Friday March 1st, 2024 Another Albertan Arrives!
Today our friend Dan Maqotiaux arrives on the island! He will be here for 16 days. We are looking forward to having him here with us to experience "Bim"! He is scheduled to arrive on Westjet flight WS2512 ( Toronto to Barbados nonstop). The most common itinerary it seems, for Albertan travellers using Edmonton as their first leg in the journey, is the "redeye" Westjet WS418 departing YEG at 00:05 hrs and arriving YYZ at 05:50 hrs. Then jumping on WS2512 at 08:30 hrs, arriving BGI at 14:50 hrs. This was the Coffey itinerary as well.
We had a leisurely morning, with me doing some blogging with my coffee and Munchie relaxing on the patio with her book!
We scheduled a stop at the Massey market down by the airport to pick up some supplies before today's airport pickup! My Google maps gave us the "quickest" route to this Massey. We have not been to this one before. Well Google's route ended up taking us off the beaten path and onto a "direct" road that turned out to be just a trail that was not for automobiles! No harm, no foul, just a minor "recalculation" and we were back on track, with only a few minutes spent re-routing!
Dan's flight got in early so we were there waiting with excited anticipation for him to walk through the arrival doors at 14:30 hrs. About 35 minutes later, Dan walked through the doors! He was in the standard Alberta winter apparel, blue jeans! So in the parking lot beside the chariot, Dan changed into more appropriate attire, shorts!
We hopped into the chariot and headed to Bottom Bay! On our route to the villa there is a sign for "Thelma's Sports Grill". We have been saying we should check it out so on our way home we swung by! Well, on this Friday at 4:30pm, Thelma's was closed! We had to settle for a Banks at the villa!
BJ had found Chef Kenny's Grill on google and it had great reviews! Unfortunately, it was the Sunday he discovered it, he's only open Friday and Saturday, BJ & Yoyo left on the Wednesday! He sets up in a church parking lot 6 minutes from our villa! We chose Kenny's for our supper, rather than driving down to Oistin's for the Friday night event there at the Fish Fry. I must say the reviews did not lie!
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| Kenny in back grilling! |
Kenny was on the grill cooking up a storm and as it was our first time, he provided samples of the fresh marlin and tuna he had that night! We all chose the marlin! Dayna was at the "counter" and helped us with our order. We got three very generous portions of the grilled marlin with 3 sides! What we didn't know was Kenny's was strictly "take away"! We were hoping there were picnic tables to enjoy the meal right there in the great outdoors! The place was busy! Walk ups like us and Dayna was on the phone continuously! We took our marlin back to the villa and enjoyed a great feast!
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| Dayna taking orders! |
One of the drawbacks of doing the red-eye from Edmonton to get here, is the toll it takes on your sleep! If you can't sleep on an air-plane you could be up for over 24 hours! So it was a relatively early evening!
Saturday, March 2nd, 2024 Dan's First Full Day!
Dan had a good sleep and was ready for a morning coffee around ten am. We had a nice slow morning relaxing and taking in the awesome view! We took a stroll down to show Dan Bottom Bay beach. I jumped in to cool off and Dan got surprised by one large wave that ended up wetting his shorts! For anyone that is into playing in the waves or boogie boarding, Bottom Bay is a great spot!
At the top of the stairs to the beach a local fellow has a table under an umbrella with handmade souvenir jewellery and fresh coconuts he cuts and adds rum for a tasty beverage (for those who like rum & coconut)! We learned that Ash, his nickname forever he said, his given name is Roy. Ash is the same age as Munchie, born in 1960. Ash told us he wouldn't be at the table on Sunday as he would be playing cricket down at Dover!
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| Mark and Brenda at Chill! |
We decided to take a drive down to the Richard Haynes Boardwalk on the south coast in the Hastings area. Its not far from Rockley Beach. We started out at Blakey's. After a beverage we took a walk down the boardwalk ending up at Chill Bar & Grill. We ended up spending the entire evening there! We met a wonderful couple from Scotland, Brenda and Mark, and spent the evening sharing stories and having a great time!
Sunday, March 3rd, 2024 Cricket at Dover!
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| Our new friend, Ash! |
We woke up to another beautiful morning! We had a relaxing morning then headed to the Dover Cricket Club and got there before the start of the match. We said hello to Ash and he was pleased that we had come out to watch them play. One of Ash's teammates, Austin, learned we were from the Edmonton area of Alberta, he called over his significant other, Adrienne. As it turned out Adrienne, whose actual first name is Veronica, has lived in Edmonton for more than 20 years! She has a place in the Ellerslie neighbourhood and her 5 grandchildren are all in Edmonton. We had a wonderful conversation with her and she provided us with some insight into how the game of cricket is played. I took down her contact information and hope we can connect in the future!
Cricket matches can be lengthy!
Back at the ranch, Munchie built some fish cakes with our left over marlin, then whipped up an awesome pasta and shrimp dish for our supper!
We had a bit of a shower this evening! Since arriving on the island we have had a few brief showers, usually at night and occasionally in the morning. The rain we had tonight was a deluge! I was looking outside and wondered exactly where the rain was coming from as the night sky was still full of stars!
With the rain came Eleutherodactylus johnstonei! We quite often have both the front and rear patio doors open to get a cool breeze through the house. The little whistling frog of Barbados stopped in for a visit! We were sitting there in the living room chatting and listening to the rain when we saw one of the little guys "hop"! Boy can they jump! Well my darling bride could not live with an "infestation" so our resident hunter tracked down not only one but 3 of the little hoppers. Dan was able to humanely capture and release the critters back to the wild! One of the little green guys that had been relocated to the back patio decided he wanted back in and promptly leaped up the step back into the living room. His mistake! Dan also leaped into action and after a short pursuit had his quarry! I ended up joining the hunt and caught 2 as well!
The frogs are not the only "visitors" we've had. We have had a few green crickets make their way inside! Again, Munchie is far less than comfortable with sharing our space with them so I have had to perform catch and release of these as well!
Cheers to all! .................more to come!
It was lovely meeting you all hope to see you all at chill bar soon. We are there most nights
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