Delphi Club, Abaco 1/17/2019 Th

This is the last post from the January Delphi trip that I didn’t fully post.

No pictures of eggs for you this morning. You must be sick of them by now. Here are some lovely flowers. I have never seen any guest put flowers in their hair. Don’t even try to get me guessing if a flower behind your right or left ear means you are single, married or on the prowl.

Today was our last day. As such, Steve was not going to go fishing. We decided that we would go on an adventure and try to find a Blue Hole. Blue holes are deep holes in the limestone bedrock filled with fresh water. The slightly acidic fresh water has dissolved the limestone to create drainage holes. V decided to tag along with us. Would it be a good or bad decision? Well, stay with me and you will find out.

There is a book in the lodge that has maps and information of the various tourist sights. Did we take it? No. Did Steve think he knew where the blue hole was? Yes. Did Steve even know there was a book that had the information? No. Did Linda bother to inquire if Steve might want to bring the book with us? No. Did Linda think that Steve knew what he was doing? Yes. Was Linda wrong? Stay with me and you will find out. Did Steve think they were going to find Blue Holes? No. Did Linda think they were going to find Blue Holes? Yes.

Quick update: For those quivering with anticipation, as if there was any other way to be; Steve and Linda remain happily married.

First picture is one of the guide boats. The guide sits in the back and drives the boat. When he gets to the fishing spot, he can climb up on the back platform and look for fish while using a long pole to push the boat. There is no electric motor on these boats. If the guide starts getting old he will sit on the platform and not stand on it. I don’t blame him, I don’t like heights and being up there would make me nervous. However, the guide has a better view if he is at the higher spot. The sport sits on the seats until the boat arrives at the fishing spot. Then he will stand up on the front platform. He can lean against the metal bar for support. That long pole on the left of the picture is the pole to push the boat along. If I were to tag along with Steve all day, I would be sitting in that chair the whole long day. No where to get out of the sun, no place to get out and stretch your legs. Basically trapped the whole day. Now if I remain at the lodge, like I usually do, I can go a nice bathroom anytime, soak my feet in the pool, jump from couch to porch swing, or to bed in the room. We are in the Bahamas so we Steve got to drive on the left side of the road. The steering wheel was on the left. Steve came this way nearly every morning on the way to the boat launch. This is the parking spot for the guides. They have already launched their boats. This is the launch spot. Not particularly scenic is it? I should have known that we were on a fool’s errand as the sign was directing us to caves and not holes. We decided to look for Nancy’s Cave first. No, I did not find out who Dan, Nancy, or Ralph were. Nor, if have they been found. Well, we never did find Nancy’s cave. The road looked like it was beginning to end, so we turned around. There were small trees growing in the dirt road, it looked like not many people had been this way recently. This looked more like a place where a cave might be found. We either have a sign post waiting to happen, or a sign post ready to be removed.

This is where you might have your picnic before or after you visited the cave. We did not bring any food with us. Since you are reading this, you know that we safely returned from the adventure. Look how slim and trim Steve is in this picture, it looks like he didn’t gain any weight on this vacation at all! When Steve reviewed my post for editing he scoffed at my comment that he is slim and trim. I will say that he is trim then. Well, this looks promising. Come along, won’t you? Here is V, she was such a good sport to come along with us. This is the interior of the cave. It was not very tall, We all took a peek and then retreated. We could hear all sorts of gurgling and sloshing noises from the area. On the way back I thought “Oh, let me return and take a little video of the exciting sounds!” Of course, when I got back to the mouth of the cave, SILENCE!On our way to our last cave. You might think that Steve was our fearless leader, but my now I am sure you all know, that Linda is always in the lead. I was already on my way back, as I thought this trail was a bust. Last cave. You can see the water has a bit of an blue tint to it. Well, that was the end of our adventure. I wanted you to see some of the bark of the trees in the forest. There are fires and a lot of the vegetation is destroyed.

After much discussion it turns out that there was a massive communication error about this adventure. I thought we were going to look for Blue Holes. Steve thought we were going to look at the caves. So he was correct in what he was driving to. I was incorrect as I was not paying attention to what he was telling me we were going to see!Back at the lodge, safe and sound we all had lunch on the veranda overlooking the ocean. I should probably let Steve get the ocean view, but I am greedy, and like to look at the ocean. When he is out fishing all day, he can look at the water all he wants. You can tell it is a travel day, as he is wearing one of his plaid shirts. One of these days I will count how many plaid shirts he owns! I had the mahi mahi on romaine. Steve had the chicken with Chinese noodles and vegetables on a green salad. We all had ice cream bars for dessert. E from DC didn’t care for hers, so J, her husband ate two. He reminded her that when you are off the coast of Africa for nine months on a naval boat, you vowed never to decline ice cream in the future. Steve had remarked at dinner one night about this poem in one of the bathrooms off the great room. I think most females never even notice it. After all, why would we? It is on the wrong wall! Then it was off to the airport where we waited for our flight to Fort Lauderdale. This is a picture of Marsh Harbour International Airport. Currently it is closed at night as the runway lights are out. They had better get that fixed soon! The building on the right is the old airport. I can’t even remember what that looked like, it was very small though! Back at Fort Lauderdale airport we had a long layover. Better a long layover than missing your flight due to bad weather. We ate at the Jack Nicklaus restaurant. Steve had the chicken with fettuccini.

