St Lucia Part II

So we get to our room and I have to confess. I was ruing a little bit before we got there about not being able to get the room with the private plunge pool attached. It basically was like a mini pool for two people. But it was $4K....so there was just no way we were doing that. The good news is when we got there, I was actually much happier with the room we got than if we had been in one of those rooms that has a private pool. And let me now illustrate why. This was our room. And yes, that is my passed out self lying on the beach chair. We are the bottom one in the middle.



As you can tell, it resembles an apartment or condo patio. Not real big but semi private. And easy access to the outside. Within 50 feet of us we have these things:

The Spa that I had my full head braided. Tony kept calling me a Caribbean Princess. :) You will see the braids in a bit. I also got a hot rock massage. That was needed and I have to say - it fixed my back until the flight back.



And this lovely Gazebo that we spent many an hour sitting in and enjoying the ocean and the surf hitting the beach.



I will discuss the tree in another post.



And then there was the hammock right next to it that had my creative writing juices flowing. I love hammocks. You can sit in one near the ocean, close your eyes, feel the breeze and you can actually feel yourself moving even when you aren't. It's awesome. I have always wanted a hammock. And check out my braids!



Don't forget the beach access to the left of the Gazebo.



And then 100 feet away there was the Pavilion and Pool with the Swim Up Bar. The pool was awesome cause it was like one big giant wading pool that you could swim if you wanted but could walk around it and with your drink. Or you could just sit on a tiled stool at the swim up bar. That was quite fun especially since you didn't need any money nor worrying about tipping the bartender. The pool also had a grotto style waterfall and enclosure and wrapped around a couple different ways. What I can tell you I loved was not hearing any screaming children. Not getting kicked in the gut by a little kid that swam underneath you in the water. Not worrying about the trace amounts of urine in the pool. No cannonballs next to you. And you want to know something great? There was no NO DIVING sign. Why? Because we were all adults and can figure out that one on our own thank you very much.



So the Pavilion is where we ate our breakfast which I loved! I got omelets every day. They had some great banana bread, coffee cake, and some type of custard bread that was like a bread pudding. It was awesome and if I can figure out exactly what they did - which I have an idea, then I am going to make sure and make it for you when you come out and see us. :) The Pavilion was an open air eating place where the roof was vaulted about 30 feet with pillars that supported the roof. You could also eat a buffet lunch if you wanted as well as dinner. The funny thing about the Pavilion was the birds. Since it was open air, there were these pigeons and black birds that would hang out and do these diving raids to scarf up food bits from the plates waiting to be bused. I kept waiting to be shat upon by one of these birds overhead - but I never did experience or see it so it must not be a problem. One of the ladies actually said when the birds get desperate usually off feeding hours, they will swoop down and grab the sugar packets and peck at those. Crazy man.

I digressed on the birds. So the whole point I was illustrating above was how close all the things that I enjoyed (including the ping pong table but I didn't think you needed a picture of that), was so much closer and easily accessible than the rooms with the private plunge pools as illustrated in the picture below.



Are you squinting trying to see what I am talking about? That's how I felt too.

Yes that is correct - those houses up on the bluff where your beach access is cliff diving. And you have to take a van for a little ride down a crazy inclined hill to get to brunch. Yes I am lazy and the walk would have done me good - but I wasn't at fitness camp! And this is a good illustration on when going to the beach - identify how close you want your beach access in your room selection. There were some people who only got a sliding door that opened - no patio. And the slew of patios facing the pool. So the room turned out great. It had a four king poster bed which was decently comfortable and get this - we had a 48 inch flat screen TV in our room that ALSO came with satellite that made it possible for this footy girl to see her monstrous United Arsenal game that she thought she was going to miss on vacation. Tony and I were pretty stoked about that!

To be continued...

St Lucia Part I

So we started out the trip by leaving on a red eye to Atlanta at 10:40PM Friday night. Now it wasn't that bad because we had first class tickets for this whole trip. Tony and I have decided that if we ever have to travel for an extended period of time like this again - we will be doing first class....or we just can't afford to go. I can not tell you how much it saved my knees and my back to have that extra bit of comfort and space. So after Atlanta we had another 4 hours to St Lucia. At one point through my travels, I noticed I was flying over some islands in the Caribbean and I wanted to know what I had flown over so i took a picture with my handy dandy IPhone. What I found is I was flying over the Bahamas. The Bahamas truly have some of the most beautiful water in the world - and it amazes me when looking from an aerial view.









When we landed in St Lucia at 2PM (one hour ahead of Eastern Time) we waited for our bags to come out and finally our big one came out. Only it turns out it wasn't OUR bag and we found this out..........oh.........back at the resort. Yeah - opened the bag and Tony asked me if those were our clothes and I thought........oh no way, those are too ugly. But you know, we really thought we were safe traveling with a big silver swiss army suitcase. Didn't think many people had those, much less traveling on our flight. So back at the airport we go through customs and as soon as you go through customs these large black men with luggage carts start belowing out 'SANDALS??" And you're like - yeah, Sandals - that's us. Now remember, our trip was an all inclusive - so we are thinking everything is paid for right? Well it it. As long as it is through the resort! So we give the guy our luggage - everyone is doing the same thing. He rolls through these two swinging doors and goes about 100 feet, stops, removes our luggage, tells us to check in at this makeshift booth and then holds out his hand and says "this is a tipping service".

Tipping service? For what? This dude rolled our bags 100 feet.

So Tony takes out the only cash we have which is $6. Gives him the $1, and the guy glares at him. Of course Tony just smiled at him. And then this happened to be a sore spot on how we got suckered on something in a different country right when we land. So learning lesson for you if you ever have that happen. Just carry your own bags!

