Some pics of my recent Caribbean vacation... and my experience with Zika. :(

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tRidiot

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Ok, so time for some more, I suppose.

So here are some pics of one of Saint Vincent's cool attractions that aren't the beach, lol. This is Dark View Falls, up in the rainforest on the north part of the island, near the volcano, La Soufrière,

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This is Fort Charlotte in Kingstown, which featured in some of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies.

These cannons were made in the 1600s, they have dates on them.
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Looking down from Fort Charlotte at a shipyard - this yard is where the Black Pearl was built. My sister-in-law works here.
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We got one night away from kids and everyone, at Buccament Bay Resort.

Here's the view out of the living room of our villa on our own little private pool. lol
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At the resort's main area with 2 tiered infinity pools overlooking the ocean.
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Same area when we went to dinner that night.
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And during full daylight.
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This night at Buccament was when I started to get sick... I wasn't sure what was going on, I had a slight rash on my right arm, but it only affected an area where my tattoo was inked, and the intervening areas with no tattooing were not broken out. The rash wasn't bad, didn't itch, it was just raised and bumpy. My wife joked that I'd caught Zika, which is widespread in Saint Vincent at the moment. We knew her best friend and her husband had caught it the week before... but I didn't pay it any mind. Doh.


So, the next leg will be the playground of the rich and famous.... this is a picture from under the wing of the tiny little plane that flew us from Saint Vincent to Mayreau. Mayreau is one of the Grenadine Islands and belongs to Saint Vincent, but it is invite-only. You can't just book a flight, you have to have permission from one of the island's residents or businesses. The flight was under 8 minutes. Lots of very exclusive and ridiculously beautiful homes. We were invited by the head caretaker of Tommy Hilfiger's estate there, who is a friend of the family. So I will upload some pics of all that later. This pic is Saint Vincent. Those two islands are also seen frequently in the movies.

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tRidiot

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Ok, so here is the actual place we stayed in Mustique... originally we were going to stay at Tommy Hilfiger's guesthouse, but apparently they decided to renovate it just before we came in and it was all torn up. The main house was rented out while we were there, I think it rents for $80k a week. :hypnotize: Yes, that isn't a typo... $80,000 per week. So, anyways, because the guesthouse was not available, we had to settle for this place - it's called The View.

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And here is "the view"
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Multiple balconies, all the windows opened wide, very spacious and airy.
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Here is a random deserted beach we found while driving around in our moke.
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Some random rich person's house overlooking said beach.
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Kids! Take 'em to some of the most beautiful spots on earth and what do they want more than anything??? WIFI! Sheesh! So this is the rooftop bar and restaurant above our villa.
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And here is the rash I mentioned earlier, spreading over my whole body. Literally, all the way down to the tips of my toes. I think the only place I didn't get it was the soles of my feet and the palms of my hands. This was when I finally began to be convinced, or at least concerned, that I might actually have Zika... I was extremely achy, feverish, crippling fatigue - I could barely walk DOWN the stairs from the top of the hill where we parked our moke to the apartment/villa/whatever. Tylenol and ibuprofen barely seemed to make any difference, and I just had to suffer through it.
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dennishoddy

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Nice Digs! Beautiful accommodations and view.
The deserted beach brought back some memories of our travels in the carib.
On the Yucatan in the 90's, we would stay in Cancun or one of the resorts south.
Rent a 4WD vehicle, and find a back road to a beach with nobody but us on it. We had some really great times.
Early 2000's, we did the same, but noticed we were always being watched from a vantage point. Finally saw a news report that drug runners from South America were using those beaches to import their product. We haven't been back since.
Seems the older we get, the heat takes a toll. I love to dive and snorkel, and could probably do that daily, but my wife is done with the heat on vacations.
Zika is scary. Getting anything like that on vacation really sucks. Hope you weren't pregnant. :blush:
 

tRidiot

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Got a lot more pics to put up, but spent all day yesterday in Tulsa shopping for school supplies and today had a meeting with my State Representative. Hopefully that issue will go somewhere, but for now, it's off to work. Maybe I'll get a few moments later tonight if things calm down... but looking at the moon phase, I'm not holding my breath:

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crrcboatz

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That place looks like Heaven. Wonderful pics and sounds like a place to visit. How well does the American dollar do there? Are things pretty reasonable? Airline tickets? Please fill us in.
 

tRidiot

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It's not cheap to get there, took two days flying each direction. We overnighted in Fort Lauderdale (I slept in the airport since I was by myself), but you can choose the place you overnight and book flights accordingly. Frequently you can overnight in NY, Miami, Puerto Rico or Barbados are the most common. Tickets will run over a grand and up to $1500-2000 around the holidays.

Eastern Caribbean dollars have a fixed exchange rate with the US dollar of $2.69, I think. You end up paying EC$2.71 to buy a US dollar and get EC$2.67 to sell US dollars.

Cost of things is in the range of US funds, depending on what you buy. Things harder to get on the islands will cost you slightly more than US, like a soda may cost EC$5, but buying locally-made goods and foods may be cheaper, somewhat. Any of the touristy places you're going to pay US prices and higher. The resorts we stayed at, mostly priced in US with EC conversion that made it prohibitive for locals. They don't make very much down there, overall.


They are building a new airport which will reopen flights to US airports. JetBlue is already trying to negotiate contracts, I think. They've been working on the airport for 12 years and it has been bogged down by typical corruption, pandering and foot-dragging to bilk more money out of the government by the contractors and committees involved. It could have been opened years ago. We are hoping it will be open this fall, meaning alot more flights and less layover. We are considering moving to South Florida, and that would enable us to make the flight in one day rather than 2 days each way.
 

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