first vacation- installment 4- Biii Cra!!!

Thursday evening we all went for a walk over to the main house. Tim was going to try to see if he could hook up to the internet, and I just needed to be out of the room :0)

We ran into Lennox, a gentleman that works for Carambola that we have seen and talked with every year when we go. He was the first person we met there in 2000, and we always look forward to seeing him.

He was delighted to meet Elisha. If you remember my "ninging" post from before, you'll remember how much he loves to play the drums (Elisha, that is). So, he has been practicing on his "air drums" every time he gets a chance. He crosses one wrist over the other and keeps a steady beat, just "lii Jayon does" (Just like Jason does....) Jason is our drummer at church, and a major source of fascination for Elisha as he watches him play. So, he is "drumming" while I was talking to Lennox- who thought it was the best thing.

Since the power was still out all over the island, he brought his family to spend the night with him. We were so pleased to be able to meet his wife and 2 girls, whom we've only heard about up to this point. They came out and we spent a few hours together, just talking and getting to know each other.

After a little while, his older daughter came over and said she saw a crab down by the swimming pool. I thought it must be a little sand crab like we had seen by the shore on the beach. So, Elisha and I joined her and her little sister and we headed over to the edge of the patio we were on and looked over to the pool. Wow. It was a big crab- probably almost a foot- if you count foot to foot and not just the body. We went down to the pool to look at it.

I felt kinda bad for this crab- it kept going further away from the water. So I thought I'd try to shoo it away, toward the beach. After a few minutes of just trying to walk behind it, I saw a broom laying over to the side of the pool. I set Elisha down behind me- about 10 feet away, next to the 2 girls. But the crab didn't want to go in the direction I tried to steer him. He headed directly behind me. Straight toward the children.

The girls screamed and then peals of laughter broke forth as they ran toward the steps we had just come down. Elisha seemed to jump out of his skin and he was screaming, too. I took off after them, and realized my poor son's screams were pure terror- no laughter coming from him. I scooped him up and held him close and assured him the crab would not hurt him. After a few minutes he finally calmed down, but the little guy who kept running away from us a few minutes earlier, was suddenly quite content to sit on my lap, snuggled very close.

He'll now tell you about the Biii Cra!! holding his arms out to the side, opening and closing his hands- imitating the claws on the front.

Friday we were able to experience a few hours of sun and fun on the beach. We then went for a ride so we could call our families and let them know we made it through and were very safe and still able to come home on Sat. It was amazing to see the damage to the trees all over the area of the island we were on. A lot of trees down, branches snapped off. Looks a lot like what the remnants of the hurricane that came through Ohio a month or so ago left behind. We were glad to be packing up and heading home :0)