#jobfish

久しぶりにアオチビキ発見!!!

前はソウシハギとかの水槽にいたけど、今のはイトヒキアジ水槽にいましたよ〜

体躯も顔も好き

Breakfast this morning was a little bit better. We had the chickpea curry today and asked to sit away from the large families. The staff today seemed much more attentive than they have been and J even got a plate of watermelon.

We went back to the room and did more admin, including getting caught up on Tripadvisor reviews. We then headed to the Silhouette medical centre by buggy for our 11th COVID test. This was a quickie – barely 5 seconds. We then stopped by the dive shop to get information about snorkelling tours. The buggy driver was a friendly chap and told us a bit about the island. There is a shop, but it is only available to the locals. Apparently all the staff have received a COVID vaccine and should be getting their second dose shortly. For now they are not allowed to visit the main island as it is quite locked down. He also explained that this Hilton is popular with families as there are no cars. This means kids can safely run wild and unsupervised around the island.

We have also figured out that they are doing a lot of renovation during the downtime. Not so nice for the current guests, but it will likely help when the resort reopens properly.

We took the Silhouette history tour today. We jumped into a buggy which took us to the Silhouette museum, at the Grann Kaz restaurant. This was the plantation home for the Dauban family, a French, aristocratic family that owned Silhouette island from around 1860 – 1960 and ran it as a coconut, breadfruit and vanilla plantation. We saw the original house as well as the mausoleum, where some of the Dauban family are buried. We also saw the local village where around 50 local villagers live. The rest of the island is apparently reserved for the Labriz hotel and staff. There is also a small conservation contingent who live here as well. It was a nice tour and we learned that Catherine Dauban still haunts the plantation house at night.

We had our usual happy hour drinks and went back to the Grann Kaz for dinner. The German family with the behaved child, a little boy named Otto, also got into our buggy to the restaurant. They were friendly.

The food at the restaurant was decent to good. S really liked the hearts of palm salad. Unfortunately they were out of avocado, so J basically had a plate of tomatoes. S’ octopus curry and J’s creole jobfish were fine, but again, not spectacular. Weirdly, J noticed the creole sauce here was similar to the creole sauce she had in St Vincent. The atmosphere at the restaurant was pretty lively and we saw a group of 8 adults that were having a great time and were still going after we left.

J got 4 mosquito bites today. S got considerably more as he didn’t wear his repellent today.

When we arrived at breakfast, who did we see, but the large German family with the baby girl from the night before. The baby was being allowed to crawl in the middle of the walkway through the restaurant. As S can’t see very well and the restaurant is dim, S almost stepped on the baby. J had to alert him at the last minute. Having had enough of inattentive parents and feeling sorry for the poor baby, which almost got squashed, S told the father that S is sight impaired and almost stepped on the dad’s child and if he doesn’t care about his kid, that’s unfortunate, but he shouldn’t let his child crawl on the floor of the restaurant. The family were speechless, but hopefully will now take care of their child so it does not get hurt.

True to our word, we had the lentil curry for breakfast with hardboiled eggs on the side. After breakfast, we visited the hotel gift shop. J replaced her water shoes and bought the last bottle of industrial-strength 100 DEET mosquito spray in the shop. Clearly other guests had the same fondness for mosquitoes as J and cleared out their stock. S also picked up a cool Hawaiian shirt with a beach print. Unlike Kenya, where stamps are only sold at the post office, J was able to pick up a postcard and stamp for her parents.

The good news is that it’s so warm that J’s coconut oil has liquefied again.

J decided to spend the day in the room selecting and editing photos from our safari as she’s gotten so far behind in posting. S spent the afternoon in the bathing suit optional outdoor pool. The pool water was extremely warm and about the same temperature as the air. Somehow he avoided the swarms of mosquitoes J could see from the room and avoided getting massacred. While J was on the computer playing music, she heard the mysterious animal noise again and spotted a lizard crawling on the ceiling. Housekeeping explained that as we are in the jungle, it’s not possible to keep lizards out without spraying the room. S, having grown up with chameleons in his house in Florida, rejected the spraying idea as toxic.

We went to the bar for happy hour and once again ran into our favourite German family, baby in tow. This time the dad actually paid attention to the baby so she wasn’t screaming. Dinner was at 4th Degree, the beach restaurant. This restaurant has outdoor seating on the beach, in the sand, like Barefoot at Sandals. Apart from a table of Italians, we were the only guests dining at that restaurant. It is possible that others have gotten the memo that the food at this restaurant is not the best. J had to send back her chicken as it was inedible. S had the jobfish with creole sauce on the side, which was OK, but nothing to write home about.

Once again at dinner our peace and quiet was interrupted by screaming British children and a hungry kitten. This time the kids were older and were running around the restaurant area. It turns out their parents were probably having a quiet evening away from the kids. At some point the kids stood at our table to ask our waiter for a few drinks. Somehow our waiter from Madagascar had become an English nanny. He was a good chap and put on a Bob Marley playlist as he loves reggae. We have now heard Bob Marley in every country on our trip with the possible exception of the Maldives.

We went back to our room and called it a night.