Friday 25 October 2013 – A frantic day as is usual when preparing to go on holiday – in fact, although I really love travelling and seeing new places, as I get older I hate all the upheaval which packing brings and always feel quite stressed. Sara is the complete opposite so at least we do complement each other. I took Thom to Nether Wallop and it was expected that Sara would pick him up but as you will read things didn’t work out quite that way! Sara and I spent the day sorting out the house – I cleaned the car and also picked up all the dropped apples as well as picking off the tree some good ones which are now stored in buckets in the cool of the garage. I had done quite a lot of packing the night before but today I had to hunt around for various leads for the different appliances which we were going to be taking with us – cameras, phones, laptops etc. etc. Eventually I felt that I had done as much as I could. I agreed to go and pick up Thom this afternoon from Nether Wallop but had been there about 15 minutes when Sara turned up to tell me that Thom’s bus had broken down at Up Somborne, only 5 miles from Winchester. I hadn’t taken my mobile phone which necessitated Sara having to drive to Wallop to tell me. As her geography/map reading is bad, I agreed to go and find the broken down bus and retrieve Thom. I had to take narrow country lanes and negotiated tractors until I eventually found the disabled bus and Thom all on his own apart from the relief driver. Apparently a replacement bus had arrived a short time after the breakdown and all the students, except Thom, had been transferred. If only he had told us that a replacement had arrived I wouldn’t have had to have driven nearly to Winchester! This problem put us an hour back and we didn’t leave for Heathrow until about 6.30 p.m. Fortunately the traffic was not as bad as I had expected, although it was still pretty busy around the M25 and we found our hotel with no problems. We had an enjoyable meal with a bright enthusiastic waitress called Nanci serving us. We slept well but conscious that we had to get up at 6 a.m.
Saturday 26 October 2013 – I woke at 5.30 a.m. and after tea and repacking the
clothes we had used the day before and overnight, we left the hotel at around
7.15 a.m. arriving at Heathrow Terminal 5 at around 8 a.m.
having found the car park and handing our car over for the week for
safekeeping. Check-in went smoothly as
did Security apart from my Kindle causing the authorities to search my hand
luggage. This was only a small glitch in
the proceedings and was handled sensitively and with courtesy. Our flight boarded pretty much on time
although we were somewhat late in taking off and the journey across the
Atlantic to Nassau took nearly 10 hours in order to fly more northerly than
usual to avoid a huge storm in mid-Atlantic which is heading straight for the
British Isles. It is expected to land
tomorrow and cause considerable damage at home.
There is nothing we can do about it – my flag pole has been dismantled
and we’ve had new stronger fencing installed.
The longer journey did have its compensations as we flew across to
Canada (Newfoundland) and then down the eastern seaboard of the USA enabling us
to catch glimpses of Boston, New York and other familiar locations e.g.
Wilmington before flying out to sea from the north Carolina coastline and out
through the Bermuda Triangle to the Bahamas crossing over Grand Bahama in the
process. We arrived at Nassau’s brand
new air-conditioned terminal at just before 4 p.m. The ground crew were unable to unlock the
plane at first because they couldn’t find the key! After completing immigration cards (not
available as usual on the plane) we went through the usual checks and questions
arriving eventually in the baggage reclaim area where our cases were the last
on the belt! After collecting these we
then took an expensive taxi ride to Paradise Island along the brand new dual
carriageway road which runs from the airport, past Lake Coyningham to Goodman’s
Bay. It is then a matter of the usual
slow grind through downtown Nassau. We
were in our apartment overlooking Nassau Harbor by 6 p.m. Thom and I went to the off licence and
grocery store for some essentials – including Sands’ beer and later Thom and
Sara went and picked up a huge pizza from the Marina for our supper. I also made some hot dogs and this evening
Thom and I watched the third game in the World Series between Boston Red Socks
and St. Louis Cardinals which resulted in a narrow win for the Cardinals who
are now 2-1 up in the series. Sara went
to bed at around 9 p.m. but I forced myself to stay up to watch the ball game
although I eventually fell asleep before the end.
