Turks and Caicos Part III

Day 5:

It was a little cloudy the morning of day #5, so we thought we would do a little souvenir shopping (no pictures).  However, the sun soon came out, so we didn't get much shopping done.  However, the the kids each got a souvenir, and they all wanted a stuffed animal.  Arden got a spotted ray, Cora got a turtle, and Dax (of course) got a shark.  He was all about sharks on this trip, and every time we got to a beach, he would say, "Mom, are there sharks here?"  I wasn't sure if he was disappointed or relieved when I told him that there were probably none.  We quickly gave up the shopping and headed to lunch.  Afterwards, we wanted to go to our beach again, but it was very WINDY by our house and a little too choppy for snorkeling.  The kids had so much fun at Sapodilla Beach the day before that they were begging to go back to the "beach wif no waves."  We decided to try Taylor Bay beach, which was near Sapodilla.  It was really similar, and again there were no waves!  Dax fell asleep on the way over, and continued his nap on the beach:

 Cora didn't take a nap.  She only took one nap the whole vacation, which made her pretty tired by the end of the day.  She got a little cranky at times, but she didn't have the energy to pull her usual bed-time shenanigans and usually went right to sleep every night.  So, we just went with it.  Here is Grandma with her little doggie-paddler (that is Cora swimming around her knees):

 A few of us tried snorkeling again.  There were a few spots of coral over by the rocks you can see behind my mom in the picture above that had some fish swimming around them.  We also saw lots of anenomes like this one:

 Here is another view of the beach...that is Arden out in the water splashing her Grandpa:

After a while me and Daxton wandered over to a dock by the rocks, and the water was so still that we could look down into the water and see a bunch of fish swimming there.  Dax loved to watch them, there were some yellow striped ones and a purple and yellow one.  Dax would drop a grain of sand into the water, and the fish would all swim over to see if it was food.  Soon Cora and Arden and Grandma came over and we all enjoyed watching the fish for a while.

Day 6
Preston's birthday!  We had wanted to go on the half-day "Snorkel and Conch" tour, and Preston decided it would be fun to save it for his birthday.  We had to be at the Marina EARLY to catch our boat.  Here are the girls as our boat was driving along Grace Bay:

The price of the tour included free Rum Punch and soft drinks.  There was only two other couples on our boat with us, and only one of them drank any Rum Punch...I think we were a pretty unusual bunch.  We headed out to the barrier reef for some snorkeling.  It was pretty choppy, so the kids stayed on the boat with Grandpa and Grandma.  I brought my camera and took lots of pictures.  There were lots of fish and beautiful coral.  Here is another of my favorite fish, a rainbow parrotfish:

The guys from the boat threw a few potato chips over the side of the boat, and these triggerfish were there to eat them up.  The kids thought it was hilarious that the fish liked to eat potato chips.

I also saw this great big spotted ray.  I hadn't brought my flippers because they take up my whole suitcase and Preston says I swim too fast when I wear them.  As this big guy was swimming away from me while I was trying to take pictures, I was wishing I had packed them so I could have gotten a little closer.  Oh well.

After we were done snorkeling,  we drove the boat over to a shallow place where there were supposed to be alot of conch to catch.  I caught a great big one all by myself (okay, so one of the guides on the boat pointed it out to me, but I had to snorkel out there, go down and get it and carry the thing back to the boat...they are HEAVY!) If you don't know what a conch is, this is it:

Conch (pronounced "konk" in Turks and Caicos) are the slimy little things that live in these beautiful shells.  They are plentiful in the Turks and Caicos reef system, so this is one of the few places in the world where it is legal to catch them and keep the shells.  Preston caught a few of them, though some were small and had to be thrown back.  After we had caught a few, we headed over to Little Water Cay, which is also known as "Iguana Island."  We found a place to park the boat on the beach, and then our captain and his mate showed us how to "harvest" the conch.  They cut into the shell around the top, and then asked who wanted to pull the conch out of his shell.  No one volunteered, so he asked Arden if she would do it.  Being a brave and adventurous soul, she agreed.  She grabbed the little beastie's "foot" and pulled.  This is what came out:

Um, ew.   They showed us how to clean them for eating, and then told us to go and find some iguanas while they made us a "delicous conch salad."  I was a little skeptical about the salad...I had had cracked conch (breaded and fried conch) and conch fritters at restaurants around the island, but I wasn't too sure about eating them raw.  I pushed that to the back of my mind and off we went to find some of the famous iguanas.  They were all over the place!  Dax had a great time chasing them around, and here he is sneaking up behind a little one while Preston and Cora watch:

 Here is what they look like up close...very dinosaur-ish:

We eventually headed back to the boat (Grandpa and Dax came in last, of course).  The conch salad was ready!  They had cut the conch into small pieces and mixed it with tomatoes, peppers and onions.  It was a lot like salsa, and they gave it to us with hot sauce and chips.  It was actually DELICIOUS!  I ate two bowls full.  Arden ate quite a bit, and even Dax and Cora had a few bites (though I am pretty sure Cora still prefers pizza, despite what she said on her birthday post).  After that we headed back while we finished up our drinks.  Look at how blue the water is!!

After we got back and relaxed for a while, Preston decided he wanted to try parasailing.  We have thought about doing it on a few previous vacations, but had never actually done it.  Val was in!  Grandma and Grandpa declined and offered to watch the kids.  Cora said she wanted to come, but we doubted they had a harness small enough for her, so we told her she better wait until "next time."  He agreed.  The parasailing company came to our beach to pick us up, and we actually got to do the parasailing right in front over Grandma, Grandpa and the kids!

Here is Preston and me getting hooked into our harnesses...

 And up we went!  Here is a picture my mom took of us from the beach:

And here is a picture Preston took of the beach...we were HIGH!

 It was really easy and SO much fun.  We could see so much!  We could see across the whole island to the other side.  We could see all the way down Grace Bay.  We watched a ray swimming below us.  It was awesome!  The hardest part was getting back onto the boat.  The wind was gusting and so the parachute would go a little crazy at the end.  It swung quite a bit just as we were trying to land, and I hit my leg a little, but it was no big deal.  Val went solo...here she is, ready for takeoff:

 Her landing was perfect, lucky girl!  Parasailing was one of the highlights of the trip for me!  So much fun! 

That night, we had Preston's birthday dinner at a restaurant called the Tiki Hut nearby.  They had really good conch fritters, and all of our food was great!  We skipped dessert because we had whipped up another cake for Preston (yes, we had finished off Cora's cake even though it had only been two days) Here is the birthday boy, blowing out his candles!

He got a new grill for his birthday before we left on our trip (I didn't want to check it), so I brought him a small present so he had something to unwrap...Season 4 of Psych, one of his favorite TV shows.  Happy Birthday Preston!! 

I promise I will finish next time....