Saturday night... fever (sorry - I tried to resist)

Hunger brings us back on the ship. Well, one of us is hungry anyway. I enjoy today, more than ever, the appetizing display of fruits. Then I go back to sleep. I sleep through the farewell pool concert with the New Birth Brass Band, through the autograph session with Poncho Sanchez, the wine hour featuring Roberta Gambarini's latest CD....

The concert tonight is the Marcus Miller band again. I think I'll skip it this time. Loved it the first time, but I'll save my last Denoral for dinner. I want to go and chat up the neighbors again, try and make a better impression than last night maybe. But I'm still nauseated and not hungry (between the healthy snacks and the flu, I'll end up being the only person who has lost weight on the cruise!!!). We do have a lovely dinner again. I learn that the brother from New Orleans is named Dean Ellis. He is a DJ on the local jazz radio station and works at Emeril's restaurant Nola. Cool. I'll make sure to call upon him if I ever get back to NO. I'm putting a link to his show's podcasts on the blog. Go check it out!

Again, I wish I could hang out more, but... oh, does that pillow feel good.

Saturday, Bahamas

When the sun rises, we are in the Bahamas.

Our stop of the day is Half-Moon Cay, which you won't find in any guide book. It turns out to be an island owned by the cruise company.

The global view is stunning.

Up close, it's very Disney. With a back channel built so that the boats used to disembark us are not visible from the idyllic, interminable white sand beach. There is a fake village square, and a small wooden church. All white. By the time we get there, all but the Tshirt store are closed. Even the little post-office is closed. I understand that it's Saturday, and that any decent post-office is going to be closed. But, once again, the island belongs to the cruise company. It lives for the ship. There is nothing here, other than housing for the 40 something crew who stay on at all times. Incomprehensible.

Right in front of us, zooming by, is... Roy Hargrove.

He is stylish with the ship's signature blue towel around his neck. But he's quite rude - he does take a picture when asked, but without a word, and dashes away as fast as possible. Diva attitude here again, as he did last night during Gambarini's set. The dude ain't no Dianne Reeves.

The beach is unbelievable. The sand is blindingly white, and of a texture I have never felt. It is so soft that it almost feels like foam. It's an amazing sensation.

The water is a bit cold to be really comfortable, but we are happy to lounge in one of the gazillion chairs spread out all along the beach. You're not bothered by the neighbors, either.

Friday night, one more show

I really want to go see Roberta Gambarini, who sings tonight in one of the small lounges. I was moved by her one song during the Roy Hargrove show, and I want to hear more. So I drag myself there. The seats are not as comfortable as in the big concert room, but we are very close to the stage. She is truly fabulous. A smoky, sensuous voice. And suddenly, who show up - Roy Hargrove. Reciprocating. Does one number. Then disappears. Then he reappears, clearly unwelcome, and does silly trumpet sounds during one of her songs. She keeps it playful, but is clearly irritated. Then he disappears again. And doesn't reappear when he was supposed to... Not sure what's going on between those two, but it seems a bit contentious.
Mrs Moody, the wife of James Moody is in the audience. Roberta salutes her. And asks whether Moody is here to. The answer: "no, he's practicing". Not rehearsing for an upcoming show with someone else, mind you. Practicing. At 84, he still spends his evenings practicing...
Great night altogether. But my pillow feels very very good.

Friday night - Herbie and cute dress

Tonight is the special concert with Herbie Hancock. Can't miss that. So I time my next Denoral so that it will start working at 6:30!
It is also formal dress night. I wear a long, satin blue dress with bejeweled straps. It fits quite well; I work on the hair and make up (naturally flushed cheeks...). In the end, I look good (sorry, no pictures - don't blame me), but, boy, do I feel lousy. Dad is quite strapping in his suit.

This turns out to actually be a bit of a disappointing concert. Herbie is not all there. He could actually very well not have been there for part of the set - he plays recorded sounds, which suggests that the rest could also very well be.
However, he does a phenomenal duo with the young Swiss harmonicist of the Marcus Miller band, Grégoire Maret. Plays something on the keyboard, the kid repeats on the harmonica. Makes it harder and harder, longer and longer. And the harmonicist just keeps repeating. The audience are on their feet. That kid is a genius! It's his big day.

