Nassau

ABC Wednesday

rmiles7721April 23, 20086Site News

Wednesday must be meme day or something because there seem to several that I participate in on Wednesdays. When I remember anyway.

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This week’s post for ABC Wednesday is brought to you by the letter “N”. What’s “N” for? N is for Nassau because the trip is still fresh in my mind and I am ready to go back to the Caribbean and hang for awhile.

I took this shot on Potter’s Cay. We went down there specifically for the conch salad. It was one long hot walk from downtown. Next time we’re renting scooters or something.

Seagull

I don’t particularly consider myself a good photographer but occasionally everyone gets lucky. I really like that shot.

This one sort of shows the old and the new. That is a shot of Potter’s Cay and behind it you can see the Atlantis resort on Paradise Island. We never did make it over to Paradise Island. I thought it was senseless to go over to sight see at some damned hotel and go shopping when there was plenty to do right in Nassau with a lot more colorful people as well.

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We had a wonderful weekend in the Bahamas and hopefully we can return again soon. I would like to go for longer but as long as it’s with the girls, going to the beach means going local to me. I just don’t see the sense of dragging them out of the country when they won’t even notice the difference.

I got this next one while we were wandering down one of the side streets downtown.

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There was some old dude playing the organ for tips right around there as well…Ahh there he is. Took me a minute to find the picture. He had himself a nice sunny spot to play in and was having a pretty good time of it. Looks like he was set up for the long haul though.

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This is the Straw Market. You seen one flea market you seen ’em all right?

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Maybe, maybe not. They certainly had a ton of stuff at great duty free prices as well. There were probably 100 different “stalls” or “stores” but most of the stuff seemed to be the same. There was a pretty good choice of stuff to buy but after you’ve looked at a couple hundred shirts, hats and purses it’s time to move on to something else…

Like the Beach! This is Cable Beach, right outside of our hotel at 7a.m. or so on the day we were leaving.

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If you want to jump in and participate in ABC Wednesday head over to Mrsnesbitt’s Place. This week’s is already up for your perusal over there.

Superclubs Resorts

rmiles7721March 11, 20082Travel

About a week after we got back from the Bahamas I was emailed a link from the hotel booking site I had used and asked to fill out a survey as well as leave a comment for other folks that might be going through it. We had such a great time I was more than happy to do so. Superclubs all inclusive resorts actually has several of them spread out through the Caribbean including Breezes in Nassau which is where we stayed as well as all inclusive jamaica resorts. I’ve seen pictures from the places in Jamaica and it really looks like a cool place to visit. Prior to booking the vacation in Disney for June I had toyed with the idea of flying to Jamaica and staying there but we decided on something a little more friendly for our five year old.

That’s the view of Breezes Bahamas from the beach at around 7 a.m on Sunday morning before we left to come back home.

The Superclubs all inclusive resorts are just that, all inclusive. That means your hotel room, all food, drinks (including alcohol), gratuities, transportation to and from the airport, sports activities, snorkeling and all kinds of other stuff is included in your booking price. Pretty sweet deal actually. If not for shopping in some of the duty free stores in Nassau I wouldn’t have spent a dime there. I do have one recommendation though and that’s that anyone that wants to do some site seeing either rent a car or scooter. The low-cost transportation we used was cool but it’s always nice to be able to just pick up and go.

There are actually nine all inclusive jamaica resorts that Superclubs runs, ranging from the family friendly to more exclusive adults only resorts.

That’s a shot of the fountain at the end of one of the pools, which is just off the beach as well. Behind where I was standing is the main restaurant, which is mostly buffet style but was still pretty darn good. Eat and drink and sleep by the beach, what else could you ask for 🙂

Tramp Stamp Tuesday

rmiles7721March 4, 2008Site News

This is the one and only tramp stamp shot I got while I was down in Nassau. Had I been trying I could have taken a ton more, but I was having too much of a good time to worry about it.

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Fire In De Hole…

rmiles7721February 19, 2008Travel

Walking through downtown Nassau we came across this in the window of one of the duty free liquor stores.

I didn’t know whether to drink it or fuck it?

Fire In De Hole Erotic Rum of the Bahamas. I didn’t buy it but somehow I have regretted it ever since. Although you are allowed to bring back two liters of alcohol duty free into the U.S. I wasn’t sure how that would jibe with the anti-liquid laws since all I had was a carry-on bag and no checked luggage. Anyone know how this would work?

Hey! If I can get everything to cooperate I am planning a new feature on here on Shadowscope. Drunk. Satan. Karaoke!

