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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A little extra bit of sunshine can be found on Anguilla’s Rendezvous Bay since our last visit in 2010. New to the beach just east of the CuisinArt Resort is a wonderful beach bar with great food and drink and the friendliest service, Garvey’s Sunshine Shack. Our travel day to the island is always a bit of a marathon. Drive to Chicago the night before, get up at 2:30 a.m., take the shuttle to O’Hare for a 5:00 a.m. flight to Charlotte, RUN to catch your connecting flight to Ste. Maarten (and I mean RUN, as it was ready to take off), take the van to the dock, take Funtime…
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We make a habit of visiting Picante on every visit to Anguilla, oftentimes twice each trip, and this trip was no exception. If anything has changed since our last visit in 2010, it wasn’t the quality of the food or the friendly service. Picante never disappoints. The margaritas are as I remembered them, just boozy enough, but not so much that you need a designated driver. On our second visit, the special was a guava margarita, which was fantastic – – not too sweet! The food was better than I remember, and I ended up ordering the same dish on both visits because I liked it so much. I ordered…
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I read about Hungry’s on Nori’s Anguilla Beaches site, and with my Anguilla Card in hand, we were ready to give it a try. Having read about the lobster quesadillas, I was sold – – plus it was Thanksgiving Day in the U.S., and I needed to keep up my tradition of a meal of Caribbean lobster on Thanksgiving! Hungry’s is the product of the collaboration of two men, Irad Gumbs (in the photo above) and Alfonzo (Papi) Hodge, known for their work in some of the island’s fine dining establishments. With Hungry’s, they offer delicious local dishes in an informal setting, alive with the talk of the day. On our…
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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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One of our favorite spots for dinner on Anguilla is B&D’s BBQ. It’s a bit different from other dining spots on the island. You won’t find white linen table cloths, ocean views, or live music. What you will find is great local food in a family setting. B&D’s is only open Friday and Saturday nights, under a tent adjacent to the owners’ home. Pull over on the side of the road and walk up to the tent. There will be a line, but it moves quickly, and it’s worth the wait. Place your order. We requested orders of chicken, fish, and ribs, each with a side of peas and rice,…
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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.…