I ordered the grilled cheese with tomato soup. I also ordered ice tea with lemonade to drink. “You mean an Arnold Palmer?”, the waitress asked? “I thought you weren’t allowed to ask for that in this restaurant.”, I said. She looked at me as if I were nuts. Now don’t tell me I was the first person to say that. Now that could be the case, as I often am the only person to say something awkward!

While at the airport I got an e-mail from S. Did I know of any good restaurants in the Florida Keys? I live to serve, so I looked up a number of restaurants on Yelp. I hope they turn out okay. I do hate to disappoint my fans!

One thing I have just realized is that I should have asked S from Scotland to dance with me. Or at least pretend to dance as there was no occasion to dance while at Delphi. If I had, then I could have claimed to have danced with a man who had danced with the Queen!

No questions today. No one ever seems to answer them. Nor are enough of you liking my blog posts. You get them in your mail box, or stumble upon them somehow. Please take the effort to like them. It is pretty simple. Just click on the like button at the bottom of the post. For those of you who are liking them, thank you from the bottom of my heart. Now, let’s see if my like numbers increase! For the truly adventurous you can even add a comment! It’s really not hard to do!

Another update: Steve and I are going to England in May to see visit with Peter and Jane (Peter ran the Delphi Club for years). Guess who we are going to see there? V and her husband J! I keep telling you that we meet people again! In fact, J described us to Peter as “delightful”!

Tomorrow continues our trip to South America in 2017. I will however end up taking another break of that trip as we are going to Argentina again Saturday night!

Delphi Club, Abaco 1/15/2019 Tu

This is not an April Fool Joke as I discovered this all last night. it turns out that I never finished my blog posts of the trip to Delphi that Steve and I took in January! There was much more that happened than what I had posted. Try to follow along, I am sure it will be terribly confusing!

More fried eggs again! I may surprise you someday and order something else for breakfast! I often order waffles or French Toast when I am in a restaurant. This post was written before my visit to the internist where he put me on Lipitor and said watch your cholesterol! Today was the last lunch for A, J and S. They were flying to Nassau, spending the night at the new Baha Mar, and then off to Miami to drive to Cheeca Lodge in the Florida Keys. I have always wanted to stay at Cheeca. Maybe if A starts a blog, I will be able to read about it. Start a blog A!

Here is our big bowl of blue corn chips and dips. I am dipping my chips in guacamole, more often now. I’m still not sure if I like it. I draw the line at ordering Avacado Toast, that’s just too trendy for even me!

I ordered the Mahi Mahi on field greens. I neglected to ask for no olives. Every one but J ordered an ice cream bar for lunch. J is trying to keep his figure.

After lunch I hugged A, J and S goodbye. J is an extremely strong hugger! I don’t know if he knows his own strength! He probably does!

S gave me a very high compliment. He told me that he had met many wives of big shot executives and that they are dull as shit. I however, am one of the most interesting women he has ever met! I was really touched, and couldn’t wait to rub it in on Steve that he is VERY LUCKY THAT I PROPOSED TO HIM YEARS AGO! Unfortunately I had to wait many hours until Steve came back from fishing to tell him of my absolutely wonderful compliment from S.

Speaking of fishing, Steve caught 21 fish today. None were big enough to unseat C, one of the new guests, from head of the table. C caught a seven pound bonefish. Steve, however still has the record of a nine pound bonefish that he caught last year. C lives in Marco Island Florida, so he probably catches bonefish all the time. Our first canapé was smoked mackerel mayonaise on a …well it wasn’t mentioned on the menu card, so you can decide if it was a pitette, croute, or cracker! Next up was pork fritters, with a soy sauce dip.

During our pre dinner conversation I introduced myself and did a minor interrogation of our new guests who lived in the DC area. Yes, I did ask them if they worked for the government and if they were affected by the government shut down. He is with the Navy, and she works in the Pentagon. As the department of defense had their funds approved prior to the shutdown they are being paid, and are working hard to keep us all safe. Not that the other people who are working and not being paid are not working hard, nor keeping us safe. They are, and when we were in the airports I made sure to tell the TSA individuals that I hoped the shutdown was settled. They were all in good spirits. One thing I noticed is that the people who I call “the barkers” were not barking orders in the airports anymore.

