Resort Life

This Saturday we treated ourselves to one night at the Bay Gardens Beach Resort (the resort we always steal pool time at). We found a deal on Jetsetter for a very inexpensive night in a “deluxe garden view room” (the cheapest room). We expected to have a room in the back, which was fine because we planned on spending our time at the beach, and by the pool.

Thanks Bay Gardens!

We arrived at the hotel around 10:30 and were greeted with complimentary rum and punches. Not a bad way to start off the day! The bellhop showed us to our room and when he opened the door we could not contain our excitement. A “deluxe garden view room,” in fact, means a beautifully decorated room with a lanai that looks out over the ocean. In the folds of the towels, pillows, and toilet paper fresh flowers were placed. The shower had two heads, as well as two jets.

View from the Lanai

Tigers in the Shower

As much as we were in love with the room, we headed down to sit by the pool. We much prefer the comfortable lawn chairs by the pool opposed to the painful ones on the beach. And in this day and age we feel more comfortable keeping our ‘much needed’ electronics out of the sand.

1. kindles
2. ipods
3. cameras


However when it comes to cooling off, you’ll bet we are in the sea. As we swam around we noticed two of the neon polo boys were also in the water- thankfully they left the shirts at home. They were obviously trying to throw their ball just a little too far into our swimming zone, and after a while of watching this interesting human ritual… we took the hint and fetched one of their “overthrows.” After talking to them we learned they were of similar age and in St. Lucia for two weeks partying and playing cricket. There are 21 of them and they are all from Sheffield “Uni” as they call it.

Obviously, enthralled by their british accents we left it at “maybe we’ll see you out tonight.”

2 for 1!

We decided we wanted to enjoy the sunset with a fruity-girly beverage. Elektra ordered a piano colada and Maddie a mango margarita. Although, when they brought the drinks out there was a total of four! Little did we know that at Happy Hour you got two for the price of one! Yippee! And for future reference we noted that they DO NOT take down your room number when ordering

Sunset

NOM NOM dinner

After evading the ever-present beach rasta-men (who we even had to avoid later in the night) we took a rest on our comfortable mattresses in our air conditioned room. For dinner we walked to the “Jerk Pit” which is a St. Lucian version of a taco truck. We shared some jerk chicken, fried chicken and fries. Don’t hate- we eat healthy all week!


We spent the night at Delirious… our new discovery. The scene includes what we think are St. Lucian “hipsters,” foreigners, and a dabble of beach Rasta’s. Of course we immediately ran into the cricket players and spent the night learning random things about England and shaping up our cricket knowledge (none).

Did you know there are two different English accents from the north and south? Apparently, if you are from the south you are more “Posh.”

Shout out to Tom/Ollie… thanks for the beverages.

At the end of the night we entered our beloved hotel and went to sleep remembering fondly of the night.

Sunday morning we woke up to blasting music from the garden area. We decided we needed some coffee and pancakes, and went down to the hotel restaurant and got a decently priced and very delicious meal.

Comfy beds!

We were sad to check out of luxury but they allowed us to keep our bags behind the counter while we hit the beach for the day. We hung out under the shade of an umbrella and read. Maddie is currently reading ‘The Girl who Played with Fire’ and Elektra, after just finishing ‘The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’, is reading Tina Fey’s ‘Bossypants’ and has occasional outbursts of laughing- so far, we haven’t had any strange looks.

We had a very relaxing day, and got home and went to sleep very early.

Jump Up! - Gros Islet

Gros Islet on a Friday night!

On Friday evening (very late evening) we attended "jump up," a street dance party in the nearby town of Gros Islet. Similar to Fish Friday at Anse La Ray, there is always a lot of food and energy. This event happens year round except during Lent (St. Lucia is a majority Catholic). Our tour guides for the evening were Jenny's nephew, Claude, and his friend, Francois. It was great going with them because we didn't have to use public transportation and they were gentlemen, making sure we were safe and having a good time.

We arrived around 11 and danced for about two hours. It was an interesting mix of people...tourists and locals. Looking around there were a couple of interesting scenes. All around us, we could spot older foreign women romancing with younger St. Lucian men...cougars, anyone?There were St. Lucian women dancing aggressively to the beat that reminded us of what we experience at college parties. Finally, there was a group of British boys wearing extremely bright lime green polos. On the back of these polos each young man had a humorous sexual innuendo such as Thrush, MILF, and Harpoon. We later saw the fronts of the polos and discovered that they were an English university cricket team.

The background to this interesting scenery included a lot of Soca (e.g., http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVmjuklcM3M&feature=related, and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTDTmccChEA), which is a genre of Caribbean music that builds upon Calypso and more contemporary main-stream music. It was fun to dance to the Caribbean rhythms and relax after a long week of working. The DJ also played a number of American tracks which drew a lot of enthusiasm from the crowd.

