Cupcake

One early evening my friend Israel and I were on our way to a captain's licensing course. We decided to stop at Starbucks for a cup of nectar of the gods that they peddle there. We stood in front of the counter as the barrista turned to serve our coffee, and I looked over at the pastry case. The only thing left at the end of the day was a cupcake. Without really thinking about it I said "cupcake" out loud. The barrista turned and looked at us with an incredulous gaze, "Did you just call him Cupcake?" she asked. "What, no I meant the only thing left is a cupcake." "Oh, I thought that you were calling him Cupcake, a pet name or something." she said. We all broke out laughing at the thought. Israel is a big, muscular guy, calling Israel "Cupcake" would be like calling a rottweiler "Fifi". But that was it, from that day forward I would call him Cupcake. It doesn't end there, when his girlfriend heard that I was now calling him Cupcake, she had to find a pet name for me, and so Muffin it was. And so it came to be, we are now Cupcake and Muffin. Yeah, it really gets the neighboring table's attention when they hear it.

Okay, onward to our real story, so I convince Israel to come stay on the boat for a couple of days, and take a break from that pretzel of a life he is leading. It's almost a 3 hour flight, and a 2 hour drive after that. I picked him up at 3:30 pm, and drove to a member's warehouse to stock up for the next 2 days. We bought enough alcohol to drown in, and enough meat to choke a horse. It's true, never shop hungry or thirsty. When we got to the boat we had a bona fied storage problem. I didn't have enough room in the refrigerators for all that food. We had to go out and buy ice to fill some coolers. Yeah, we're gonna have a great time. We made ourselves a couple of drinks, and I showed Israel around the marina grounds the first night.

The next day we drove out to the southwest corner of the island, to a town called Boqueron. This little town has an air of "Key West", lots of bars and restaurants, lots of street vendors, right on the water's edge. The kids went swimming while we went bar-hopping. After we were all tired from our chosen activity, we went looking for food.

The vendors had Oysters, clams, octopus, and conch. Some vendors had pinchos, or kabobs of a variety of meats. I really liked the conch, it was as tender as I have ever had it. The clams were pretty good too, Eva even had some. We stood by the vendor and ran up a big bill. We even took some to go, it was so good. We took the scenic drive home, and had a few more drinks when we got there. In an exercise of excessiveness, I baked 6 Cornish hens, and a crab bisque. We were all experiencing great discomfort from over-eating. Yeah, that's what I'm talking about! Another drink please.

The next day Israel discovered that there would not be room for him on the plane, he was flying standby, so his vacationette got extended by a day. We decided to take him to a waterfall that we had discovered while touring the island with my brother Richie and his wife Betty. This waterfall is not in any of the travel guides, we came upon it by chance. It is not only beautiful to look at, it is great to swim in.

Israel scaling his way down the sides of the waterfall.

This is the first tier of the waterfall.

Marie and the kids at the bottom pool.

Marie and Eva at the foot of the falls.

Hadrian and Eva in the Jacuzzi.

Hadrian in the Jacuzzi.

Hadrian jumping off a cliff.

There are 3 tiers and a pool at the base of each. The lowest pool is also the largest, and Hadrian likes to climb the cliffs around it, and jump from them. The water is cool by Canadian standards and freezing by mine, but the kids love it. We spent the day there, and it was great, but we were hungry again. We had so much food at home that it made no sense to eat out. We had a late picnic at the marina while watching Eva try-out her new paddle board. Just before dusk I saw a sailboat enter the harbor. I could tell that they were cruisers because of the jerry jugs tied to on their deck, a sure sign. I was feeling friendly so I waved them over. Later we all met up at our boat for cocktails. I spread out plenty of hors d'oeuvres, and we shared stories for a few hours.

A picnic at the marina.

Eva Learning to paddle board.

New visitors to the harbor.

A little help from Mom.

It was hard to get up the next morning. While the clock said it was time to get up, my throbbing head said different. It was to be a sluggish morning, we got out of the boat at noon. Israel had a plane to catch, on the other side of the island. We had just enough time to have lunch before he needed to be at the airport. I just had to take him to Raices, a local dive where they serve brontosaurus pork chops. I love watching the expression on people's faces when they're served these huge chops!

The brontosaurus chop!

We waddled out, and made it to the airport right on time. What a great time we had had with Cupcake. This is what life is really all about, sharing joy with family and friends...Okay, who is coming to visit us in paradise next?