Whatcha think?

Friday in the Bahamas

rmiles7721February 19, 2008Photography, Travel

The trip down to Nassau was fantastic! Just what I needed but not nearly long enough. That combined with the nasty plane ride home was enough to slightly tarnish the trip. Oh yeah, and I’ve been fucking cold ever since I got home.

We dropped the girls off early at school on Friday morning so we could get down to the airport. The drive down wasn’t too terribly bad, we managed to get in the airport at around 7:30 Friday morning. It was actually very crowded and we had to wait through the line at security forever. Once we made it through the obligatory cavity search and managed to get to the gate I took one of the Xanax and settled down to wait for the plane. The ride down was pretty uneventful and I actually enjoyed it once we had been in the air for awhile. The Xanax didn’t do shit to calm me down but I seem to be getting a little better at flying. At least I thought so until the flight home.

The airport in Nassau looks like it was built around the time that JFK was hanging out in the Bahamas although they seem to be trying to update it. We had to wait awhile to get through customs but we did have these guys hanging out playing the entire time.

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Can’t help the graininess of the shot. I was afraid one of the security guys was going to stomp my ass if I turned the flash on.

Anyway, once we made it through security and out into the general terminal, Breezes has a booth there that directed us to a shuttle bus. They provide transportation to and from the resort as part of the deal.

I really regret not renting a car or scooter while we were there. The caves where the pirates used to hide their shit and the villas all along the coast were truly a site to see and I would have liked to stop and take more photos than I did. We spent an inordinant amount of time either walking or riding the bus and while it’s nice to let someone else do the driving, perhaps a taxi would be the best bet. A tad bit more expensive but at least they will stop when I want them to.

We got to the resort around noon and check-in isn’t until 3 so they stuck armbands on us and let us roam around to check the place out until we could get our room. We tried their native brewed, called Kalik. It pretty much sucked. If you like Budweiser with a higher alcohol content and more carbonation you might like Kalik. It was probably closer to Corona than Bud but it was still crappy piss water. I much prefer Sam Adams and Guinness as well as other dark, full beers. They also had serve-yourself daiquiri dispensers there so I settled on Pina Coladas. I didn’t drink much on this trip anyway. I wanted to make sure and enjoy the island in my own self-created stupor without adding too much alcohol to the mix. The water was too cool to get in, either the ocean or the pool, so we just sort of hung out. It was pretty overcast when we arrived and it had started drizzling shortly after we got there. You can see the rain arriving in this photo.

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Normally you can see clearly to Long Cay and to the right the coastline as well, that’s rain coming. It never did rain very hard unless it was while we were napping, which we did shortly after we finally got our room, which was closer to four rather than the three p.m. check-in time. It was actually starting to get pretty fucking irritating that they didn’t have the room ready. I think we were both crabby and tired.

After a nice nap we checked the place out some more and then had dinner. There are a couple of different restaurants in the joint as well as the buffet. We chose the buffet and the fare was actually pretty decent. Nothing to write home about but I certainly had my fill. We made a trip to the Crystal Palace Casino right down the street where the wife won $100 on the slots. Some of that was profit 🙂

After the Casino we hung out on the beach for awhile where they were doing a circus show. Two of the four acrobats couldn’t be there so it was OK, but nothing fantastic. After that we just hit the sack. Flying screws with my ears and we were both tired.

I will post more pictures and more about the trip later this evening. I’ve got a bit of house cleaning to take care of and then I have some work to do this evening as well. I have posted most of the pictures to my Flickr page if you want to see them before I post them here.

Eating’ the Conch Penis…

rmiles7721February 18, 2008Travel

First check out the video…

We went down to Potter’s Cay early on Saturday afternoon. Actually we left the resort very early on Saturday and spent the morning walking around Nassau shopping and eating. It’s beautiful down there. I’ll tell you one thing though, fuck the walking and buses. Next time I take my own advice and drive, call a cab or rent scooters. I enjoyed the sites and being able to take pictures but we wasted about four hours on Saturday just walking so by the time we got back to Breezes I was ready for a nap.

After walking forever we got down to Potter’s Cay. Here’s what it looks like on the dry side.

Potter's Cay

I don’t guess anyone had used this boat in quite some time…

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This gull flew by at just the right moment…

Seagull

These guys were playing dominoes right next to the conch salad booth where we stopped. I’ll tell you one thing, they take their dominoes seriously. NOT a child’s game at all.

