Saturday, January 07, 2006

Another Day in Paradise (Part 3)

Ok we have now reached the part of our perfect day that turned out to be slightly less than perfect. In fact it left me pretty much wishing I knew how to fly or glide or get anywhere without needing my feet. After almost being dumped into the water by the speedboat guy, he dropped us off at Ile Aux Cerfs for what was supposed to be an hour of chill time. The island was filled with partiers who wanted to do nothing more than drink and soak in the warm water.

We waded through the warm water from one end of the beach to the other. The tropical water was the same “just right” warm temperature as a newly drawn bath. Warm but then you get used to it and it transforms into lukewarm without your consent. (My apologies and thanks to Colin and Penelope for borrowing their descriptions.)

We laughed when we found cooler spots of water and stood for a moment in them to relish the difference. No frigid North Atlantic waters were these, we remarked as we plunked ourselves down to sit in the warmth of the water as it lapped upward every time a speedboat passed by.

After a while, Hubby decided that we should go up on the beach to look around. Now do you remember what we brought with us when we left the catamaran to go parasailing? (Go scroll up, I’ll wait.) Now the more apt question should be: what didn’t we bring. Exactly: our sandals.

We walked up the beach to a chorus of “Hot! Hot! Bloody effing hot!” as we searched out sand that was still in the shade and therefore cooler. Around the time we found a cool spot to stand, Hubby had another brilliant idea: let’s walk up the stone stairs to the covered bar area on the top of the hill. Now at first glance this would seem to be a good idea – but let me assure you that it wasn’t.

The surface of those stone stairs wasn’t as smooth as one might hope. They were, in retrospect, what appeared to be chunks of coral reef. Each chunk seemed designed especially for two things:
1. To retain heat and burn the bottoms of my already tender feet.
2. To cut open the bottoms of those tender, now burned feet.
By the time I ascended to our seating area in the closed café my feet were so sincerely sore I could barely walk.

I’m sure that in his guest blog Hubby will refute some of the following statements about what transpired next. But this is my version and I’m sticking to it.

Realizing that we had to return to the jetty for pickup, we began the 1 mile walk across more coral hot rocks, steaming hot sand and coral remnant line sand. I’ll admit that I whined a tiny little bit while we crossed these hazards but I was in serious pain! By the time we arrived at the jetty I literally could go no further.

When the boat arrived, Hubby battled with the skipper for my shoes so that I could have covered feet for the final 10 feet of my walk – this time across wickedly hot concrete. The only bright spot for me was the realization that we weren’t the only ones in this predicament. None of the other parasailers had brought shoes and several of the wives mentioned that their husbands hadn’t been as kind as Hubby. (Of course none of their husbands had the inspirational idea to walk across jagged hot stones either but I’m not going to go there.)

So how bad were my feet? By the time we were dropped off for the day I couldn’t even walk across the sand to get to the taxi without the slight cushioning of my shoes for the pain. Typ0 = wimp.

But let it be known that as a while the day seriously ROCKED. My sunburn turned into a tan and my feet were better by the next day. Parasailing was seriously wicked fun. And crossing the sapphire blue waters off the coat of Ile des Cerfs was amazingly romantic. And doing all that with the goofy boy you kind of, sort of like was pretty cool too.

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