I asked many questions of our guests from Washington. I will keep all the answers to myself. Our starter was a conch salad. Something that I do not care for at all. I ordered the rack of lamb. I asked it to be cooked medium, as the other night it was a little too rare for me. Steve ordered the hog fish. A terrible name for a tasty fish.

I sat next to J from Ireland, one of the barristers. The other barrister D, you will remember returned home. Our new friends from DC asked J the same questions that I did about the wigs and robes! Great minds think alike! Of course I could only understand about every third word that he said! I do wonder if I am unintelligible to him. Dessert was a delicious coconut creme brûlée. Steve didn’t eat it as he doesn’t like coconut. I bet his weight gain this week will be less than mine!

How much weight do you gain on vacation?

Do you like Mounds Bars, or Almond Joys? Both are coconut based, so Steve abstains.

Can you keep a secret?

Abaco, The Bahamas. 3/26/2019 Tu

It’s our last day, and we are all up early. Usually Steve has breakfast and is all ready to go fishing before I get up. Most of the non fishing spouses are this way. Nothing worse than getting in the way of an angler with a one track mind, to get on the water and jerk some fish lips!

Here is an actual picture of the untouched fruit bowl! You know I had to be up early to take this picture!

Here is a picture of some of the pastries. They are made fresh every morning. Or at least they are put in the oven and baked fresh. I am not sure if they are pre made or not. I will have to investigate that next visit.

There are also savory danish. These have cheese and small pieces of ham in them. You know that I like the sweet ones more! More oatmeal doctored with raisins and coconut and some kind of dried fruit. Lots of maple syrup and some butter, so maybe I am not doing so well in the cholesterol lowering diet after all.

Here we have a map of Abaco Island. Steve’s finger is about where the Delphi Club is located. To the lower left is Sandy Point. That’s where Nancy’s is. I wrote about our trip to Nancy’s in my December 2017 blog post I believe. Steve goes wading here. To the north west a bit is Castaway Cay. It’s correct name is Gorda Cay, but the Disney Company bought it and they can call it whatever they want to. It’s a long boat ride there, but when the cruise ships are not there, the fishing is great. Steve was fishing there one time, and was waiting patiently to spot a fish. One of the guest saw him and questioned his Dad “Is that a robot?” He was used to all the automatronics in Walt Disney World!

Just to the west of Great Abaco Island is the Marls. That is where most of the anglers go fishing. I think if you tried to go by yourself you would no doubt get lost and die. Not a good way to start your vacation at all!

Soon it was time to settle the bill and then have Margery pick us up and take us to the airport. I did not have special attention on me this time. I have learned to keep my mouth shut and not ask any questions.

Here is the group getting into the plane. Steve is watching out that he doesn’t trip on the little ones.

We had no problems with the flight. Looking for a place to eat was another adventure. You know by now that I adore points and deals. Well, with some of our credit cards I get membership in Priority Pass, which gives you access to airline club lounges. Fort Lauderdale Airport didn’t have a lounge, but one of the restaurants lets you have up to $26 worth of food per card holder and the same for the guest. Well it took us 15 minutes at least to find the restaurant. I had one card, and a number for the membership for the other card. I figured we would get free lunches as we had two cards with two guest memberships. “Of course!” They said. Unfortunately they only accepted the membership with the one card, saying they couldn’t accept the written down number on a scrap of paper. I think they are going to charge my credit card for four admissions, instead of two. So that will be an extra $56, when we probably only spent half of that on our meal. Not to mention the $20 tip that M left. Steve hates my attempts to get deals on this type of stuff. I agree, it would have been better to just eat lunch at the restaurant near our gate. Except last time we ate there we had lousy service!

Last picture of our trip. I went over to the David Gandy display at the perfume store. One last kiss! What’s funny is that when Steve had his beard, I used to hold his face that way so I wouldn’t get my face all prickled from his beard!

Bearded or Smooth Shaven?

Do you even know who David Gandy is?

Do you know that I have 164 followers now? Yippee!

This is the end of the Delphi posts. I will resume tomorrow with more of our South American trip from 2017. You do want to know what happened in South America-don’t you?

Abaco, The Bahamas. 3/25/2019 M

Good morning!

More fruit and then oatmeal for me. I have been very good and not had any eggs this week. S, our new friend from England has been having Eggs Benedict every morning. They looked really good, and I was seriously tempted to try them, but I was good and stuck with oatmeal. Hopefully my cholesterol will go down and I may try a bite in the future.

While the guys were off fishing, the ladies who lunch on the veranda lounged about on the couches in the great room.

