Beautiful tranquil Toucarie Bay

---

Well we are here in Mango Lodge and tonight all seems right with the world. We arrived on Monday and it’s now Sunday - we’ve had a few things to sort out but hey ho that’s life. It’s funny but you feel lucky if your luggage arrives with you at the airport. The added bonus was that our car was ready to pick up from our friendly mechanic, it started first time and he’d even cleaned it!! Bonus!! We drove to the house and there it was Mango Lodge all in one piece, and not blown away by a hurricane - anything else is manageable.

The things we had to sort out seem long ago now, but basically they were: No cooking gas for 4 days - one empty gas cylinder and our spare cylinder has gone walk about – very thankful for our George Foreman and the toaster! No broadband for 3 days until the engineer came out to fix the fault; No electric on half of the sockets (due to a scary wiring fault) fixed by a clever electrician willing to keep trying; Broken tap in the kitchen replaced by Andy; Insurance and licences for the car sorted; plus new bank account opened (almost). Oh! and the battle with the squatting cockroaches has been won!!

The garden looks amazing. So many of the plants have grown beyond belief and everywhere looks so colourful. Son and his family next-door are well and Margaret is managing with her walking frame and wheelchairs. It rained heavily on and off for the first 4 days but we have just had 2 wonderful warm sunny days which we took advantage of in the garden and swimming in the bay - which I must mention has been tarted up with new gazebo and picnic benches and even newly planted shading almond trees. Tourcarie bay is on the Waitukubuli National Trail which has just opened last year. The tourist office are heavily promoting it so it's really good for the village, and the picnic area is just at the bottom of our road so it is a huge bonus for us. It makes the bay look really smart so we’re thrilled about that.

We have booked a hotel in Roseau for the Carnival on Monday/Tuesday so we are now looking forward to that.

P.S. To see the photos large, double click on the first one then scroll through them

---

Photos

A blue tang (juvenile) and a slippery dick
OK, so I didn't have to write slippery dick, but it is the type of fish and "some kind of wrass" woudn't be half as much fun

A trunkfish and friends
A bluehead and lots of brown chromis

A small mouth grunt and a French grunt
Don't blame me for the names, it's what they are called. Can you tell I got a new Reef Fish identification book for Christmas

Comments

[Valerie]

I wish I was....
there instead of here with the last week of works on the restaurant - sooooo much to do. It's gonna be a tad stressful me thinks. Everything looks wonderful and ESPECIALLY the bay. I remember so fondly being there with you - one day swimming and seeing the bubbles rising and that other day when they were drawing the fish in. Happy memories. xx