Sunday 27 October 2013 – First full day in the Bahamas and we decided to make it a fairly lazy one. We have no internet connection and want that to act as a bit of a holiday in itself – although I do wonder how the storm has or has not affected things back home. Thom and I went down to the Pools in Atlantis this morning and Sara and Mary were to go to the supermarket to buy all the essential groceries to enable us to keep the holiday as cost effective as possible – eating out is so expensive with four of us. In fact Sara and Mary arrived about an hour later to say that they had missed the bus to the supermarket. I went to see the concierge and established that the main supermarket was only about twenty minutes’ walk away over the huge bridge which spans Nassau Harbor but that it closed at 3.30 p.m. on Sundays. Sara and I decided to walk the distance and bring the groceries back in suitcases which we could wheel. The journey out was fine – light empty suitcases and after walking over the bridge we were at the supermarket within ten minutes – very easy. The reverse was a bit of a nightmare. The groceries we bought were extremely heavy – including a gallon of orange juice, a heavy water melon and a bag of potatoes. The trundled back very slowly and the high bridge was a “killer” and as I write this on the following morning my lower back is hurting. The decided that this was not an experience we would want to try again and it reminded me of those charity stories about women having to walk several miles with pots of water on their head – also in the searing heat. Tonight we ate fried chickens’ wings with fresh corn and potatoes – very enjoyable and all the more so because we know what we had to do to get them. We had also brought back a lot of cans of drink and in this heat it is most important to drink plenty. Mary, Sara and I played with the “wobble ball” in the large pool by the apartments. It was “chilly” tonight as the temperature has dropped to about 70 degree F. Thom and I watched the fourth game in the World Series which saw Boston equalise the series by winning 4-2. The teams have now won two games apiece. It certainly looks like the Series will go its full length. Tomorrow I guess we will stay around the resort especially as I haven’t been on any of the water rides yet.
Sunday 27 October 2013 – First full day in the Bahamas and we decided to make it a fairly lazy one. We have no internet connection and want that to act as a bit of a holiday in itself – although I do wonder how the storm has or has not affected things back home. Thom and I went down to the Pools in Atlantis this morning and Sara and Mary were to go to the supermarket to buy all the essential groceries to enable us to keep the holiday as cost effective as possible – eating out is so expensive with four of us. In fact Sara and Mary arrived about an hour later to say that they had missed the bus to the supermarket. I went to see the concierge and established that the main supermarket was only about twenty minutes’ walk away over the huge bridge which spans Nassau Harbor but that it closed at 3.30 p.m. on Sundays. Sara and I decided to walk the distance and bring the groceries back in suitcases which we could wheel. The journey out was fine – light empty suitcases and after walking over the bridge we were at the supermarket within ten minutes – very easy. The reverse was a bit of a nightmare. The groceries we bought were extremely heavy – including a gallon of orange juice, a heavy water melon and a bag of potatoes. The trundled back very slowly and the high bridge was a “killer” and as I write this on the following morning my lower back is hurting. The decided that this was not an experience we would want to try again and it reminded me of those charity stories about women having to walk several miles with pots of water on their head – also in the searing heat. Tonight we ate fried chickens’ wings with fresh corn and potatoes – very enjoyable and all the more so because we know what we had to do to get them. We had also brought back a lot of cans of drink and in this heat it is most important to drink plenty. Mary, Sara and I played with the “wobble ball” in the large pool by the apartments. It was “chilly” tonight as the temperature has dropped to about 70 degree F. Thom and I watched the fourth game in the World Series which saw Boston equalise the series by winning 4-2. The teams have now won two games apiece. It certainly looks like the Series will go its full length. Tomorrow I guess we will stay around the resort especially as I haven’t been on any of the water rides yet.
Monday 28 October 2013 – Woke early this morning with the sun shining into our bedroom. I had a good night’s rest in the large kingsize bed which we have in our apartment out here. The weather seems much cooler today – not the usual high temperatures we are used to. I watched the mail boat come into the harbour and dock opposite our apartment – the bay being quite busy today. Just one ocean liner in today – Azure of the Seas. Sara and the kids went across to Atlantis after a large breakfast of American pancakes, frankfurters and fruit. I stayed behind for an hour and wrote up the first three days of this blog from my recollections since leaving home. We have no internet connection and this is quite liberating. It will also mean that this blog is not likely to get posted until after our return to England. As I write this up I am sitting on our balcony overlooking the harbour sipping Canadian Dry whiskey and feeling like Ernest Hemingway. After my journalling I walked across to Atlantis via the aquarium and joined the family for the rest of day enjoying the slides and water rides and also had a lovely dip in the ocean whose water was much warmer than the pools. I really enjoyed the Rapids and the Tidal Wave but did manage to crack my head against the wall just where the wave machine is at its most powerful. Later on I was also tipped over and found my head on the bottom of the canal. Still, that’s all part of the fun of Atlantis – there has to be that slight element of fear in the rides. Tonight we ate beans and rice and then went out to the Marina for Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. I had a particularly interesting combination of banana yoghurt with peanut butter. It may sound disgusting but out here it seems perfectly normal. I watched the fifth game in the World Series which saw Boston beat the St. Louis Cardinals by 3-1. So far it has been an extremely low scoring series. A break from the baseball tomorrow night.
