There is a good story as to how this trip came to be. In college I had a very good friend named Dawn Slaughter. Half way through college she left Southwest Missouri State (now just Missouri State) to go to an arts school in Georgia. As time passed we lost touch, and hadn’t heard from one another in about 18 years or more. Thanks to Facebook, in mid 2008 we found each other. Dawn was living in New York. Long Story short, for her 40th birthday party she had rented a villa on the little island of Vieques off the coast of Puerto Rico and invited a group of friends to celebrate with her there. She invited me and I thought it sounded like too much fun to pass up. Andrew couldn’t go, so I invited another friend from college, Jamie. He and Dawn had never met. So, Jamie and I were off to Vieques to spend a week in a villa with a group of people we had never met. But, knowing Dawn, the group of people would be a lot of fun! There were 18 of us in total, from places like NYC, Miami, Chicago, Nashville, Washington DC, Seattle and Vancouver.
Our villa, called At The Waves, was set just outside of the main town on the island, walking distance, to Isabel Segunda. We went into town a couple times for dinners and to el mercado to replenish the refrigerators and bar, but we really had all we needed at the villa: a pool, a BBQ grill, drinks, beautiful views and fun people.
The one excursion that the whole group participated in was the night time kayaking trip to Bahia Mosquito. It was a night time trip because this bay has the largest concentration of phosphorescent dynoflagellates in the world. It’s also called Bioluminescent Bay. When you get in the water to swim, the water actually lights up around you. It glows, like you’re swimming in a sky of stars. Pretty incredible.
Dawn’s birthday dinner was a feast of lobster and fish, followed by a cake that a local baker had made.
Our last night on the island a big group of us went to the town on the south coast called Esperanza. It was prettier than Isabel, but smaller, with one main road which was right on the coast. The nightlife is surprisingly active for such a small place, and we joined right in.
Not only are Dawn and I in touch once again, but we now have a group of friends in common. It was such a good time!
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