This trip report (still long) will be a little different version with fewer food details than my previous reports. My brain went into Island mode, and I didn’t keep the best records this year.

Flights; We are thankful to have Sun Country flying non-stop from Minneapolis for $660 pp (booked in July). One aggravating “fuel” stop in San Juan on the way home, but we can’t complain. The same flight was $1300+ the week before we left.

Car Rental: We had been with a long standing agent for 9 years. I stated in previous reports how I never asked a price and was always treated fair. Some people on this board suggested I was pretty brave to do that. Maybe they were right. When I got home last year I got a charge for almost $200 more than I expected. After 3 requests for an itemized breakdown of the charges, I finally got a response. I received NO weekly discount on the daily rate, $8 a day for liability and almost 18% in taxes ( including turnover tax). Even with his breakdown he came up short of what he charged me. Lesson learned. ( Please don’t ask who)
This year I got a few quotes and decided on Empress. They had a deal on a Getz for $160 a week + tax etc. The price was hard to beat, but they didn’t have enough cars to fill the demand. We had a jeep for the first several days that I’m pretty sure had Douglas MacArthur’s prints on it. We then got a Getz that served us well, with the exception of 1 dead battery. In spite of a few bumps, I would use them again, and my total was $352 less than last year!

Lodging: Les Balcons, Oyster Pond. We love the quiet, more country feel of a smaller complex. Not for everyone, but it works for us.

With regards to where we ate out, I will mostly only include places that don’t get a lot of comment on the board.

Breakfasts were mostly on the terrace, we are getting lazier every year

Lunch:
Chez Leandra on Orient has a huge excellent wrap with frys for $9.00. You can easily share it. They also have the best conch chowder I have had. A large bowl with a generous side of garlic bread for $10. ( On our last day, I actually went back and got a bowl of chowder at 3:00 pm, and I wasn’t even very hungry. How bad is that.)
E’s Oven, Anguilla. I had the stewed chicken loaded with flavor $10, and Susan had the curry chicken salad $13, which she loved.
Andy and Cheryls. Had good food there as always. For us, not sure we want to spend $60 on lunch plus a couple drinks too often. With the round up, the service charge was near 16%. They seem busy, so more power to them.
Orange Fever , Rosies and Uncle Ernies (Anguilla) are consistently good.



Dinner:
Le Soleil in Grand case: Doesn’t look very fancy, but you get the water view and very good food for reasonable prices. They have great appetizers including various Tarte Flambee which is almost like a pizza (12 inches) 11-13 E. My duck was as good as any other I have had. 22 E. You get a large plastic bottle of water for 4 E instead of a smaller glass bottle for 6. The cuisine is from the Alsace region of France with Caribbean twists. Desserts are very good. Service great, exchange 1/1.20. Not for everyone, but my opinion is you can get a very nice dinner waterside in Grand Case for less than $100 a couple unless you like better wines. I’m sure their wine list is limited, but I am the last person to be evaluating fine wine.

La Taitu, Mount Vernon rd. Kind of out of the way location, but good food. They offer an entrée and dessert for $22.50. I had a large catfish filet ( I always go for the local catch) that was very good, and a large piece of coconut flan for dessert which was excellent. Susan had a curried shrimp dish 18 E, which was also good. They do charge the full conversion rate, but a glass of wine is 4 E which is about $5.30. Still a good value. Almost every table was full at 8:00 PM.

The Bridge, Sandy Ground. Went to the Friday night buffet, table next to the water where you can watch the fish. Easy listening music starts around 7:30, not loud. Buffet included 4 salads, many sides, mahi-mahi, lamb, shrimp and BBQ chicken skewers. Various cakes and fresh fruit for dessert. Also get 1 bottle of wine per couple. The place was full and it is a large restaurant. Mostly locals eating there. Great service, owned by Enoch Hodge. Not gourmet food, but very good and we will go back. Not in the same category as Claudes or Capt Oliver’s, but cheaper and a warm local creole feel to it. Many people can’t justify a buffet, but you don’t have to eat yourself into oblivion. $35 pp which isn’t horrible considering you get a bottle of wine.

Pizza Pasta, Maho. First time for us thanks to Dave and Britt. Very good food at reasonable prices. Not an empty table in the place. Tiramisu was almost lethal. We had a coupon for A free drink from JMB’s website and they gave all 4 of us free drinks to the tune of a $27 value.

English Rose, Anguilla. A reasonably priced “local” hangout with great food. I had a seafood pasta dish which might be the best I have eaten on any island. Large portion for $18. Susan had the Red Snapper with lemon butter sauce which was also very good. If you look around, not everything is sky high in Anguilla.