Tuesday 29 October 2013 – Woke early again but had a really enjoyable lie in
with Sara. After finding out about the times of the church services in Christ
Church Cathedral, Nassau, I decided to spend the day in downtown Nassau and not
on Paradise Island. After watching an incredible piece of American daytime TV
called the Maury Show (Jeremy Kyle style) I set off for Nassau via ferry. The ferry has now gone up to $8 return fare
but still with the “cabaret” entertainment from “your friendly tour guide who doesn’t get paid by the captain”. The
patter has actually changed from previous years – the Bridge Suite is no longer
the “Michael Jackson Suite” but Stevie Wonder did still once stay there (“or so they told him”) and it appears
that Nicholas Cage is no longer one of our neighbours. Conch is still “Bahamian Viagara” but there was no mention of the absence of “hanky-panky” at the Yoga Retreat –
although it stills remains in existence.
Four liners were in today – Carnival
Sensation, Carnival Expectation,
Majesty of the Sea and Disney Dream and
as usual we passed them close to as we entered the dock at Nassau. On disembarking the ferry I walked up to Bay
Street and to the Effy jewellers
where they had been advertising free semi-precious pendants. In fact the
pendants were indeed free in a pack with two earrings. Sara wanted one of the brown tanzanite
pendants so I bought a pack for $10.
Unfortunately the Pompey slave Museum is currently closed for
refurbishment and so it will not be possible to take Mary there tomorrow as she
has wished. I went into McDonald’s to use their free wi-fi
before going on to Christ Church Cathedral (Anglican/Episcopalian) to attend
Holy Communion in the chapel. There were
only three of us in the congregation but Revd. Father Colin Humes conducted the
short service including a short homily on the parable of the mustard tree. He asked me to read the set intercessions
which I was pleased to do. The other two
members of the congregation were tourists from Spain and couldn’t speak much
English. After the service we had a long
and interesting chat about things both theological and Bahamian and struck up a
good rapport. We parted agreeing to keep
in touch via Facebook and I
discovered later in the day that he had done just that. I had lunch back at McDonald’s and picked up my email using
my BlackBerry. I went up the hill to the General Post Office
and bought stamps for some postcards and letter we want to send. It was then time to return to Bay Street
where I wandered around the various souvenir stores close to the ferry dock and
liner terminal. Tonight after a supper of pasta for the
children and tuna salad for Sara and me, we played a few hands of gin rummy
until going to bed quite early. No baseball
tonight.
Wednesday 30 October 2013 - We had to wake up early today to attend an Owners' meeting at the offices of the timeshare we are staying in. The presentation - advertised as 20 minutes lasted an hour and twenty minutes and was, as we had surmised, a sales opportunity to see if we wanted to add to our existing timeshare. We did want to discuss options for moving our weeks into another season but the cost for us at the present time would be prohibitive. We listened to and noted the options, took our free gift (a professional photo opportunity) and politely left taking American muffins for the children. We then all went to the water park and spent a few hours on the slides and Sara plucked up the courage to go down the Abyss - a steep slide in darkness from the top of the Power Tower - about a 100 feet drop. She had to admit that it wasn't as bad as she had thought. Thom and I came back to apartment early and went onto the internet - him to do some college work and me to pick up any essential work emails. Nothing too onerous thankfully. Tonight we had supper in the apartment - hot dogs and burgers and I watched the final game in the World Series - Boston Red Sox winning 6-1 at Fenway Park to win the series 4-2 and become "world" champions.
Wednesday 30 October 2013 - We had to wake up early today to attend an Owners' meeting at the offices of the timeshare we are staying in. The presentation - advertised as 20 minutes lasted an hour and twenty minutes and was, as we had surmised, a sales opportunity to see if we wanted to add to our existing timeshare. We did want to discuss options for moving our weeks into another season but the cost for us at the present time would be prohibitive. We listened to and noted the options, took our free gift (a professional photo opportunity) and politely left taking American muffins for the children. We then all went to the water park and spent a few hours on the slides and Sara plucked up the courage to go down the Abyss - a steep slide in darkness from the top of the Power Tower - about a 100 feet drop. She had to admit that it wasn't as bad as she had thought. Thom and I came back to apartment early and went onto the internet - him to do some college work and me to pick up any essential work emails. Nothing too onerous thankfully. Tonight we had supper in the apartment - hot dogs and burgers and I watched the final game in the World Series - Boston Red Sox winning 6-1 at Fenway Park to win the series 4-2 and become "world" champions.
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