After the show, we go to dinner. This time, Ronald has reserved our little table. The menu is somptuous. Unfortunately, I send back most of it untouched; which worries Ronald, not about me - (I haven't said anything about being sick. Who knows, maybe they'd put me in quarantine at the bottom of the ship. I just try not to come to close to anyone.) but about the quality of the food. I keep reassuring him that it's delicious. I even refuse the lemon drop that the sommeliere automatically orders for me - yeah, I'm known around here! Our neighbors are back too. We spend a lovely evening discussing with the father and the two sons. We learn that their dad spent quite a bit of time in France as a GI; specifically on the west coast. He knows Royan and La Rochelle. The conversation changed topic before I got a chance to ask whether he knew Chatelaillon!!! I still don't know their names, but they are totally charming. It turns out one of the brothers (the one from Miami - the other lives in New Orleans) saw dad (and Marcus Miller) at the gym earlier today. So now I have to believe it.

I'm all dressed up, and can't go anywhere. I wish I could go dancing now. Stupid virus.

Friday at sea - flu

I'm sick... Muscle ache. Fever. Let's see, where were we 48 hours ago? St Barth?
Good thing it's a day at sea. Bad thing, I forgot to bring even Excedrin. Me, the migraine girl, travelling without my Excedrin... And I'm not going back into the bowels of the ship to see the physician. Let's see what dad has in his massive pharmacy. 4 tablets of Denoral. Oy. Let's try one. Takes a good hour and a half to do something and it lasts for, what 3 hours... Sleep. Watch TV. Fabulous caper movie with Peter Ustinov, Maggie Smith, Karl Malden, Bob Newhart. I don't see the first few minutes, so I don't know the title. Will have to look it up when home. Sleep.
Dad goes and work out at the gym. Marcus Miller is pumping iron next to him!
Sleep. I manage to get dad to bring me a cup of tea in the afternoon.
I manage to get myself up for a bit and go rest in the fabulous spa. I particularly love the tiled, HEATED, lounge chairs. Although, I don't really need the heated part today. There is usually no one there. So peaceful. So romantic too.

Waiting for us in the room...

Almost every night, at bed turning, they brought us a fresh pair of towels, folded creatively. There was also an elephant. But the hanged monkey is a bit creepy. The eyes of the doggie are chocolate. I piled those up to bring back to Arthur.

Roy Hargrove

Tonight's concert is trumpetist Roy Hargrove, featuring singer Roberta Gambarini. Dad heard her earlier in one of the late night spots, and was wowed. In fact she comes in for only one song and never shows up again. It is very strange. It would have been better with her. He's good but not unforgettable. We stay hungry. I am starting to feel a bit sick too. Bed. We sail away for another 48 hours at sea.

The world famous post office of Nevis

There is one shop tourists enter: the philatelic office. This is the one specialty of Nevis. The big seller these days is the Obama spread, which flies off the shelves.

Well, that's pushing it. The pace has nothing to do with flying and there are no shelves, just an ocean of wooden boxes behind a little counter. Million of stamps. Two clerks. Amazingly, they find whatever you want very quickly and they do take AmEx. Nothing electronic, mind you. I'll keep the beautiful receipt. I get a dinosaur set for Arthur, one of Marilyn of course, and one of Alexander Hamilton [Note for the Frenchies - c'était le premier ministre des affaires étrangères des US. Un beau gosse, qui aurait sûrement fini président s'il ne s'était pas fait tuer en duel par Aaron Burr, le troisième vice-président.]. He was born in Nevis, and left at 17 to attend... Columbia University (I'm sure Leon and Paul knew this). We missed his house. Well, in fact the house was destroyed in a 19th century earthquake. So we missed the reproduction of his house, rebuilt in a different location...

