to make it through the airport screenings! My carry-on was full of toiletries (lotions, LIQUIDS, etc), so that had to be checked.
After re-packing and opening some of our wedding gifts, we came downstairs to eat up the top tier of our wedding cake (nothing repulsed me more that eating a YEAR-OLD wedding cake- EW!) and check out some of the pics that had been taken thus far. Time for bed because we had to get up and leave for 7 in order to make it to our plane!
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