May 10th

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Well, today was a visit to the Queen Elizabeth Botanical Garden again, for a full 3 hours. Yes it was hot, but it was worth it. Hope you enjoy the photos of the flowers and trees.

One of the big hits of the day was seeing a huge Blue Iguana on the loose (sorry the photo is only partial of him, as he was making tracks through the brush), and an AGOUTI !! also in the same historical farm area of the park. They refer to them as rabbits here, and evidently eat them as one would a rabbit – or not! And a marvelous huge caterpillar - evidently it will grow in to a SPHINX MOTH - remember that from AZ?

David loved getting even more photos of the green parrots and Western Spindalis.

Then it was time to sit in the shade and drink ice cold coconut water, and go home for lunch and a nap.

We had been thinking of going across the road to use the kayaks and just float a bit, as it was a VERY HOT day, but the brown seaweed has come in a bit, and it was a bit stinky yesterday. So instead we drove into town to try to buy some fish – nope, none there. So we had one hour snorkeling at Eden Rock instead and saw a TURTLE (and this time it DID come up to breathe), and a STINGRAY buried in the sand, and a NEW FISH – whoooppee: a “tobaccofish.” Hard to believe there are still new ones to find.

We also discovered something interesting from Mario, the man who runs the Eden Rock Drive shop, and who is always, always there. He cannot hire help because no one can afford to live here – evidently rentals took a huge leap during Covid because people were forced to quarantine, and landlords raised rates. There were 2 HUGE ships in port when we arrived: a Disney vessel and one from Italy that comes from Miami. It pulled out soon after we got in the water.

A quick stop for fish for a curry tonight and some other essentials, and then we got on a zoom call with the Fadeleys and McClungs, at long last! We were late because the traffic from downtown was indeed horrendous. After the call we made a super mango curry with the grouper (is that sacrilegious to do with such good fish?), with peanuts, raisins, and bananas of course, plus roasted squash of some kind that was being sold at the side of the road. We are eating very well here.

Oh, and the good news is, the fishy smell in the area seems to have gone ahead. Phew!

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