In case your forgot, this is the Great room. S sat on the white couch and crocheted. I sat on the orange couch and read. M sat on the other white couch and read and texted. She gets a lot of texts! Every few minutes we would hear a “zing!’. More dips and chips for lunch. I felt so much better that I could even lean over to grab a chip. The previous days, I had to have someone hand me a handful!

M was able to convince the kitchen staff to make her some iced tea! She got a whole pitcher of it and almost drank the whole thing. I did have a glass, along with my glass of rose.

I had the Mahi Mahi again. M had the Chinese chicken salad with avocado instead of the chicken. She partially destructed the artful arrangement of noodles before I could take my picture. Shameful action indeed M!

We were offered raisin cookies. There were originally 8 on the plate. I ate seven of them. I do seriously have a sweet tooth!

We decided to go pool side after lunch. This is truly my happy place!

I stayed under the umbrella and M was in another of her many bikinis that she brought. No wonder her suitcase was so heavy!

We were both pleasantly surprised that we were not bitten by many bugs. I had brought my clothes that had insecticide applied to the fabric. No doubt my limbs will be falling off in ten years-but look Mom! No bug bites! M used a bug spray that one of the ladies from Michigan had brought. It is called Smidge. We can’t buy it in the states, but I will look for it when Steve and I go to England in May. I may end up buying an even dozen bottles of the stuff!

G and Steve went to Cherokee Sound to fish today. Cherokee is gorgeous but the fish there are very difficult to catch. Steve did end up gettin one fish on his last day, about ten minutes before they were to return home. G got skunked, but I think he had a sufficiently good time to decide to come again. This picture is from a tree that had blown over. Those are conch shells in the roots of the tree. Just in case you are guessing that conch are good climbers, NO they aren’t. They crawled into the roots before the tree was blown over.

Speaking of conch, the first canapé was conch fritters.

Here is a picture of two of the lovely ladies who were serving us dinner tonight. The other canapé was humus with olives on a cracker. I don’t like olives, so I passed on them.

Here is Steve meeting one of the new guests before dinner. Steve is always pontificating about something, I am not quite sure what was said. Perspective is everything, another guest also named Steve was standing behind my Steve. The new Steve was a larger man than MySteve, but NewSteve is practically hidden!

Here is another picture of M’s iced tea. It was dark and sweet!

The first course was crab bisque.

It was Jason, the chef’s night off, so dinner was not as fancy. I had the chicken with mushroom pie. Dessert was very interesting. The top bits were chocolate nibs, then, underneath was a fruit crackly shell and under that was a layer of semi melted vanilla ice cream. I didn’t like it, but I still ate almost the whole thing!

Here are M and G, not sitting on the couch K-I-S-S-I-N-G, but G is explaining the intricacies of fly fishing. M is a very sweet wife, and is pretending to be interested. A few weeks back Steve and I watched a Dave Chappelle show. He did a skit about a box that people could push that would say “Wrap it up!”. It could be used when you heard a politician, bloviating about some nonsense, or when clergy took too long in getting to the point of a sermon, or the part of the skit that put Steve in hysterics the most-when someone was hammering away in bed having sex, and taking way too long. Anyway, I think that Mary is wishing she had the wrap it up button around so that she could push it!

Max remarked after dinner that he hadn’t made an appearance in the blog. Well that is because he has not proposed to Nicole yet, and it is way past time for him to do so! If he doesn’t watch out, an extremely handsome guest will sweep Nicole off her feet while Max is busy changing the flies in his leader!

Final tally for the four days fishing: Steve had 15 bonefish, and one barracuda. None of the bonefish were of any great size. G had four bonefish, and a pin. M had a tan, and Linda had a back attack but no bug bites.

Last post will be tomorrow with an appearance of a David Gandy poster!

Do you ever think “Wrap it Up?”

When?

Or do you just think of England?

Abaco The Bahamas. 3/24/2019 Su

Sunday morning and we have a surprise picture from Steve of the fruit bowl untouched by everyone else. Steve is up early to go fishing and took this picture for the blog. He is such a good husband to me!

This cinnamon danish was supposed to be in a circle, but it went on strike on the way to the oven. It was still tasty! Steve gets up early to be sure he gets one!

I didn’t do much today, as my back was still sore, but not as much as yesterday. One of the guests gave me a velcro back brace. She had broken her back four times, and always carries one with her. It helped me stay more vertical.

I was able to go to lunch. Here is Mahi Mahi one a bed of greens and fresh vegetables.

Steve saved the day and got a fish in the last hour of fishing. G got a nil. The fish were not cooperative, they did see fish, but they did not like any of the flies presented. Better luck next time!

M and I spent the afternoon sitting by the pool. Then at 3 I had arranged to have a massage therapist come to give us 3 massages. M and I were both definitely going to have massages, it was up to G and Steve to decide who would get the massage. G was the winner of that contest!

First canapé was shrimp popcorn with red pepper dip.

