There are a lot of lists of the best beaches in the Caribbean and the best beaches in Anguilla. When it comes to Anguilla, you usually hear about Shoal Bay, and don’t get me wrong, it is a beautiful beach. So is Meads Bay, and Cove Bay, and Maunday’s Bay. I could keep going, but my favorite beach on the island remains Rendezvous Bay. It was our first beach on the island. When we first visited in 2007, we arrived after dark. I remember walking out on the balcony and seeing loads of stars, hearing the waves, and seeing bits of the surf in the distance, but it wasn’t until the…
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Coming back to The CuisinArt was like coming home again. We stayed here on our very first trip to Anguilla in 2007. I still remember the doorman calling to us as we ventured out for our first bit of driving on the island, “Left is right, right is wrong!” It’s a family-friendly resort that’s not too stuffy and not at all chaotic. It just fits. The resort is just as beautiful and the staff just as welcoming as I remembered. The grounds are well-maintained, filled with lush plantings. The lobby looks out to the beautiful series of tiered pools that lead you out to the beach. And the beach is…
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One constant has remained for every trip to Anguilla – – Saturdays are for Smokey’s. I remember our first trip to the island in 2007. I heard there was live music at Smokey’s for lunch on Saturday, so I was determined to make it there on our first full day on the island. We walked there from the CuisinArt (you could do that back then – the beach was wider). I remember being seated at the table just inside the easternmost door, looking out over the water. I had the jerk chicken (which I’ve had every time since), and heard The Musical Brothers performing, doing Christmas songs. I had found…
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A trip to Anguilla is not complete without a stop at Bankie Banx’s Dune Preserve. We first visited in 2007, and although our kids were young, ages 8 and 10, we forced them to stay up late so we could hear Bankie play. The place has such a relaxed feel to it, that it’s hard to pass up. It’s kind of like being at your own beach place. It’s just so easy to hang out there, and the views of St. Martin never get old. The sign on the road has been updated since 2007. And it’s a bit more built up since then. This year, we popped in when…
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We travel over Thanksgiving and every year give thanks for all we have. We find ourselves doing the same at the year’s end. We are thankful for the wonderful people we have met and the great adventures we have had together. Join us for our New Year’s Eve countdown of our top ten irie moments of 2014! #10 Learning New Things: Travel Photography Class with Kevin Miyazaki In June, we took a class in travel photography from well-known travel photographer, Kevin Miyazaki. We were given assignments with two days to complete them before the next assignment came out. I spent a lot of time shooting in my own home town…
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Blanchard’s Beach Shack is a new addition to Meads Bay since our last visit in 2010. Blanchard’s flagship restaurant was well-known to us. When I planned our first trip to Anguilla, I read “A Trip to the Beach” several times, and was familiar with the family’s journey to opening one of the best-known restaurants on the island. The Beach Shack was new, an alternative to the more formal evening experience, a place to stop for lunch and enjoy the beauty of Meads Bay. As you approach, you can’t miss the place, with its brightly-colored exterior and many signs pointing you in the right direction. The menu is pretty extensive, and…
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We took the film on the road and the results are back. We took the film cameras to Anguilla, the Canon 1V and the Mamiya Pro TL. We took a variety of film stocks, Fuji 400H, Kodak Portra 400, Porta 160, and Ektar 100. We experimented and burned a lot of film. Many lessons were learned. Here are my impressions of our efforts and the results. 1. Digital has ruined me for film – shooting the same scene again and again. I am so accustomed to shooting RAW and shooting multiple images to try to nail the shot that I wasted a lot of film. For example, I had the…
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I had a lot of trouble deciding what to pack for this trip. I knew I wanted to shoot some film. In fact, I was more excited to shoot film than digital. This would be our fourth trip to Anguilla in seven years, and in my mind, I kept thinking, “done that.” I wanted a new challenge, to see Anguilla differently, so I decided to take my film on the road. With that decided, I still had a tough time deciding what cameras to bring. I knew that the Canon 1v used the same lenses as my digital SLR, so I wasn’t really adding much in terms of weight/space requirements.…
