5/11/07 – 5/18/07: Big Apple Villa (downstairs), Little Apple Bay, Tortola
Me, my wife and our son, and my wife’s sister and her husband.

Friday 5/11
8am flight (American) out of Philadelphia. Went to airport via van service. By the end of the 20 minute ride, we had my son (then 20 months old) saying “Yeeeeeaaaaaah, beach!”. Smooth flight. Kept our son amused until 10am, then we had to resort to the DVD player – hello Elmo. Arrived in SJU at noon. My wife’s sis and her husband were booked on the 1pm Cape Air flight to EIS. We were on a later flight leaving at 2:30. Bad food choices at SJU. Had to settle for “Subway”, which actually turned out to be pretty good. 20 minutes before flight time, I headed to the bar, slammed 2 shots of vodka and a Heineken for the flight. It’s all good.

Arrived at EIS at approx, 3:20. 1 bag missing. Wife’s sis had a Red Stripe waiting for me – warm, but satisfying. Cabbed it to Jerry’s at West End, and picked up the Montero. Cheryl from Purple Pineapple met us there and we followed her to the villa. What an incredible view of Little Apple Bay from the top of Zion Hill Road – WOW!!!!!! Love at first sight.

The villa was wonderful. Can’t beat the view. Cheryl was great – very friendly and a great, attentive host. Bobby’s provisions were all there (w/ some exceptions) – plus a lot of liquid surprises left by Fran and Map (thanks guys!, “hiccup”). Jumped in the ocean. Had a liquid dinner after my son went to bed.

Sat. 5/12
Son woke up at 6am – this day and every day we were there - ugh. We spent the entire day at the villa. In the water all day. Max loved the sand. Naptime at 1pm = “rumtime” for the adults. Snorkled all day. Saw what appeared to be a large puffer or porcupine fish and a lobster. I waited all day for my first Manpot sighting. Mid afternoon, while in the water, I got a wave from “someone” in the skylounge of CRC – yes sir – it was Malcolm. Wife’s sis and her husband went out to dinner at Myetts. I was not feeling so good – too much travel and booze, not enough sleep or food. Slept wonderfully that night

Sunday 5/13
We hit Sopers about 10am to pick up a few things. Max knocked over bottle of pineapple juice, glass broke, Harbour Market employee not too happy despite my profuse apologies. Checked out Kuralu – we had it booked for Wednesday for a Norman Island trip. Headed down to Smugglers until about 3pm. WOW!!!!! Now that’s a beach. Wife got some incredible shots of me and Max in the clear, clear water. We ate lunch at the BBQ, run by two very nice ladies who oogled over my son, and cooked me up some yummy kingfish w/ ockra and onions. Wife had the jerk chicken – very good. Snorkeled – saw a group of three squid hanging in formation above some coral. Very cool. Didn’t drink much this day. Needed to recoup.

Monday 5/14
Took the 10am ferry out of West End to Jost. West End was very hot, and Max was cranky. I knew it was going to be a tough. day with him. Max had a melt down on the ferry. I held him on the outer deck, so the engines would drown out his tantrum – it worked. Unfortunately, I couldn’t really enjoy the view/ride.
Hung out in front of Gertrudes most of the day. Wife and I took turns watching Max, so that I could go over to the SDB and see if I could spot some TTOL’er. Saw two people who looked familiar. I asked them – “are you guys TTOL members?” They said, “no, but they are”, pointing to a couple standing nearby who were walking over. It was Steve and Mel, aka, “Carribean5”.
Max was not having a good day. Seddy bought us some time be lending us a small inflatable raft, which we filed with water so Max could have a “pool”. He loved it – for a little while. Major meltdown – sand, sunscreen and salt in his eyes. He finally crashed on a blanket under a palm outside Gertrudes – he slept for 2 hours and 45 minutes – YES!!! I walked back down to Seddy’s One Love to thank him for use of the raft and to have a drink. What a great guy. He was waxing poetic “Marley-style”, and “performing” for his guests.
I was sitting at the bar talking with a woman and her husband. We were talking for about 20 minutes when I saw her pull out a notebook and write down my name and hometown. I asked her - “what, are you doing a trip report or something?”. She said, “Yeah, Travel Talk”. At that point I exploded with excitement said “me too – I’m ‘Bricksmythe’” She laughed, and turned a few pages in her notebook and held it up so that I could see -- It said “Bricksmythe, Philadelphia”. During the previous 20 minutes, I hadn’t even noticed that she and her husband were using TTOL coozees – More laughter.
After Max woke up, he sat at a picnic table and had his first ice cream sandwich. We were joined by another TTOL member, Sue – “Salica”. Later that day, my wife said to me – “wow, you TTOL people are really into it!” – Uh, yep.

