lessons from my vacation

after two days of working, I finally was able to relax and begin to enjoy the break. i couldn't help myself and had to log in to document a few lessons learned from this trip: my second visit to the warm and sunny bipolar island of St. Maarten/St. Martin (the south side is a Dutch provice and the north French) It's like two vacations in one and on one day this week, we plan to venture to an entierly different country, Anguilla, which is a favorite destination to celebrities because it so remote. This sleepy island is so scarcely populated that the last time we were there five years ago, we barely missed seeing the two day carnival celebration by 1 hour. Miraculously, the streets were VERY CLEAN and there were NO SIGNS whatsoever that boisterous parade had traversed there merely hours before.

but I digress. Lessons learned from this trip:

1. When you shop at the grocery store, opt for locally manufactured foods. That imported stuff is TRES EXPENSIVE! Actually, I learned this lesson when I flew thru Iceland a few years ago and discovered that because everything must be imported into the cold island, a bucket of chicken for example cost $55.00!!! EEEK!!! Once the quality of the product isn't too compromised, going local is safe.

2. When you have an option of rental car companies, it's not always best to try to scrimp and go with a local company. We usually stick with Hertz or another international company because we know there are certain quality standards and if we have a problem, we can easily contact and follow thru with a US based rep. When we visited Aruba, we went with a local company without incident, however, on this trip, we had to turn in three vans before getting one with a working air conditioning unit. With 100degree days, planned hour plus day trips and three small children, we weren't too eager to just "settle" for the mediocre ac unit in our van.

3. If you can spare a $1 per bag, opt for the sky cap. Ours we used when we flew out of town, not only loaded our bags on the trolly, he checked us in, skipped us ahead of other passengers waiting to check their bags, and then carted our bags off to security for us. That was the best sky cap service I had ever gotten and now I know to demand and expect the same or similar from others.

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OT: I am truly blessed because on more than one occasion, I've left very valuable items on public transportation and each time they have made their way back to my possession without any incident or anything missing (as in the case of a lost wallet a couple of times). This time, I left my brand new (albeit horribly scratched) Blackberry on the first leg of my trip. There was indeed an announcement...TWICE. once in Spanish and another in English. No one claimed it. Thank God. I was sleeping. I am a bit still peeved at my mom, husband and mother in law, who were traveling with me and the children for (1) hearing this announcement; (2) knowing my track record of losing crap and (3) failing to check with me to see if it was indeed my "crackberry". Alas, my baby sister did not tell me about the announcement until we had landed in Saint Maarten and I was frantically searching for the phone. Thank God, the flight attendant who found it was gracious enough to contact my last number dialed.

photo credit: lamkevin on flickr