Next up was smoked mackerel mayonnaise.

Our starter was stone crab claws. Usually they have a horseradish dressing. As Steve and I both dislike horseradish, we had ours plain. G picked his clean! Um um um.

Steve and I each had the Mahi Mahi on herbed quinoa.

G was sitting next to me. He had the Osso Bucco. I really like Osso Bucco, but have yet to have it in a restaurant cooked as well as I do it at home. So it was fish for me. The other night we had dinner with friends. One of the guests loves duck, and prepares a phenomenal duck himself. He ordered it and was disappointed that it was not as tasty as his version. So I went to school on that lesson, and had the fish instead!

For dessert we had banana beignets. A very sweet dessert.

That’s all for today.

Yes, my back was a bit better.

No, I will not post pictures of me in the back brace. I described it as a very unsexy corset.

No questions today, but I will announce that G got a pin for catching his first bonefish! I inquired of Max if Steve could get a pin also, but it is new this year, and only for those that have never caught a bonefish before. Steve may have to come back with an alias, to get that pin!

Abaco, The Bahamas. 3/23/2019 Sa

Breakfast had a pretty pineapple arrangement. As I mentioned earlier, one of these days I will come to breakfast before the hordes have had a serving of fruit.

After breakfast M, the two Michigan ladies and I went down to the beach for a walk. I started out ahead, as I knew that I would end up at the end of the line.

My goal for the morning was to reach the end of the beach on the short end. Almost there.

Mission accomplished, it was time to go back. Here is J from Michigan, she was looking for little beads, from fishing nets that were in the seaweed.

M kept on going and I went up to the room to do some stretching.

Which did not go well at all. My back seized up, and I had problems walking. I did make it up for lunch though. Grilled cheese and tomato soup again.

M had the Caesar Salad with sliced avocado.

My back had started to act up a bit when I was stretching so I went back to the room to lay down a bit. I was thinking about going into the pool, hoping the water might help, but I could not move further than our door. By the time Steve came back from fishing I was in really bad shape. Here I am on the floor. I had just taken a hot shower, Steve had put me in the chair. When he came back I was laying on the floor. I was feeling a faint coming on, and decided that if I was on the floor already I wouldn’t have far to go if I did faint!

First canapé was spiced apple on brie and a cracker. It is lovely and looks simple to make. I think just a little bit of chopped up apples in honey.

Next up was pork fritters and Cajun mayonnaise.

Our starter was a roasted peach salad on greens. I love fresh peaches, so I always find this salad especially yummy.

G had the beef tenderloin for his main.

I had the duo of lobster. One part was done in a tempura style, the other part of the tail was grilled. I gave some to G so he could have a surf and turf.

Dessert was really yummy. We had creme brûlée with an almond frangipane (that is cookie-for those of us like me who call a cookie a cookie) and a guava pastelle (jelly candy).

G hit the jackpot as he got to finish three. Steve doesn’t care for it, and M knows G loves it so, she gave him hers. She is a very good spouse. I wouldn’t give up a chocolate dessert for Steve!

G actually finished all of them! Here he is being silly and pretending to slurp them all up!

G and Steve had a good day fishing. G is working on retrieving his cast.

Yay! G got his first bonefish! He ended up catching four bonefish! Steve caught 11 bonefish and a barracuda.

Will my back recover?

Does G have sillier hats than Steve?

Will I have something different than grilled cheese for lunch tomorrow?

Abaco, The Bahamas. 3/22/2019 F

Good morning! It is a beautiful day here. Back home In Poughkeepsie it is cold and rainy. At M and G’s home back home I think it is snowing! When we left the crocuses were just starting to peek their buds out of the ground.

Since I got a very bad result for my cholesterol levels the last time I was at the doctor’s, it is no eggs, but oatmeal for me. That and Lipitor are my new best friends. One of these days I will get up extra early, so that the fruit bowl looks a lot nicer. There were many non fishing spouses at breakfast today and they all wanted to know what the white speckled fruit was. My devoted blog followers would know the answer-it is Dragon fruit. So named because the outer part of the fruit looks like dragon scales. The

Did you know that fruit had protein in it? I didn’t.

After breakfast I took a short walk down to the beach, and then went back up and walked on the private limestone road. Earlier in the day, one of the guests was running along the road and saw a litter of piggies. She was afraid that the mama pig was going to attack her. I am always afraid that a wild boar will jump out of the bushes and gore me. Steve says that they are afraid of people, and would more likely turn around when they saw a human. I sure hope so, I don’t want to have to post LindasExcellentAdventures at the hospital.

Then it was back to the room for my stretching.

Soon it was time for lunch. Here is M enjoying the view. The Club is in process of improving the view and have cut down a number of trees.