We then proceeded to have an hour drive in a eurovan through the tropical island of St Lucia. We passed by their Olympic stadium that they use to play both cricket and soccer. We saw a lot of the countryside which was very much a third world country. And that was a good reminder. It was very tropical. We saw lots of women on the sides of the roads selling their various fruits and vegetables. Besides tourism, banana is their biggest export crop. So we were able to see banana plantations all over the place. We saw some prostitutes, drug dealers and then a slew of various people. Houses were shanties mixed in between nice houses or businesses. It was difficult to tell what a business from a house just by looking at the building structure. Lots of houses were on concrete stilts to help protect from flooding. We saw soccer pitches throughout our little trip as well - but no one was playing on them. They brew their own beer on the island called Piton as well as their own liquors and Cocoa Cola. As custom with many Caribbean islands, I believe St Lucians speak both English and French. Often interchanging languages mid sentence.

After arriving at the hotel we realized our luggage screw up and thank goodness found out the guy whose luggage we had was at the hotel. But we weren't sure how we were going to get it back, cause of some helicopter delivery service the guy had ordered for himself. So we went to the gift shop to get me something to wear temporarily cause after that much travel I was gross and wanted out of my clothes and we weren't even sure if we were getting our clothes back. However, that was an expensive trip to the gift shop to only get three items. Lesson learned...next time, check the name on your luggage tag!

I will continue this post tomorrow..........

I'm Back

Ok well I have actually been back for almost a week now but I have had a lot of little things going on. And it has taken me a spell to upload pictures and for some reason they aren't all uploading quite right. I plan to have pics for people to see this weekend along with some commentary on my blog.

As to how everything went - it went good. I have a nice tan - that is starting to fade already. And I cut my hair short after having it in braids for a week, resulting in seeing my natural hair color for maybe the second time in my life. I'm not really sure how I feel about the color but T wants me to keep it this way for awhile so......we'll keep it for awhile and see if it grows on me. No pun intended.

As to other events going on, the kitties are good of course. Other than being very needy upon our return. Those poor neglected little fluff balls. All the food and water then can have - a semi ok litter box. Warm house to snuggle and romp in. Toys to play with - oh the woe they must feel! LOL

Played in my women's game last night which I got to be a forward - I love that! Sometimes I have to play center mid and that is tougher. We played 11v8, then 11v9, then 11v10 by the second half. Needless to say we played with no insistence in the first half and as a result put ourselves in a bad position in second half. We went up 1-0 from a GREAT run that YOURS TRULY made all the way down the right flank, cutting in toward the box and making a great square pass in front of goal to our lone player that got forward with me. She got caught up with the keeper but the ball landed at her feet 1 foot from goal and did a back heel kick into goal. Then we had some poor defensive mistakes and allowed them to have some breakaway runs - so they tied it 1-1. Then......I pulled a Ronaldo.



I ended up battling for the ball with their sweeper in two small skirmishes in a row and then she took a bad touch and I realized – 50/50 in the box. I probably wasn’t going to get there but I was going to force it and see if I could get the ball or a call. We both went in hard, I angled my shoulder down into her and stretched my leg. Barely getting the ball - and she swiped me. Now the reality is, it was just a good hard challenge and most likely other refs would not have called the penalty - but you never know and if you don't try - you'll never know if you can get the goal. I got the call – although really, I probably shouldn’t have gotten the call. It’s a penalty!!!! At that moment, I was tired from battling and running. I had been knocked down pretty good – which I of course took the girl with me. But nonetheless - lots of times if you have been knocked down - you shouldn't take the kick. And my eye is all blurred – I have had some eye infection for two weeks and last night playing it got real bad. Driving home was not good either. So I asked three girls if they wanted to take it – seeing as I felt I wasn’t probably the best candidate at the moment. Everyone shrugged it off. So I set the ball, took my steps, looked at the ref, he blew the whistle. I ran up, struck and…………………………………………………….



Right to the keeper…........dead center. For crying out loud Athena – DO BETTER!!!! It would have put us up 2-1. We ended up losing 2-1 and I was so pissed at myself. Can you believe that? The only thing worse would have been if I shanked the ball around the goal. At least I got it on frame. Our keeper was joking at the end that if the keeper had just dived like they all do then I would have scored! True seeing as many PK's scored even in pro matches are dead center and the keeper dived - whereas if he had just stood still he would have made the save. So in the end - I hope I get another chance to make up for that mistake. I don't like making those kinds of bad mistakes. So just like Ronaldo in the second minute of the Barcelona game this week - I missed the penalty that could have saved the day and turned the match around.

Au revoir Mes Amies

In case I got my French wrong or you just don't know what that means it means Buh Bye my friends. I'm OUTTA HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

St Lucia, here I come!

Ideology and Reality

Most have seen this before - and while I am not a Gates worhsipper, I do think it pertinent to life.

Bill Gates gave a speech at a High School about 11 things they did not and will not learn in school. He talks about how feel-good, politically correct teachings created a generation of kids with no concept of reality and how this concept set them up for failure in the real world.


Rule 1: Life is not fair - get used to it!

Rule 2 : The world won't care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

Rule 3 : You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school. You won't be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both.

Rule 4 : If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.

Rule 5 : Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Your Grandparents had a different word for burger flipping: they called it opportunity.

Rule 6 : If you mess up, it's not your parents' fault, so don't whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

Rule 7 : Before you were born, your parents weren't as boring as they are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you thought you were. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent's generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

Rule 8 : Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades and they'll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. This doesn't bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

Rule 9 : Life is not divided into semesters. You don't get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. Do that on your own time.

Rule: 10: Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

Rule 11 : Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one.