October 2nd

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It was pouring cats and dogs by 5:45 am, a lovely sound on the tin roof - so no birding or snorkeling this morning. Having our ready-to-go-home Covid test seemed the only alternative. The clinic was up near La Cabana, open from 7 am to 10 pm, and had been packed the other day. But at 8:15 on a rainy Saturday we were the only people there! It was both a throat and nasal test by a nurse, and I count it a real miracle that I didn’t panic – I just warned the nurse that I gag easily and then prayed to relax. And God answered that prayer – the swab wasn’t actually on the tongue but on the side. Phew. The results were guaranteed within 20 hours but we got results around 1 pm.

After that we rewarded ourselves to pancakes at Linda’s, and a quick visit to the market near downtown. The huge cruise ship Norwegian Joy was in (evidently an 11-day cruise out of Miami) again, but – again – no signs of crowds. And it was hardly raining by then. 😞

We stopped by the Spanish Lagoon again to try to capture better photos of the 2 different types of hummers here. Surprisingly we have picked up SEVEN new birds for our life list.

At 3:30 we met up with Nelson, Francis’ husband (she had to return to Holland for work over a year ago), to do a drift snorkel at Mangel Halto. It was overcast still and rather churned up from the recent storms, so we worried that it would not be nice, but we ended up seeing an Ocean Trigger fish again, a huge green moray, a HOGFISH (first ever in Aruba – we saw them in the Keys), two porcupine fish, and other nice things. Visibility improved after the first 10 minutes.

We were glad we were all experienced snorkelers however when the drift seemed to reverse when we were about 2/3 of the way down. I got my exercise! At the end of the snorkel we were rewarded by seeing a big rainbow – it was still raining further inland.

So then we packed up and met at the “Local Store” in Palm Beach for excellent hamburgers with Nelson so we could catch up with news. He hopes to finish some renovations on the house which will end up with 3 separate apts to rent, and then join Francis in Holland next fall.

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