Tuesday 5/15
Woke up and drove my sister in law and her husband to Roadtown to catch the ferry to VG so that they could explore the baths, which they had never seen. Me and my wife and son just hung out on the beach in front of the villa all morning. Great day. Max was an angel. I am sitting in the water at about 10:30-11a.m., when I hear a male voice call my name from behind me. It was Malcolm. Stood there and talked for about 15 minutes. Great guy- learned a lot of interesting tidbits about island life and the hoops that you have to jump through to buy property and obtain residency in the BVI. Max went down for a nap about noon. The villa was so close to the edge of the water, wife and I were able to sit in the water and still see and hear the baby monitor – nice! My wife and I sat in the water drinking Cruzan dark and diet coke and remembered what it was like to be just a married couple. It was really nice and relaxing just sitting there taking with her with no distractions and no tv. Water was perfect again that day. We took turns snorkeling.

After I picked up Courtney and Patrick from Road Town, we all headed to Myetts for dinner. I know about island time, but 1 hour and 20 minutes for 4 appetizers with the restaurant basically empty was al most more than I could take. However, I gotta give props to the wait staff. All the ladies were as delightful as can be. They all kept coming over and entertaining my son and giving him little “things” to keep him occupied and happy. Kudos ladies, kudos. After the meal Max chased a “doggie” around the beach while we all chased after Max. He was very excited and very sweaty.

Wednesday 5/16
Today was mommy and daddy’s day out. Wife’s sister was scheduled to watch Max all day. We were suppose to go on a daysail on Kuralu. However, we had last minute trepidations about leaving our son for an 8-9 hour period in a strange place. We cancelled with Capt. Robin early that morning. I felt bad about canceling at the last minute – I really did. But, my little guy comes first. As an alternative, my wife and I drove to Trellis to catch the ferry to Marina Cay. I was under the impression that the ferry ran about every 15 minutes, so I didn’t check the times ahead of time. Instead we grabbed some coffee and the cyber café and safe for while. Then we strolled over to the ferry dock only to discover that we had just missed the ferry, and the next one wasn’t coming for another hour. We both started to get grumpy. I knew something had to be done fast. I said, “look, this in our only day to be by ourselves – let’s go to the Loose Mongoose, slam a couple shots of Cruzan and a couple of Red Stripes, and cheer up.” We did. It worked great! On the ferry we met Eddie and Susan from Baton Rouge (a couple about our age), and hit it off immediately. We hung out with them all day. Ate at Pussers. Snorkeled and saw another stingray. However, all other marine life seemed to be congregating at the base of the cement pier just outside Pussers. There must have been 1000 fish gathered at this spot. Very cool. We dug Marina Cay – very beautiful. We got home to find out that Max had a rough day, a little fussy. That night, we got takeout from Sebastians. The spicy stewed conch was unbelievable. And, yes, it was SPICY!!!!

Thursday 5/17
Max woke up with a fever of 103.2. We were very stressed over this. We gave him some meds and he fell back to sleep for a few hours and woke up fever free. Since the swell was up and we wanted to keep Max off of the hot sand, we headed over the hill to Long Bay Resort and hung out at the pool all afternoon. Had a great time, cool pool, good rum, good food. Seems like a wonderful place to stay. That night, we had mote takeout from Sebastian’s. Had the surf/turf and she had the combo fritters – fish/conch. Another delicious meal from Sebastians. I highly recommend it.

Friday
Leaving today. We had purchased too much beer. I walked next door to the villa which was being remodeled by Cheryl’s husband, and gave him the left over Carib. Then, I took a walk over to CRC to say goodbye to Malcolm, get the grand tour of CRC and bring him our last 6 pack of Red Stripe. Great place – what a view from the skylounge.
Got to meet Ms. Manpot, Candice. She was great as well. I later realized that I should have brought my camera – could of got a picture of me sitting in “Da Ting”. Maybe next time.

Trip home was largely uneventful.
Cant wait to go back. Hope you all enjoy the pics.


PHOTOS