Bahamas- Atlantis, Paradise Island

Today was Saturday. We have already lost track of actual time and are now tracking how many days we have left until we must return to real life.

For the last few months I have been reading the blog of a former coworker’s wife. I met him at Microsoft. He is originally from Bermuda and like, the Bahamas, Bermuda was settled by the Brits. Heidi explains on her blog, that rather than saying “hello” and “goodbye”, the natives say “good afternoon” and “good evening”. They are very polite and they have the accent. It’s cool that they say Good Ahftah-noon.

We took D to the super duper awesome kid’s pool today and we all had a blast. I was dying to go down the small water slide, but thought it would be too much for D. I can’t even explain this kids pool, but naturally, I’ll try. They have a large pool that doesn’t get any deeper than thigh high. In the center, there is the equivalent of a big toy, but of course the slides off are water slides.

There is a huge bucket on the very top of the toy that is slowly filled by a fountain with water. Every 8 minutes or so, the bucket overflows and tips over, dousing the whole toy and everyone on it with water. They had water fountains coming up through the floors, through fire hose type nozzles, from out of nowhere. It was a blast, but got to be overwhelming for D.

Watch out! The bucket is dumping!

She napped in the afternoon. B read and I took a nap in the sun on our balcony. Can you finish this story yourself? Yep, that’s right, I turned red. It’s not too bad though.

Then we took a walk on the white, sandy beach and explored a hurricane-battered former hotel. It’s next door to our property on the beach. We approached it with caution because it’s in disrepair. The windows and doors are blown open. It actually looks like an 80-room motel, but the landscaping was overgrown, the paint was peeling and it needed some love and affection. I want to make it mine! It just needs a little TLC! Maybe next lifetime.

Our white, sandy beach

We still had a few more hours of happy toddler time, so we went over to see the “shish” in the giant aquarium. The architects of Atlantis made an underwater model of what Atlantis might have looked like if it was discovered. We walked the route and saw all the fish, the old skool diving gear and naturally, the gift store in the middle of it all. We saw some amazing fish, jellyfish, sharks, lobsters (which I wanted to butter up) and other sea life. It was fun.

We walked back to our side of the property and found ourselves on the other side of the hotel, with the big bridge overhead.

A friendly employee of Atlantis took a family photo of us, so that was very cool.

Here is Dahlia fake muggin' for the camera.

The people here are amazing. I know you might hear that about host cultures all over the world, but dang, the Bahamian’s know their stuff.

Tonight we had the babysitter some back and we went out to a lounge to have a drink, then waltzed into Bobby Flay’s “Mesa” for another beverage and finally, a 9:15pm dinner. YUM. I had the ahi and B had Lamb. We talked about buying a place here, the food was that good.

I feel compelled to mention that my wardrobe has been challenging. I tossed three dresses into my luggage and found last night, that they’re big. Something happened. Thanks to my new trainer, Shawn, I lost a size and a half and now, the dresses that I wore last year this time, are too big! Yeah me! Boo wardrobe! As if I don’t have enough trouble paying for clothing, finding clothes that fit and actually knowing when to wear what. (I know, complain… complain…) I wore a tacky outfit (Tacky is my birthright- thanks dad!) last night. Tonight, I noticed that my pink dress had adjustable straps, so I worked it and rocked the dress.

Date night!

B and I had great drinks and an awesome time. I am fully stuffed like a thanksgiving turkey and now that I have emptied my brain to my friend the blog, I’m now going to pass out and dream about floating down the “lazy river” on an inner tube tomorrow.

Gym tomorrow too. Maybe the “Body Cyclin’ ”.