Woke up
early Tuesday morning and watched the sunrise while sitting on our deck. Well, not really a sunrise – we face west,
and, as we all learned, the sun continues to pretty rise in the east. But, as the sun rose over the mountain, it
was pretty to watch the water, palm trees, and gardens go from shade to sunshine.
The view isn’t
any less spectacular the second day. As
Anne called it – it’s too perfect. The
islands, including the mountains of Tortola, across the channel. The palm trees, framing the view from the
villa. The pool reflecting the palm
trees. The brilliantly bright blue water. The sailboats lazily circumnavigating the
channel. The occasional powerboat
zipping through. The small plane, that
causes us to shout “Da Plane, boss, da plane!”
Carol noted that Corona blew it – this beach is where they should film
their ads.
Torie and I
hit the sea kayaks early, going north around the rocky point to Plum Tree bay. Coming back, the wind was blowing full force –
it was quite a workout for my upper body, particularly the arms. Oh, I almost left this part out – when I
first pushed off from the beach, I went a little ways and flipped the
kayak. Not sure how or why, but I
dragged it back to shore and reloaded.
It’s a short one – just 11.5 feet, so the stability isn’t as good as I’m
used to. Also, Torie kicked my butt
getting back. I felt like I was sailing
back into the wind.
The rest of
the morning was spent hanging at the beach.
The people from the other two villas had gone somewhere for the morning,
so we had the place to ourselves. We
hung out on the very comfortable lounge chairs, hung out on the rope bed, went
into the water for quite a while, and just relaxed.
After lunch
(leftover pork tenderloin that was still excellent), the two families went
their separate ways on road trips exploring the island. The road to the north climbs up higher and
higher, affording spectacular views of Leverick Bay and Bitter End Yacht
Club. We passed goats in the road and
chickens in the yard, and stopped for the occasional photo of the views.
The
Stapletons stopped at Leverick Bay Yacht Club for lunch and TJ recommends the
Mahi Mahi. After a stop for additional
provisioning at the grocery store, we got some ice cream and headed back. We spent more time at the beach, before Carol
and I came up for our massages. While at
the beach, Maddy and I kayaked to the south, down into Pond Bay. There were a number of yachts anchored to
take advantage of the beautiful sandy beaches.
Most of the yachts were from Puerto Rico. We beached the kayaks and did some shelling
and deep water wading. Definitely have
to go back.
Unfortunately,
the masseuses went to the wrong place, so we had to postpone. I spent some time talking to William Matthews,
a Virginian who runs the place.
We then
headed to Coco Maya for dinner, complete with drinks on the comfy beach
chairs. Carol and I split the
lobster/mango tacos and the curried shrimp.
The Stapletons treated us to dinner, and TJ nicely sprung for two
bottles of Williams-Selyem Pinot.
We came back
and hung by (or in) the pool – the kids too.
For a while Carly and Torie walked down to the beach, while Toni baked
blueberry muffins. TJ hung in the pool
for a good hour and a half, while I was probably in for an hour. At 10pm, I called it a night, climbing the
three stories before sacking out. The
others stayed up to 11:30, howling at the full moon. Okay, it was calmer than that – they all
stayed up and talked.
Today we are
off to the Baths.
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