We ended up leaving around 1 a.m., but we couldn't leave without purchasing a bake (pictured on left), the delicious donut-esque treat we had discovered in Anse La Ray. Except, we do have to note that the quality was not as high as in Anse La Ray. We look forward to attending this Friday night dance party again!

Three Day Weekend!

Elektra Sporting our Orange Towels

This weekend we spent a lot of time at the beach and the resort. We started the weekend with the "ultimate scam." In need of more towels (one towel is not sufficient for beach and shower use) we headed into town with Jenny were she showed us a place to buy cheap towels. While browsing the selection, Maddie spotted bright orange towels, the same color that they use at the resort! Since then, we have been enjoying the lovely poolside lawn chairs.

It's been very nice. The sea has been exceptional. The perfect temperature where it's not too warm, but cold enough so that jumping in is refreshing. Maddie spotted some cool sea creatures, and Elektra saw a couple of fish.

Maddie water jogging around the pool

Saturday night we ventured into the Rodney Bay area to test out the night-life. It was a good test run for future endeavors. Not wanting to walk/take the bus late at night we left the house around 7:30. Unfortunately it had gotten dark and was a creepy walk to the bus stop. We encountered a pack of dogs… but they were all bark and no bite. We found some bars to hang out at while watching the NBA finals and will return next weekend. The night life starts late here, and we headed in before it really began.  People eat late and the clubs start opening until midnight or later. We called Kusbert, trusted CEHI employee for a taxi ride home.. it was filled with good laughter and jokes.

Monday was a national holiday and we didn't have work! Woo-hoo! We slept in, did some cleaning, and moped around the house in the HOT HOT heat. We watched "No Strings Attached," before heading to bed for a long day at work.

Anse la Raye Fish Friday!!!!

On Friday night we got to attend the "Anse La Raye Fish Friday" festival. Anse La Raye is a small fishing town on the northwest part of the island. Every Friday they close down the street directly next to the water and locals set up make shift "restaurants" and stalls with delicious seafood options. We were able to charter a mini-bus taxi with others from the conference because otherwise the 40-minute trip would have been impossible without access to a car.

When we got there, we could not believe the options. The aromas were absolutely intoxicating. We wandered down the short strip and eyed the selection. At the end of the street there were massive speakers blasting music: at first it was american pop, but as the night progressed it switched to Caribbean.

When it came to choosing our food we decided to have the snapper(highly recommended by Jim). The snapper is cooked in a pot first, then placed in foil on a grill with an oil based garlic sauce. For side dished we ate fried marlin with Irish potatoes, stuffed crab, and a fish/flour/fried concoction. Not only was it delicious but VERY cheap. We spent about 33 EC which is about 6 USD each! 

The Snapper

Not completely full, we sampled a few other options such as sweet plantain and fried dough, which is similar to a donut but with less sugar, needless to say, we could not believe how tasty it was. Maddie also purchased a small fried fish that she named Frank. "He" was very delicious too.

Frank cost $.92 USD... YUM

We loved Anse La Raye and are hoping to return soon, we just need to figure out how! 

Meet Our Dogs!

Meet our two friendly dogs that belong to Jenny (our land lady)!


This is Gunster, she was given to Jenny to watch while her friend went on vacation. The friend never came back, and Jenny gained a new friend!

This is Pepsi, she is Gunster's daughter!

Pepsi contemplating life

We bought them treats!

There is a larger dog that is tied up in the back... The true "Guard Dog." He isn't very nice and hasn't been neutered. Consequently, he tries to seduce Gunster but she refuses him (he doesn't like that)... so Gunster has a limp and only three working legs due to big dogs attack :( She is still sweeter than ever and tries to keep up with Pepsi. Pepsi is rather skittish, and until we showed her some love was afraid to be pet.

"Treats?"

Pepsi struttin' her stuff

Our greeting when we get through the gate

SURPRISE SUNSET CRUISE!!

One of our first pictures together!

Before the conference discussions began yesterday, attendee Jim announced to everyone that he would be taking everyone on a sunset ride on his yachts (yes, plural). And, yes, we had a minor freak out of excitement. A boat ride was something we wanted to do while on St. Lucia. There was limited room on the bus, so we didn't know if we would be able to go as interns. After the conference we approached Jim and he was more than happy to take us along!

We drove to beautiful Marigot bay where the group split in half and boarded two boats. Because we had no prior knowledge of going, we went in our work clothes.

This was the first time we felt that we were truly in paradise.

Marigot Bay

The sunset was amazing, the company was great. We sailed up towards Rodney Bay Marina, lying on our backs under the moonlight looking at the stars.

As we pulled into Rodney Bay Marina we passed the most incredible homes. They were massive with docks for their equally massive boats. When we got back to the hotel area, Jim kindly drove us home so that we didn't have to take the bus and walk at night.

Thank you Jim for an amazing adventure!

More photos:

(Princeton) Tigers in St. Lucia

Yes, Princeton Tigers... our school mascot. We are not a younger version of a Cougar, or "an elderly woman who pursues younger men."


Apologies for the confusion.


-M