I enjoy a good vacation for a lot of reasons, and I especially enjoy a Caribbean vacation because of how much I love ocean swimming.  I realize not everybody shared that joy.  In talking to others, it seems common for people to feel like the ocean is scary and overwhelming and unpredictable.  I can see that, I guess, but whenever I’m in there, I feel so calm and happy.  Darth Vader agrees, I think.  Every time we swim (which has been twice a day so far, since Miles sides with me on the ocean debate), the kicks and stretches in my belly stop.  I assume it’s because he’s lulled by the sounds and movement in the sea.  I imagine it’s a lot like an amplified version of the general in-utero environment.  The waves probably sound like my circulatory system, and the movements are a gentler version of the movements I make every day, minus the jarring lunges I sometimes make around Miles.

Heck, maybe that’s why I like ocean swimming so much.  It’s a primeval, fetal kind of experience.  The beach has been lovely in the mornings and early afternoons, though not so much in the evenings when the tide comes in and lots of seaweed globs around.  Maybe I could just pretend that’s a placenta or something.

Okay, I had planned this to be a food post, so here we go.  I don’t have much for still food photos, but I did get video of the most visually impressive meal to date, so I’ll update later with evidence.

The first night we got in, it was late and we were tired, so we stayed in Palmas for dinner.  Palmas del Mar is a strange beast.  It’s sometimes called a resort, but it’s not the all-inclusive hotel kind of resort.  It’s really more like a big complex with lots of condo buildings, each of which has its own name.  There are also golf courses and tennis courts, but that’s not really on our agenda this time around.  Palmas has a couple of commercial areas with restaurants, so we went to Blue Hawaii the first night and got some expensive but high-quality Chinese food.  That’s been our experience in Palmas–eating at the resort is expensive, but we haven’t had a bad meal yet.  That’s better than paying way too much for crappy food.

The second day we hit a Tex Mex place, where my dad and I had Puerto Rican tacos.  They were really interesting.  I don’t know what you call the shell part, but it was a hollow little bread thing made with coconut.  It was available with a variety of fillings.  My dad got octopus and chicken, and I got shrimp and pork.

We’ve also been doing a good amount of cooking and eating here at the condo, which is nice both for finances and for getting stuff to please Miles.  He’s done a good job so far—he likes rice a lot, and that’s pretty ubiquitous,  but it’s good for him to have some fruits and vegetables for snacking.  He’s also a convert to Bimbo cookies.

Our most exciting meal yet was at Casa Rustik, a pretty authentic-seeming little place where we were the only gringos.  We drove a ways down highway 3 and parked on a sidewalk, but it actually wasn’t too hard to find.  Denny, my mom and I all got mofongo, which was a big pile of mashed and seasoned plantains stuffed with meats.  They got pork and I got crab.  My dad got a very impressive whole fried fish (chillo, I think the waitress said) in ajillo sauce.  It was a lot of food and we all got very full.  Miles liked the bathroom because they had blue soap.

I’m not sure what’s on tap for the rest of the week, but I’ll re-update later.  There are many more photos on Flickr.

P.S. Denny is more of a pool guy.