The chips have changed since last time. We had triangular chips when we were here in January. M and I each had the grilled cheese and tomato soup for lunch. I had a glass of Rose. As it is Lent, M is abstaining from alcohol and Diet Coke.

I asked if there were any cookies after lunch, and we got some lovely mini banana muffins, and fresh fruit.

The rest of the afternoon was spent poolside. M did some laps, while I read one of my romance novels. M is reading the James Patterson book about Jeffrey Epstein. I am looking forward to all of the men involved in that scandal having their names announced. I am not sure if they can be arrested, but at least they can be shamed.

I had fun watching a little hermit crab walk across the patio, but have decided that although I found it interesting, I don’t think that the video was blog worthy.

The guys were late getting back from fishing. G and Steve spent the day wading. Steve caught three bonefish and a barracuda, of no great size. G had a nil for the day, but came very close to catching his first bonefish. Unfortunately, it was eaten by a shark halfway to the boat. He has just started to learn how to fly fish, we are hoping tomorrow will be a better day.

Gazpacho shooters were passed around. Dinner might have been even more fun if they had vodka in them!

Next up were baby scallop tempura, with pickled ginger dipping sauce.

Our starter was Tuna Tataki, Chritophene salad, micro greens, wasabi kewpie and citrus soy. I don’t like wasabi, so it was a little bit too zingy for me!

My entree, which I forgot to take a picture, of was Rack of Lamb. Steve had the Grouper.

At the Club this week were two couples from Michigan, One of them has a house near M and G’s Lake House in Michigan. H is 81 and plays in a jazz band once a month. So M and G will be taking a road trip to hear H play next summer. Another couple is from Boston. Unfortunately their flight was cancelled, and they couldn’t get to Delphi for two days! We have a couple from Brooklyn staying, I didn’t get a chance to talk much with them. We also have a couple that rented a house in Green Turtle Cay for a month. She surprised her husband with an overnight trip and day of fishing here. They are hoping that there is room for them to stay an extra night. At first I thought the whole trip was a surprise, but it was only this part of the trip.

M sat next to H from Michigan. He asked her why she wasn’t drinking, Now she could have been insulted and jokingly said that she was a raging alcoholic. Instead she told him the truth, that she gave up alcohol for Lent. He looked at her with a scowl on his face and said one word, “Fool!” and then when she said she also gave up Diet Coke he responded “Diet fucking coke? Does that even count?”. And she said, “That was even harder than the alcohol!.” Then M knew H was AOK,and he even gave her a copy of the CD for his jazz band.

No picture of dessert, as we had fruit and cheese for dessert. Everyone enjoyed the cheese, as everyone must know by now, I prefer something sweet for dessert! We did get some home made chocolates, dusted with coconut for dessert.

Will Greg catch a fish?

Will we get any people from the UK visiting? Everyone here now is an American.

Will there be a betting pool on hermit crab races?

Delphi, The Bahamas. 3/21/2019 Th

We are back to the current time frame. So all those who only read blogs posts about the current situation can rejoice!

What’s a good blog post with out some eye candy? You should know from past blog posts, that I find David Gandy terribly attractive. Steve gives me lots of grief when I mention that I find someone terribly attractive. I mistakenly mentioned years ago that I found the former senator from Massachusetts, Scott Brown as terribly attractive. Steve found this quite amusing. You remember him, he posed for as a nude centerfold years ago. Not that I have any of his pictures stored under my mattress or as screen saver….Anyway, back to the present. I have only eyes for Steve and David Gandy looking smolderingly from the window of a perfume store. Sigh.

Well our friends M and G are on the trip with us. They must have thought I was nuts to all of a sudden dart away from the TSA pre check line to take some random picture of a perfume store. Steve, who tries to remain unsurprised by my darting, could only roll his eyes. He knew there must have been some bright and shiny object to distract me.

M and G were instructed to go left, at the Pre Check lane, Steve and I to the right. Their Line looked shorter, and I was quite disturbed. I got more unhappy as our line seemed to be stuck in a holding pattern as -I kid you not-rolls of toilet paper had to be placed on the conveyor belt of the x-ray machine one at a time.

Eventually enough rolls of the toilet paper were removed from the box and it could be smashed enough so that the big box could go through the scanner.

We finally met up with M and G. They ended up in the regular line and had to remove their shoes, while we did not.

We found our gate where we sat and sat. We were pretty tired already, as we had a 5:15 car pickup from our house. M and G had to be up even earlier, as they live 20 minutes away.

There was a man sitting across from us, who seemed to be quite proud of his legs. Steve got me chuckling as he mentioned that the man “Must be very proud of his yams”. Yams? I started to giggle, they are called “gams, not yams!”. “Gam’s are only describing female legs, anyway”, I retorted!