As there is really not much else we can do here, and hunger pains are coming, we go back to the ship. Obviously, most of the other 1798 tourists had the same idea. There is a loooong line waiting for the tenders, manhandled by the local port authority - as efficient as everything else. The line snakes around and around, with little shade. People are getting cranky. This is the first fault in the perfect organization of the cruise, likely not by their fault. We enter the enclosure where everyone is parked toward the front of the line, and we make our way - up current - towards the end of the line. When we get there, there is no space to extend the line within the enclosure. The only option is to spread out on the street. The port authorities don't want that, so they order us to go start a new line. We were thinking that we'd be in a different location, but that we'd go after everyone. But, in fact, they order us to start a new line, just next to the other one. The poor, red-faced, sweaty people who've been in line for an hour become even more red-faced and start hurling insults at us. Trying to explain that we're just following the orders of the uniformed people doesn't really help. We are going to be lynched. But we are not particularly unhappy to not have to wait another hour before having lunch. After a few minutes, they order a first group to move forward. To calm the crowds, we let a few people go ahead of us. We are part of the second group. They push us into a circular gazebo, and we wait again. As there is only one entrance to the gazebo, the people who were first in line are now stuck at the back of the gazebo... It would make sense that they would gather the number of people that fits in a boat. But that would be too organized. So, we don't get into the first boat. It's a zoo, a stampede. But we learn from our experience and we maneuver to be close to the exit. We end up being just next to Romero LuBambo, Diane Reeves' Brazilian guitar player. He's a brilliant guitarist. But a very normal man in his fifties, with a real wife (not a surgeried barely legal babe), and a bunch of children. No diva attitude here either. They are taking their being trapped in the gazebo in stride.

Thursday morning, Charleston, Nevis, British Commonwealth

After one final stretch of kayaking, we get to a shipyard. Very Caribbean, too. One guy is hammering away at his colorful boat. He doesn't seem particularly pleased when I take a picture of him.

A conch and lobster fishing boat comes back from an outing at sea. Half a dozen beautiful guys jump ashore. With very little loot for such a large group. They are rather disorganized. Life is hard here, but certainly at a different pace. I feel like I'm in a postcard.

I get to take the prototypical Caribbean picture of the well worn barca against the backdrop of impeccable blue sea.

We have plenty of time to contemplate this, as our taxis are of course not here. A manager paces, punches his cell phone, and curses about unreliable cab drivers. The group of Americans, used to managers taking responsibility, roll their eyes. One taxi arrives but it's not the same one as before. So our stuff is not in there. You know, the dry pants, clean towels, etc... They suggest we go to town in this one, then find the other one there. I'm not going to change on the street in town, and no one wants to risk having the manager disappear too. So we all wait. Except a feisty bunch who clearly cannot waste a minute of their vacation time. They are going to have fun. So they decide to walk to the Four Seasons to have a drink. Since they have not taken the pain to communicate with the locals along the way, they don't know the Four Seasons was closed by the hurricane. They are so obnoxious that we almost let them go...

Diane Reeves sits in the cab with her friend. No diva attitude here. She has no belongings in the missing cab, so she could very well make a fuss and request to be taken to town, as her cab is here. But she just chats quietly with her friend.

The other taxi finally gets there, and they start hurrying us to jump in. I make the case that, after making us wait for over half an hour, that they are going to have to wait a few minutes for us to change clothes.

We return to Charleston, the small capital of Nevis, around lunch time. Uniformed school girls and dressy office employees in heels navigate the pot holes of the uneven sidewalks. It's a happy, cheerful behive in a landscape of tropical decrepitude. Amazing really.

A bar. Closed (hopefully).

There are some carefully maintained historical buildings, next to massive messes.

The market is mostly empty. And the lady there looks like she is out of a period movie.

We didn't see the cemetery, but there is no escaping taxes here either...

Love the firestation, where there is no sense of urgency. The wives are here too, playing cards.

The shops are cavernous, offering an unlikely assortment of anything.

No tourist enters them. There is no lack of tourists, though. The ship has disgorged its 1800 passengers in the small town, each carrying the same light blue towel. There is no mistaking us for the locals... Most of us err back and forth on the main street. As we must look disheveled from our morning at sea, many fellow tourists ask us if we went to the beach. When we say we went to three beaches, there is clear envy in their eyes. It seems we were really lucky to book this kayak trip - nobody else got to see a beach on Nevis. There are apparently none close to town.

We feel a bit out of place, but rather comfortable. We only have a little bit of time, but I wouldn't mind coming back. It's lovely, in a way, and warm. Though I fear the leisurely and inefficient pace might drive the Western tourist crazy in a few days.