Desperate to hasten the arrival of sunny days and warm temperatures, the Gardener and I took off for the Caribbean and beautiful warm places~~
Our 2 week cruise took us to eight wonderful islands in the southern Caribbean. I'd like to share with you some of the photos from our restful and romantic trip- starting with Antigua.
We usually don't do the ship sponsored excursions - instead we prefer to take off and just "do our own thing". As we travel together to the different islands, I'll tell you about some of our favorite things to do and places that we love to visit.
Longbay Beach is about a 30 minute taxi ride from the cruise pier. We were traveling with our friends Bob and Jan, so there were 4 of us in the taxi and it cost about $70 for the round trip fare. There are no taxi's waiting at the beach as it is on the far opposite side of the island - so you will need to arrange for your driver to pick you up for the return. (Our driver actually just stayed with us and took a nap in the car while we were at the beach.)
There are several lovely restaurants on the beach. This is the view from the restaurant where we ate our lunch.
For lunch I had grilled polenta with fresh marinara sauce and it was fabulous! You will need to remember that you are on "island" time here - and restaurant service is very, very SLOW! So plan accordingly.
These people seemed to follow me around for the entire trip!
There are beach chairs and umbrellas for rent at a cost of $5. There is a lot of shade on the beach - so we actually only rented chairs.
Isn't this a beautiful view?
The beach is nice and long - perfect for beach walks.
Yes, the water really is this wonderful shade of blue!
The Gardener and I took a long walk down to the the other end of the beach~
and we found this place.
So we climbed up the stairs~
and found this charming little restaurant.
This is the view from Mama's restaurant. Mama was nice~ her menu had fresh home made pasta and the special of the day was grilled red snapper. I'm eating here next time!!
There were places to rent water sports equipment~
but we were all just lazy - I mostly did this!
(I almost finished Keri Beth's little beaded dress while we were on the cruise!)
We also did a lot of this!
But - all good things have to come to an end - so in the late afternoon we headed back to the pier.
Gosh - this ship looks big here!
The sunset reflections were beautiful.
One last picture before getting back on the ship!
~~~
Next up will be the island of Grenada. We'll visit the spice market and take a little tour of the island. (While we were there - I did a little audition for a new job~~ (oh, yeah!)- you just wait!)
Love,
Vicki
ps- My latest travel feature was just published in the online
"Living Better at 50" magazine. This month I am taking you to someplace very special - Venice! You can access my travel feature by clicking the photo on the top of my sidebar. I hope you enjoy traveling with me! 
