Cruise Ship "Invasion" and "Cookie" Birds

Honeymoon Day 6 - Saturday, May 7, 2011 - Cane Garden Bay, Tortola

On Saturday, we slept in, as was our usual. This morning we planned to save our swimming for the afternoon since the previous morning had been a little chilly. Instead, we decided to bring our books to the beach and read while sitting out in beach chairs.

Before we headed out that morning

When we got to the beach, we found something quite different than we'd see the previous 2 days.  There were about 100 people on the beach, instead of 4-10 like we'd become accustomed.  If you've been reading all these honeymoon posts, you may remember that our taxi driver from the airport when we got to the island warned us that there were 2 days (Tuesday and Saturday) during our trip when there would be cruise ships docked at the island.  On Tuesday, we slept in so late that we barely saw the cruise passengers and those we did see were headed back to the ship.  On Saturday, though, we were up a little earlier and shared the beach with them for about 2 hours before everything returned to normal.

It was a little strange to see; the beach was bustling in a way that it wasn't the rest of our time there.  There were other beach chair vendors who chairs were stacked and chained the rest of our trip, but on Saturday morning, all the chairs were set out and several beach bars were operating. One of the vendors actually mistook John and I for cruisers, and asked us when we had to be back to our boat. By about noon however, everyone from the cruise had cleared out, the vendors stacked up their chairs, and the extra bars closed up.

We decided to eat lunch this day at the one beach bar that was open everyday: Stanley's Welcome Bar.  We heard one of the other patrons explaining that, years ago, when they first came to this beach, Stanley's and a restaurant on the far end were the only things on the beach.  Now, there 6 or 7 restaurants.  We started our lunch with some Conch Fritters, which were quite good, and then I had a Salmon Burger and John had a Bacon Cheese Burger.

After lunch, we went for a swim and read on the beach a little more.  Then, we showered, ate some ice cream, and headed back to Myett's for some internet action.  I brought my phone again to get some sunset pictures.

Not sure what inspired me to take a picture of my feet in the sand, but it seemed appropriate at the time.  :)

There were a couple interesting large sand sculptures out on the beach that evening

John catching up on a little internet news

For dinner, we went back to the cottage and had sandwiches (and more ice cream). Then, like most other evenings, we read our books while relaxing in the breeze. Each evening as we were enjoying our nighttime read, there were some unusual sounding birds in the area - John nick named them "Cookie" birds because they sound like a little kid saying, "Coo-kie?" in a high pitched squeak. There were bird noises all day, but the "Cookie" birds only made those noises in the evenings. After John pointed out the sound they make, it was hard not to laugh and say "Coo-kie?" all evening.  Just one of the many things that add to the charm of the island.

"Coo-kie?"