The so called “expert at cooking fish” restaurant would have been keel hauled by Michele, Greg and Monica. The fish was not just overcooked but annihilated and the flavours were straight from a packet bought at a US supermarket.  When offered the choice of pud between key lime pie, pumpkin pie or brownies with New York cherry ice cream we gritted our teeth and just asked for “the bill”, which they didn’t understand.  We returned to WIndy and decided to tuck into the danish pastries we had bought there, intended for breakfast, washed down with a Carib of course, but ended up feeding the fishes because they too were doughy and huge, dry and tasteless.  This led us to the conclusion that we really really could not face much more of American cuisine and half naked, loud Americans.  Where is the Caribbean that we have so enjoyed?  We have decided to cut short our visit to the “British” Virgin Islands and do a very quick “just because we are here” visit to some of the more important islands before heading back to the real Caribbean.  We will certainly give the American Virgin Islands a miss.  We don’t have to visit them, so we won’t! 

OK, rant over. 

We spent a lovely day pottering around a very flat Anegada in jeep hired from Eric, left hand drive, but we at least drove on the left.  We met numerous cows with handlebar horns, sheep and goats wandering about freely in peoples gardens as well as on the road.  The main points of interest on the island are headlined as the flamingos, that were hiding, the iguana head start programme, which was closed although we caught a glimpse of a couple of tiny little iguanas through the fence while having a lovely chat to a splendid born and bred Anegadean girl and her son Robert (she turned out to be Eric’s niece, it is a small island) the Faulkner museum, which was padlocked.  We then moved on to Loblolly Beach where I made Bob walk on the sand while I had a good snorkel.  It was a bit windy and the current rushed me along so quickly that I was as fast as Becky Adlington but I did see quite a lot of fish as I was washed along.  On the safety of the beach I had fun beachcombing on the pink sand and admired some amazing snails as big as my fist surrounded by millions of their offspring, some as tiny as caraway seeds clinging to the corally rocks.  Lunch at the Flash of Beauty beach bar renewed our faith in cooking standards and I had delicious fried fish (which I was offered steamed as a healthy alternative, who ever heard of steamed fish in the Caribbean?) and Bob a tasty lobster salad.  We sighed with relieved pleasure.  Our journey continued round the other half of the island on the rough sandy, bumpy road and we kept our eyes peeled for those flamingos even venturing down to the shore of the salt pond where we scanned the open water in vain.  In such privacy, Bob obeyed a call of nature.  It is difficult to tell who was the more surprised when a land crab popped out of his hole to see who was peeing into his home.  He dived back down in alarm, poor chap.

I am writing this, back on the boat after a lovely day, Gerry humming in the background, (yes, still happily humming) before we set off to Eric’s uncle’s restaurant tonight.  We will see what tonight will bring.