Quai Ouest, Oyster Pond. Hidden away on the shores of Oyster Pond down from Dinghy dock. Had my best grouper the whole trip, large filet done perfect 18 E. Most of their entrée’s are around that price. 1/1.20 exchange. Comp rums shots to finish. Since we can walk there, we go every year, but I would drive there if we stay elsewhere.

La Villa, L’Estaminet, Marks, Lal’s ,Sand Bar and The Stone were all great to good. Toppers we will not be returning to anytime soon.

Fun stuff. Spent a lot of enjoyable time with Dave and Britt from Minnesota including a overnight to Anguilla. Norms party was a huge success. (nearly a hundred people). Sunday nite lagoon cruise was very nice, will do that again. We like La Bamba on Sunday night when Category 5 plays. Beachs were mostly Orient, and Mullet, Dawn and Shoal Bay East.

Valentines night 2012. (bear with me)

Being the romantic? French chef wannabe that I am, I decided to cook Susan dinner at Les Balcons. The “fisherman” comes into Oyster Pond on most Tues, Fri and Sundays, and sells right off the boat. Being from Minnesota and cleaning, cooking and eating lots of fresh fish, I figured I’d hike on down there and pick up a few red snapper or something even better. With a full ,well equipped kitchen and a weber gas grill, no problem.
When I saw him come in, I hurried on down and sure enough, he had out his scale ready for action. The first thing I found out was he knew very little English. The second thing I found out was Tuesdays are his lobster fishing days, no fish. Hmmmm, having opened my big mouth about cooking dinner, I decided we would go with lobster. Being the metric conversion king that I am and trying to act cool, he held up a rather large creature and asked me if I liked that one. I said sure that looks pretty good. What H*#+ did I know. Then he says , “You want another?” I asked him the cost, and I think he mumbled something like 22. Not wanting to appear cheap to my valentine I figured we should each have our own lobster. He slapped them on the scale, and I vaguely saw 2. something. He put them in the thinnest bag I have ever seen, and they were not happy to be there. I asked him how much and he said $88. About then when I could start breathing again, I was happy I had a $100 bill stashed in my wallet.
Off I went, back to the room wondering what in the heck did I just do. I brought the bag out on the terrace where Susan was relaxing and set the bag down next to her feet. Not sure she was too impressed with where I set them down. I told her to keep her eye on them while I do a little research on my computer to help develop a plan. While I was inside checking appropriate websites, I noticed her moving rather quickly. She was making a “fence” out of the lounge cushions to help contain the lobsters who were now out of the bag and knew exactly what direction the water was from our deck.
I knew I needed to “dispatch” these fine crustaceans, but this was a little different than filleting a walleye pike. I won’t take the time to give the details ( for fear PETA people might be reading) but with Susan’s help and minimal injuries and property damage, we got the job done(actually the funniest part). After separating off the tails and splitting them we were ready to grill. We had mashed a garlic clove and melted a large amount of good New Zealand butter. We had a good amount of seasonings available to us which we used very little of. The grilling went very well. These were big tails, especially the one!
A formal description of the meal read like this; Grilled lobster smothered in garlic butter accompanied by French bread ,leftover scalloped potatoes from Marks Place and 3 bean salad from Grand Marche. This was paired with a November 2011 bottle of Heavenly something water from Grand Marche $.80 and a couple Caribs.
Susan said it was some of the best lobster she has had and I felt the same way. It had a very sweet flavor to it, better than I thought it would be. I found out later, you can get “bad” tasting warm water lobster and there is no good way to prevent it. After scouting some lobster in Gran Case and asking approximate weights, I’m pretty sure we had over 2 kilos of lobster and several people told us the price sounded pretty good.

Crime: We saw none, but did see more enforcement present on both sides of the Island. One road check on Le Galion, but they waved us through. I would have flunked if they checked for conch chowder consumption.

Traffic: We finally figured it out, but still got caught a few times. ( accidents really gum things up). I think the roads are in about as poor a shape as I have seen, but I know they are trying.

Weather: Apparently it improved right when we arrived. Virtually no rain, perfect breeze, no bugs where we were. Maybe the best ever.

Our 10th trip and they just get better. I never saw it back in “the day”, so we enjoy it as is. Like the rest of life, change is inevitable. The biggest question is how we adjust to it. In our minds, it is definitely the “friendly island”.

See you next year, thanks for reading. <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/handshake.gif" alt="" />