We finally loaded onto the plane. Steve and I each had aisle seats. I looked at the seats on the left and the right. There was a large gentleman on the left, so i picked the lady on the right to sit next to. Steve doesn’t’ let anyone invade his space. He is a manspreader! The girl next to me was petite, and I didn’t have any problems with sharing the row.

I watched A Star Is Born. I liked it, but I am always driven crazy by managers and other friends who only have their own lives as a priority. I had seen the other versions before also, with Judy Garland and James Mason, and also the one with Barbra Streisand and Kris Kristofferson. After A Star is Born, I got to watch Bar Rescue, which is always one of my favorites. I like My 600 pound life, and also Hoarders. I do like to watch other peoples problems!

I was quite excited about the second Bar Rescue that was aired at 12:00, all about a Titty bar called Chicks on Dix! Unfortunately we landed and I missed the outcome!

Oh, well I will just have to try to find it on television another time!

We landed and wandered around the terminal until we found our gate. Although we didn’t have precheck, the line through the regular security was short. Our gate area was deserted as our flight wasn’t going to depart for another three hours.

We decided to have lunch at Nick’s Tomato Cafe. M is hidden behind G. Steve and G are wearing plaid shirts. Steve alway seems to wear a plaid shirt on his traveling days.

The pizza was very good. Steve and I had the mushroom pizza. M and G had the vegetable pizza.

We also each shared a plastic box of salad.

The guys were still a little hungry so we ordered another meat pizza.

Our waitress was a little bit cranky, so Steve deducted two dollars from his tip for her crankiness. Years ago, we used to eat dinner at a local restaurant and Steve loved one of the waitresses cute hair. He always left her an extra dollar because of her perfect hair. This way 30 years ago when a dollar was worth something! We ended up knowing her socially, and always laughed at the story.

Our plane was delayed for over an hour, but we finally were called to the gate and onto the plane.

Unfortunately Steve and I got the dreaded row 3, with no window.

I asked Steve if he could ask the flight attendant if we could move up to row 2 as no one was sitting there. She was really nice and let us move up.

We flew out of West Palm Beach and there were lots of private jets. This beautiful plane took off just before us. Someday I may have lots and lots of money and be able to blow it on a private jet ride! Now that will be a very excellent adventure! We flew over the coast, and got to ogle at all the big high rises.

After about 45 minutes we landed at Marsh Harbour. There had been a lot of rain earlier in the day. We were hoping that the coming week would not be filled with rain. Our first canapé was fried artichokes with dip. Sorry about the fuzziness, I must have been shaking the phone with excitement at being at Delphi again.

Second canapé was tuna on a cracker, or more formally vitello tonnatto!

Our first course was watermelon salad with feta cheese.

No one claimed the biggest fish, so Max took honors of head of the table. Steve, G and I had the Hogfish, with soft polenta and asparagus.

M, who is a vegetarian, had the lemon couscous, with asparagus and broccoli.

For dessert we had Ibiza mint and anise cheesecake, with Dulce de leche cream, and blackberry coulis.

That’s all for today.

Will M and G still be our friends by the end of the vacation?

Will G catch his first bonefish?

Will Steve sit at head of the table?

Delphi Club, Abaco. January 16, 2019

J was a good sport and let me take a picture of his Eggs Benedict. Not that he would have been able to stop me of course!

Not much was happening and it was soon time for lunch. Today I had the mixed greens with orange and wahoo. Of course I had an ice cream bar for dessert. Soon it was time for dinner and we had fried artichokes for our first canapé. Second canapé was tuna poke.

E and J took the house car to Marsh Harbour where they took the ferry to Hope Town. V and I were most interested in their adventure as we had been staying at the lodge and not going offsite our whole stay. As I expected, it turns out that V and I made the right decision. The park and ride lot was all full, so they had to park a mile away form the ferry and walk to the pier. By this time they had missed the ferry, and had to wait for the next one. The ferry ride was very nice, however. When they got to Hope Town, they didn’t rent a golf cart and instead walked around. The distances were a little bit further than they thought they would be but they had a great time. They went to a cute restaurant and ordered conch chowder, conch salad and conch fritters. I would have been miserable with all that walking. However E and J are young, in top notch shape, and are in love. What other kind of day are you going to have? Plus, they were away from my questions for a number of hours! Steve got head of the table. I wanted him to pretend to toast me, but he refused. At dinner I was suitably grumpy, but then was distracted after I had heard about E and J’s day.

