Our last day on the island was Sunday. What a glorious day! No waking up to an alarm (which is the opening riff of Kickstart My Heart on my iPhone), no need to be anywhere that would turn us into brain sucking zombies in 13 seconds flat, just a full day of nothing to do. And that is exactly what Mrs. Hardy wanted to do...nothing. Aaaaahhhhhh! I turned her lazy! No one thought it could be done! But my influence, the Caribbean sun and sea and vast amounts of rum accomplished the impossible! Bwaaahaaahahahaha! Unfortunately for her, I dragged her ass out to the little death trap on wheels (as so coined by Nixon; thanks man!) and off we went for another day of driving by clairvoyance. Our plan was to drive around the island to Rum Point and Kaibo beach. I figured no matter what the road did, if I kept the water to my right, we'd get there just fine. Let's hear it for those critical nursing skills, shall we? I had gotten pretty good at driving on the left by this time, even if I did give away my foriegn-ness by turning on the windshield wipers every time I wanted the turn signal. Damn backwards car. After a 45 minute drive we arrived at Rum Point. This is when we knew we were in the right place
That's right! We're on Cayman time, baby! (I'm still on Cayman time but that's neither here nor there, really!) Did I mention that Pepsi is like the national drink in the Caymans second to rum? No wonder I like this place! We decided that a trip out to Stingray City would be a fine idea, even if Mrs. H. was as leery of the sting rays as she was of the turtles. We took a beautiful sail on a catamaran
(This is actually of the catamaran coming in to dock...not that you can tell, but isn't the water pretty?) The crew was a mixture of young tanned boys from New Zealand, England, Australia and BAHRAIN of all places! So Mrs. Hardy chatted up the captain (he was the one from Bahrain, she doesn't chat up strange men for no reason, I promise) and got some of her fears relieved about the adventure she will be embarking on in September. He did mention it got a little wild when the Saudis came over for the drink and the prostitutes which he mentioned was Bahrain's national product. To which I commented, "So, it's like Thailand then." No one disagreed. I'm not sure these boys were old enough to know that much about prostitution... :) We arrived in Sting Ray city and entered the water to play with the sting rays..which are basically underwater dogs. Or giant, swimming portabella mushrooms. Take your pick. Mrs. Hardy has the waterproof camera so that's where the pictures are. I'll post as soon as I wrassle 'em out of her cold, dead hands. On the way back in Mrs. H. asked if she could drive the boat and the captain heartily agreed. And then left her alone at the wheel. Did I mention she'd never been on a catamaran before, let alone sailed one? We let him Know the facts and he rather rapidly jumped back up to help.
Monday morning came awful early as our flight left at 0730 and we had to return the rental, get through security (haha! can you say cakewalk?) and most importantly, figure out the rum situation for Mr. Hardy. You can all breathe a sigh of relief, we entered the US with rum on board. We also sat next to a chatty young man who felt the need to tell us about every purchase he made in the Caymans and took us under his wing to guide us through customs in Miami. Really, dude, we can read. I shouldn't be catty, he was just trying to be helpful, but I had a lot of travel ahead of me and had no desire to be coddled. In Dallas, we ran into a young man who was returning to Ft. Lewis and bonded with our smart ass attitudes. Although he almost got smacked when, walking through First class I mentioned something about the "walk of shame," meaning that I felt like First Class looks at you as the scum of the earth when you walk by. (Like that line from Snakes on a Plane: "Coach? Is it safe there?") He looked at me startled, and I said, "Not THAT walk of shame!" And he said, "Oh, good, because you're too old for that." Listen, puppy, I'll have you know that I've never done a walk of shame, but really, I'm not sure if you can be too old for that. There are probably people in nursing homes who do the walk of shame! Now, there's a visual!
Oh, look...pics from Mrs. H.
Me and the portabella mushroom of the sea. Tried to get a stingray hickey; no such luck.
Mrs. H. and the man from Bahrain doing some sailin'!
We've decided we should live there... Mr Hardy wants to open a bar someday, why not in the Cayman islands? They can run the bar, I'll be the serving wench who treats sunstroke, dehydration and stingray hickeys on the side, the boys could attend the international school, and I'd be available for when the Hardys decided to reproduce. It's a fine plan!
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