Dominos

I guess because of where I was sitting in the shade and the fact that it was so bright everywhere else, the exposures in a couple of these were really crappy. I had my dark shades on and wasn’t really paying attention or I would have most likely noticed in time to fix it. This is the dude that made the conch salad. He’s in the booth right next to the domino players and was extremely happy to chat with us while he made the salads. I forgot his damned name or I would have posted it here and told you guys to go visit him.

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The guy has been doing this for seventeen years. He buys conch from fishermen in the morning and makes salads all day long for both locals and tourists alike. Just a few bucks for a Heineken and Conch salad and it took both of us to eat it. Think cole slaw without the cabbage and with seafood. It really kicks ass. This is how he makes his living though and as he was so gracious and the food kicked so much ass I figured I would tell ya’ to go see him.

Conch Salad Ingredients

Those are the fixin’s above. He was making them two or three at a time to save on wasted food I am sure but for the three he made while we sat there He took and entire onion, a couple of tomatoes and a bell pepper and diced them up small, as well as one slice from a jabenero or some other type of hot pepper and a bit of sea salt. I found a recipe at the Hot Sauce Zone that has more involved ingredients and it sounds pretty good as well. Anyway he also diced up small a couple of fresh (raw) Conchs right out of the water behind his place, popped a hole in the shell to release the muscle that holds it in and pulled the damned thing out and started washing and cutting. After mixing all of the up he stuck it in a bowl and squeezed the juice out of a couple of limes and an orange as well. It was pretty damn refreshing after a hot walk to get down there.

Bridge to Paradise Island

Here are a couple of shots of Potter’s Cay from the water side.

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That big ugly pink thing behind the bridge? That’s the Atlantis resort. It’s not as close as it looks, it’s just fucking huge.

Oh yeah, the conch penis. The dude making the salad brings out these wiggly looking clear things to us and the bahamian sitting with his girlfriend right next to us. The other guy says “Conch Penis, better than Viagra” and down the fucker goes. I don’t think it’s the penis, but I ate it whatever the hell it was because I’m a guy and you can’t let one guy eat it and think you’re a pussy or anything. I wasn’t bad actually, supposedly has plenty of protein. Work like Viagra? I’ll never tattle…

Almost Valentine’s Day…

rmiles7721January 27, 20082Parenting/Family

Valentine’s day is a darned joke.

Up until he late sixties the Catholic Church recognized almost a dozen different Valentine’s Days, named so after Christian martyrs. Our current Valentine’s Day comes from two of them named Valentine and is supposed to be a saints day commemorating Saint Valentine.

During the time of that dirty old man Geoffrey Chaucer the day became associated wit romantic love.

During the 1800s handwritten notes to our ‘valentine’ started giving way to mass produced greeting cards. The commercialization of Valentine’s Day led the way to the further commercialization of holidays. It’s the time to buy greeting cards, red lingerie such as bustiers and tons of flowers.

Not that I am a complete Scrooge about the holidays or anything, but personally I would prefer the wife to just write me a note or something rather than go out an buy junk that will just get stuck in a drawer somewhere.

This year is a bit different though. I start my vacation on Valentine’s Day. Since I don’t know what things are going to be like in June as far as extra money goes, or my work hours, we are celebrating our 20th anniversary a bit early and going to the Bahamas on the 15th. I would have gotten tickets a day earlier but it would have been much more difficult for her to take an extra day off work, not to mention the fact that we had to find childcare for the girls as well.

Breezes Bahamas

rmiles7721January 24, 20082Travel

So I’ve booked the hotel for next month. I got one of those all-inclusive packages because, well, alcohol can get mighty expensive and it’s included as well. Not that I am a lush or anything, that’s only when I am on vacation.

Oh, wait, that is my vacation. I have permission to be a lush then.

The Breezes is on Cable Beach on the main island rather than Paradise Island but it is also several hundred bucks cheaper than Atlantis or Paradise Island Resorts. Except for the whiners most of the reviews I read have been pretty decent and there are even a couple of video reviews on youtube. It looks more like a resort where old people and middle class people that can’t afford Atlantis stay, so I should fit in quite nicely.

Bon Voyage et al.

Getting all my ducks in a row…

rmiles7721January 8, 2008Blogging, Parenting/Family, Travel

I have spent the great majority of the morning going between reading news sites and fooling with paperwork. Since the wife and I are going to the Bahamas next month and I don’t have a passport, while her’s expire ten years ago, there is quite a bit of stuff to do.

