Ten days at Concordia - Part 4

[jmhouse]

part one
part two
part three

I'm slacking with these posts out of pure laziness. I'll try to do them more frequently so I don't stop before I'm finished. My memory is already starting to get fuzzy...

June 4, 2010

Today's plan was to get some sandwiches at Big Ben's and go to Waterlemon and snorkel the Cay.

But first a short lesson about solar panels. As most people know, solar panels convert sunlight into electricity. At Concordia, everything in the eco-tents runs on DC power from batteries charged by the solar panels. If it's cloudy/hazy out the batteries won't charge as much as they would on a clear sunny day. The amount of energy used in these tents is not very high but if power starts running low, the highest energy user gets turned off first. The three main things that use up power are the small fans, the lights (which were all CFL bulbs), and the fridge/freezer thing. The first few days of our trip were cloudy/hazy and also very hot/humid. So to sleep at night we had to run the fans constantly or we'd end up in a pool of our own sweat and extremely irritable. Well apparently that combination caused the fridge to turn off in the middle of the night. So we woke up with slightly warm fridge items (milk, sodas etc) for the first couple days. It only took one bowl of cereal with warm milk for us to learn our lesson about energy conservation.

Ok back to the good stuff. Again we had planned to go to Big Ben's to grab lunch for the beach. I wanted to use the cold sodas to keep the small cooler cold (each eco-tent has a small cooler to use at beaches etc). We stopped at Big Ben's as planned and got both breakfast (egg and cheese on english muffin with coffee) and lunch for later. The lunch was just some turkey sandwiches. The breakfast was delicious enough that we ended up going back several days during the week.

So we drove our way over to the Annaberg area and took our time getting ready to go. Just as we were about to leave the parking lot and hike to the beach, a truck taxi showed up and dropped off about 20 people. I'm not sure exactly where they were going (Waterlemon or Annaberg), but we decided to just go to another beach. So we detoured over to the North Shore Road with no real destination planned out. Maho looked a little packed already, and Trunk would be soon enough. The Jumbie spots were completely empty however. Done. Parked it and hiked the short trail down to the beach. Empty. Perfect. The new trail down to the beach is really pleasant. I remember the short road walk and wooden stairs from my trip in 2007 and the new trail is definitely better.

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4723001710/" title="Jumbie Bay Beach by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1026/472 ... ef6b_b.jpg" width="900" height="600" alt="Jumbie Bay Beach"></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4723422846/" title="Beach Setup by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1250/472 ... a917b3.jpg" width="500" height="333" alt="Beach Setup"></a>

We did some snorkeling as other people slowly trickled in and spread out at different ends of the beach. It doesn't take many people to show up for it to feel crowded there. But looking over towards Trunk reminded me of how crowded it could be. I liked the snorkeling here but the GF didn't. Looking back though, she was right (as usual. how does she do that?). If we had to rank our snorkels from this trip Jumbie would be last. But I still liked it!

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4725178864/" title="Spotted Trunkfish by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1024/472 ... 116f3e.jpg" width="500" height="333" alt="Spotted Trunkfish"></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4725178990/" title="Coral and Rocks by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1023/472 ... 7b9465.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="Coral and Rocks"></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4724527169/" title="More Coral by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1426/472 ... 16ffb8.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="More Coral"></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4724527271/" title="Coral by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1222/472 ... c917cf.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="Coral"></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4724527397/" title="Yellow Fish by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1209/472 ... 353bd7.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="Yellow Fish"></a>

OK so my photos from here don't really do it justice. I think I just did more swimming around than taking photos this day.

After snorkeling we both dug into our sandwiches and they were delicious. I walked around and took more photos around the beach and then we headed out.

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4723464874/" title="Jumbie Bay Seagrapes by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1136/472 ... 95da_b.jpg" width="900" height="600" alt="Jumbie Bay Seagrapes"></a>

On the way back to Concordia we stopped by the smoothie truck. I love that place. We relaxed a bit around the tent and took showers. Then we decided to head to the pool for the rest of the afternoon. The plan was to bring a change of clothes and go straight to dinner from the pool.

I walked around and took some more photos around Concordia to pass the time. Plus it's a nice walk around the boardwalks and stairs.

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4725299462/" title="Drunk Bay by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1101/472 ... a99211.jpg" width="500" height="333" alt="Drunk Bay"></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4725299566/" title="Stairs are good for you by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1051/472 ... 843190.jpg" width="500" height="333" alt="Stairs are good for you"></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4725299688/" title="Hermit Crab Gathering by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1044/472 ... ed20cd.jpg" width="500" height="333" alt="Hermit Crab Gathering"></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4725299778/" title="Bat Crossing by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1028/472 ... af48c2.jpg" width="500" height="500" alt="Bat Crossing"></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4725299852/" title="Concordia Studios by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1398/472 ... dbd0f6.jpg" width="500" height="333" alt="Concordia Studios"></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4724663345/" title="Concordia Stairs by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1368/472 ... 7156_z.jpg" width="640" height="427" alt="Concordia Stairs"></a>

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4725315276/" title="Concordia Boardwalk by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1201/472 ... 204f60.jpg" width="333" height="500" alt="Concordia Boardwalk"></a>

We left around 5 and decided to check out Sweet Plantains. We got there and found out they don't open until 5:30, so we just walked around along the waterfront for a little bit. I skipped rocks on the water, but it was kind of hard with the small waves in the harbor. It was still very nice outside as it seemed like the humidity was starting to break.

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmhouse/4728653176/" title="Coral Harbor by matt house, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1370/472 ... 25a7_z.jpg" width="640" height="427" alt="Coral Harbor"></a>

We headed back toward the restaurant as 5:30 rolled around and got a table in the small back room area. The open windows next to the garden there are really nice. This was probably our favorite meal of the trip. It's a little on the expensive side but worth every penny. I honestly can't remember the exact meals we got, but it was Friday so one of them was one of their Indo-Caribbean specials. Soooooo goooooood.

After that we just went back to our tent, played some board games, and went to bed with happy stomachs.

[Kentuckygirl]

Nice report! I'll have to go back and read your other installments. I haven't seen Concordia, so I really enjoy seeing your pics from there. Thanks!

[jmhouse]

Thanks! Concordia is definitely worth checking out in my opinion (which is slightly biased), even if it's just to eat at their restaurant. The food is great there and it comes with a really nice view.

[onthelake]

Great shots of Concordia! We stayed in a studio for a few days and loved it!