Anguilla, Anguilla, Anguilla: part the tenth

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn a Concrete Bunker

 

Two of our three last days, in brief: 

Sunday --Geraud's for breakfast, Elodia's all afternoon.  Overcast & rainy all day, though we escaped the rain for the most part, we could see squalls in the distance and saw evidence of the rain everywhere we went. We ordered the bbq ribs & chicken which were being grilled at the time of our order (around 1:00), but it was so late  by the time the food was ready that we didn't eat lunch till 2:30.  It tasted good enough to wait for, but it left us too full to eat dinner that night. Too bad, since we had been thinking about making reservations at Oliver's when we got back to Caribella--one of those places we've been meaning to try but somehow never got around to.  Now it will have to wait for a future trip.   We bid adieu to Carol at Elodia's and told her that we'd look for her next year, God willing, and she came around the table to hug both of us goodbye and then walked us out to our car, waving goodbye to us as we drove away.  Instead of a full dinner we ended up snacking on crackers with a little cream cheese and olives with our cocktails at sunset and then ate dessert next door at Mango's, comprising two rums (neither of which we loved), one coconut cheesecake (surprisingly light), one Mango's banana split, with lots of pineapple.  Good.  Unfortunately I cannot recall the tab, but I recall that each dessert was around US $14. 

Cloudy day at Elodia's

Storm clouds rolling in

Waiting for lunch at Elodia's

Post-lunch smiles at Elodia's

Monday:  Toast & coffee on the balcony at home for breakfast, Gwen's for the day.  We arrived around 11:00 and set in to do some reading until the staff showed up, but what we got instead was a very annoying proselytizing man who introduced himself as "Mr. Anguilla," whose real name I won't mention here since I have nothing good to say about him.  He was friendly enough at first, and we chatted about our vacation with him, but very soon he started making some very offensive, anti-Semitic comments.  He worked himself up and started yelling about what God has planned for all of us, especially those sinning Muslims, when I told him that I'd appreciate his not yelling in my face.  He told me he wasn't yelling at me, he was just yelling, at which I replied that, as someone on the receiving end, the effect was the same for me.  He was also going commando, and whenever he grasped his shirt up in a gesture of argumentative conviction, his pubes would show.  It was decidedly NOT fun so I put my hand up, and rather coldly informed him that our religious views were different from his, and would he please let us get back to our books.  It was about as rude as I have ever been to another human in my life and it made me uncomfortable, but probably not as uncomfortable as I would have been if I'd let him to continue to harangue us.  Finally another group of tourists arrived from St. Martin so "Mr Anguilla" made his way over to them and sat down with them for quite a while.  They admittedly looked from afar like they were enjoying his company, so either they agreed with his religious views or found other topics to talk about. I couldn't say.  But the entire encounter left me feeling very uncomfortable. 

Post-encounter with "Mr. Anguilla" Ugh!

Who's afraid of a little rain?  Not us!

These hammocks couldn't be any more relaxing

Lunch, at least, improved the situation.  We ordered two plates of bbq chicken, hold the fries, substituting extra coleslaw for the curried pasta salad.  I can't recall total 'cause my husband paid, not me, and since it's a cash transaction there was no receipt.  It was overcast & breezy again that day--coolest day we've had so far.  I snorkeled upper shoal bay for the first time and enjoyed it quite a bit--I imagine it would be much better on a sunny day when you could see better. We spent the rest of the afternoon in those marvelous hammocks and left around 3:45.  We stop by Sea Spray (again!) to try rum punch this time and it was so good we had to get a second one--if you prefer your rum punch on the not-so-sweet side, you should definitely give these a try.  For me, they tied with the Ferryboat Inn for best rum punch I've had on the island.  If you liked a sweet, fruity rum punch, and especially if you like the ones with amaretto, these would probably not be as much to your liking as they were to mine. We chatted with both Veronica and Pamela for a while, then along came a man who introduced himself as Africa, and we chatted some more.  He told some good stories about whale watching & fishing, with Pamela chiming in with some extra details since she had gone out on the water with him quite  a few times.  We also chatted about Grenada, our other favorite island, once we learned that Pamela used to live there when working for Windjammer.  All in all, an excellent end to the afternoon. We dined that night at Mango's.  I had crayfish (excellent, but 5 crayfish is too many), DH had the conch salad, dessert was banana split again for him and apple tart for me. I can't decide which style of crayfish I liked better, the one at Mango's or the one at Veya.  It's not quite as different as comparing apples to oranges, but I think you could say it's as different as comparing an excellent spaghetti bolognese with a terrific Pad Thai:  they both start off with noodles, but beyond that there's no real comparison.  Suffice it to say that both preparations were outstanding.

Just driving 'round the island

Veronica, with her excellent rum punch