It takes two or three weeks to get one if you are willing to pay out the nose, which we are having to do. The first thing we had to do is get online and order our birth certificates. We got hers this weekend but I didn’t get mine until today because a signature is required and of course I am at work during the day. Fortunately I am off today and tomorrow. My first two days off in a row since December 8th. I feel it too.

I was supposed to go to the doctor today at 9:30 or so but they have moved the office and I misunderstood where the location was. Needless to say I missed my appointment. They were nice enough to reschedule it for tomorrow morning for me. That’s cool because I have some writing to do today anyway. Tomorrow I am keeping RePete home with me as she also has a doctor’s appointment tomorrow afternoon.

I have to go pick up another copy of my auto insurance policy as well. We have decided that the time has come to get new automobiles and as much as I am a fan of driving a car until the wheels fall off and hate car payments, it’s not worth the inconvenience when one of them breaks down and that will be at some point in the near future. We both take good care of our cars and have over 200k on both of them, but with my job I can’t be car-less. Since I donated the van a few months ago to the Alzheimer’s Association I don’t have an extra vehicle in case something happens with one of these.

I prefer to go through 99% of the car buying process online. Financing all the way up to finding the car. All I should have to do at the dealer is take a test drive and if I like it, drive it the hell out of there. The last car I bought was in 2000 and we ended up spending about 30 minutes in the dealership. The only reason it took that long is that I had not arranged to have it added to my insurance ahead of time. I won’t make that mistake this time. I have to stop and fax my license, insurance and references to the financing company in the morning and then I can start looking at cars. I was hoping to have everything taken care of by yesterday morning so that I could pick the car up today but no such luck. That’s OK, it will give me time for a bit of research. The wife can go get her car this weekend and I will go on my days off next week after researching a few. I still haven’t decided what I want anyway.

Traffic has been pretty heavy (for me) at the site over the last 72 hours, mainly because of the Meredith Emerson posts I put up. Somehow I have landed fairly high at Google and Yahoo! (number 2 and 4, respectively) and I have had something like 16,000 visits on those two posts alone. Several comments as well, which is nice because it means that someone is actually reading it and not just breezing through. If I could just bottle that and figure out how Google picks the top stories I would retire my happy ass tomorrow.

 

In 45 Days I Will Be Here…

rmiles7721December 30, 20075Travel

nassau

I had almost forgotten to post about it but that last review I did on Costa Rica real estate reminded me.

I booked our flights to Nassau, the Bahamas this morning prior to going to work. I start my vacation on February 14th and I was actually looking for flight information to Key West but after looking around several sites as well as Clark Howard’s (one of my heroes) I discovered that I could fly to Nassau cheaper than I could to Key West. WTF is up with that?

I don’t have a passport or anything and the wife’s is  long expired so I sent off for our birth certificates (actually she did) this morning and I should have them back by the end of the week. Tomorrow morning I will get my passport photos done and then send off for them prior to the end of the week. It’s kind of expensive but you can get expedited passport delivery in something like three weeks. That should give me a couple of weeks to spare.

This is Atlantis, one of the resorts down there…

atlantis

I don’t know that we will stay there but it’s one of the places I have been looking at.

My natural instincts are to get something cheap and deal with that but there are a couple of the all-inclusive resort deals that look interesting. All food, alcohol, activities and gratuities for one price. Not too bad. I am looking forward to the trip as I have never been outside of the United States. Might as well make the first trip to the Caribbean. First I have to deal with the down side though…

What’s the down side you ask?

Getting there.

I would just as soon drive to Miami and then take a cruise to Nassau but since we are going in the middle of February the wife is going to have to take an extra day off of work as it is. We are somewhat limited on time.

Damn.

As I said at the top, I booked our flights this morning.

I hate flying.

The last time I flew was in February 2006 when I went down to the Gulf Coast to work for a week in one of our restaurants.

I hate flying.

I may ask my doctor for a couple of valium just so that I can make the flight. Maybe not Valium, but something else to tranquilize my paranoid ass so that I can make the two and a half hour fucking flight over the middle of nothing but sharks.

Did you know that hitting the water from 30,000 feet is just like hitting cement?

It may be safer to fly than to drive but at least when I am driving I am in control and can pull the fuck over.

It’s not even a matter of facing your fears. I have faced my fear of flying before and every time I do it again it’s worse.

Anybody have any tips?

I don’t want to get so drunk that I’m chasing dwarves around the airport or anything, they might throw my ass out before I ever get on the plane.

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