That is J from Lexington at the bottom left of the photo. He is originally from Belfast but now lives in Lexington Ky. Next to him is J from Belfast, he is one of the barristers. Next to him was V from England. You will remember J from breakfast He is married to V. Then there is Steve. Next to Steve is E. She is from DC. Her husband is also a J, must have been camera shy. Then we had two guests at the table. They were staying at an Airbnb south of Delphi. He was from England, and she was from the US. She has lived in England for the last five years, but still eats her food in the American style. Many of the guests here use their knife and fork in the Continental style. I try to switch it up and dine in the Continental style while we are here, it is very difficult to do so! Our starter was shrimp bruschetta. Steve and I each had the grouper with asparagus and crab pilaf. Dessert was a banana tart in with spice ice cream. Steve loved it, which shocked me as he does not like fruit at all. J wanted to get a group shot of the table. Additions to the picture from last time are J in the plaid shirt at the upper right , and V from England via Scotland on the lower right, and Max, front and center. Since Max has refused to propose to Nicole, I am limiting my effusiveness. Once he proposes I will tell you what an excellent job he is doing at Delphi. We had more chocolates after dinner. These were pure chocolate so Steve was thrilled.

Steve caught nine fish, his largest was 3 and a half pounds.

As we were going to leave the next morning, Steve and I stayed up to chat with J, J, and V. The others all retired early. Much was discussed, no problems were solved, but a good time was had by all. A lot of wine was drunk.

What is your favorite fruit?

Do you have a vacation wardrobe different than your regular duds?

Do you follow Continental or American style dining?

Delphi Club Abaco. January 14, 2019

Another day and more eggs. Let’s see if the fruit is different today. Yes! Today we have added a new fruit. Dragon fruit! This is what they look like before they are cut up. It tastes very similar to a melon.Today we had four new guests arriving so we had a bigger crowd for lunch. The breeze had settled down so we were eating on the back veranda again. You can tell that I claimed a seat with a view right away. There are my reading glasses designating my chair claim! I decided to try the beef burger with sweet potato fries. They also offer a pork burger. I have not tried that.

The afternoon was more reading, blogging and stretching. I did soak my sore feet in the pool a bit. The cool water really helps the itching. Our first canapé of the evening was conch fritters with a dipping sauce. Next up was hummus on baked pitettes. Pitettes is just a fancy name for a cracker. These guys had olives on them. I passed as I don’t like olives. Our starter was crab and pumpkin bisque. Steve and I had the chicken and mushroom pie. It was yummy. An alternative was fish pie.

Dessert was Delphi Tiamisu.

J from Scotland sat at the head of the table tonight. S actually sat next to me. I teased him “You are daring to sit next to me again?” He joyfully bantered back to me “You know all my secrets now, there is nothing left to tell!” Well it might not have been that exactly as I am terrible at remembering stories, but it was of a similar meaning.

When we stayed in December one of the guests was a writer. He had ghost written a number of autobiographies. None that I was allowed to find out, as he was a ghost writer, after all. I inquired “How can anyone remember conversations that they had years ago?” You actually can’t unless you have a phenomenal memory, or keep a detailed diary. The guest told me that he needed to fact check a number of facts that clients had given him. Upon further research, the stories didn’t jive with the truth, and the clients had to be gently reminded of this. They were rarely happy that they had to tell the truth. I think they preferred thinking that they were responsible for all the team wins when they were high school football players, or the excellent business deals made were all due to their financial acumen.

At dinner there was a lull in the conversation and I asked S from Scotland if he knew any Burn’s poetry. Well he serenaded me with quite a few stanzas. I could only understand every third word, but it was enchanting! He did not just recite the poem, he used great facial expressions and emoted with such style! It was grand!

Mr. V from England as opposed to Mrs. V, married to J; told us a story about his wife. Before they were married she would accompany his fishing. She would row him across the lake to all the good fishing spots. What a brilliant match V thought! After they got married she stopped accompanying him, and certainly didn’t row the boat. Now that is Bait and Switch! To be fair, V said he didn’t expect her to row his boat forever.

I also have forgotten to mention that the male V, not to be confused with female V married to J ], is a fly tyer also. Steve wanted to see his fly collection, so Steve brought his up during the cocktail hour a few days ago. I was hoping that V would remark “That is a nice fly, at a few of the flies that Steve had tied”. He did! V brought down his flies (as he was in one of the upper rooms, he would have come down to meals as opposed to us staying in the lower level and coming up for meals. Totally unnecessary comment, but it keeps my word count up!) Steve thought V’s flies were also nice, and may tie his flies a little bit different. Although as Steve’s catch percentage had been very good, he might not need to improve his fly selection.

The female V, married to J has also been plagued by the itches. I gave her a number of my extra antihistamines, and anti itch lotions. Let’s hope they help. Steve had not been bothered by the itchies at all. Only some of us have those irresistible pheromones that attract any and all biting insects. V and J are going to another resort next week, and it will be miserable to continue with all this itchiness. I return to Poughkeepsie on Thursday to a possible snow storm coming this weekend!

Steve had a slower day and caught five fish.

Have you written an autobiography?

Is is full of lies?

What say you, pitettes, croutes, or crackers?