First Weekend on the Rock Part II

Sooooo, Blogger was being a little bit of a tool, and was acting up when I tried inserting photos into my previous post. So here's another, continuing on about my first weekend on de rock.

Mateo brought me to one of my favorite parts of the island. It's a scenic turn-out that gives you a fabulous view of both the Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea. If you turn the other way, you get a great view of Frigate Bay (the area where we live and also where the Marriott is located).

Atlantic Ocean on the right, Caribbean Sea on the left.

View of Frigate Bay.

First Weekend on the Rock

Milo, Trooper, and I arrived on-island January 15th, 2011, which was a Saturday. After Mateo and I unpacked and did some quick organizing, we met some of his fellow classmates/friends at Cathy's—a restaurant on The Strip at Timothy's Beach. Since we were running behind, his friends ordered ahead for us and we had a Red Snapper for dinner. It was pretty delicious. Unfortunately, I didn't get to take a picture of the googly-eyed fish.

After dinner, we headed to Royal St. Kitts Hotel & Casino for Mr. RUSVM. At the beginning of each term, 'Semester Olympics' are held, and students from their respective classes compete in various events. Money is awarded to whatever semester wins. Mr. RUSVM is one of the events, along with sporting activities like flag football, ultimate frisbee, soccer, etc.
Anywho, Mr. RUSVM is similar to a male pageant, I suppose. One male from each semester is nominated to compete. The event held three segments.

1. Which Disney Princess Are You?
2. Your Favorite Movie in 30 seconds or less.
3. What would you be doing to make money if you weren't at Ross?

A lot of the students attend Mr. RUSVM, and I ran into a few friends (Michaelene and Tony), that I had met in April 2010.

On Sunday, we got out the dog hair clippers and gave Trooper a haircut inspired by the Chinese Crested dog breed. Super Trooper was just too hot, and we really didn't have a choice. He had panted all Saturday night, and just didn't seem to find a way to cool down. So...chop chop went his hair.

The rest of the day was spent taking a trip to Port Zante for some ice cream at a cute little parlor called 'Scoops.' We also enjoyed a leisurely walk around Basseterre. A point of interest here, is the 'The Circus.' It is situated in the center of a round-a-bout and features a historic clock tower/water fountain known as the Berkley Memorical Clock. Supposedly it is modeled after Piccadilly in London.

That last few photos are of me in an old British telephone booth and of Matthew at 'Pizza Boys' where we had lunch.

This is the venue that held Mr. RUSVM (Ross University School of Veterinary Medicine).

3rd Semester's skit of Beauty and the Beast.

Michaelene playing The Beast. Check out that hair!

3rd Semester again. Happy Gilmore skit, featuring Tony.

Inside an old British phone booth.

Matty at Pizza Boys.

The Journey Continues...

I'm baaaaaaaaaaaaaack...

After a long nine months, I have made it back to St. Kitts to join Matthew while he attends Ross University. As a bonus, our dogs—Milo and Trooper—have come along too. 

The journey began on January 15th, 2011. My Dad and I loaded up his truck at about 1:00 a.m. and left my parents' home shortly afterwards. My first flight was scheduled for 6:05 a.m. out of Grand Rapids, MI. The roads were in less-than-ideal-condition, and it took us about three hours or so to get to the airport. Since we were leaving so early, the roads weren't plowed, and it was snowing like crazy. The blizzard was not quite welcome in my eyes. I kept thinking, "How convenient." A) I didn't need to be late for my flight, and B) I did not want to deal with a delay.

Once we arrived at the airport, my Dad and I unloaded the luggage and my two dogs. Milo and Trooper went into their kennels with ease, but they were quite hesitant. Little did they know that in about an hour, we'd be on a plane leaving the snowy Mitten and headed towards a sunshine-filled destination.

At the Delta counter I had to fill out a few extra forms for the dogs and attach stickers that read 'LIVE ANIMALS' onto their kennels. Here's my question: Are there people who ship 'DEAD ANIMALS?' Whatevs. Anyway, the Delta rep was very helpful, and she seemed well-versed on the airline's regulations when flying pets. I felt confident that Milo and Trooper would be in good hands. After the dogs were all set, the representative checked my baggage. Surprise, surprise—one of my bags was over the weight limit. Thankfully, it was only over by 2 small lbs., and she let me through anyway. Whew. I really thought she was going to insist that I remove some items. After the dogs went through security and after their kennels were searched for crack and other illegal items, I gave my Dad a hug, blew a kiss to my doggies, and bid adieu. 

The first stop was in Atlanta, GA, where I would catch my connecting flight to St. Kitts. Once I arrived in the ATL, I went to my gate, which was of course, on the opposite end of the airport. Thank goodness for inner-airport transportation! As soon as I arrived at my gate, I checked to see if my dogs had been accounted for, and thankfully they were. I had about an hour or so before my flight to St. Kitts was going to board, so I went to the ladies' room and tried to make myself look less crazy. I hadn't slept since Friday at 10:00 a.m., and I was looking a little grubby. After very little improvement of controlling my crazy hair and smeared make-up, I gave up. I opted to sit around and pass time on my cell phone instead. I texted my contacts to notify them that my current number would be turned off indefinitely once I arrived in St Kitts. After a few sad good-bye texts, I shut off my phone, boarded my flight, and fell asleep.

I later woke up to a flight attendant handing me a Customs form. St. Kitts requires you to fill this out before heading to Immigration at their airport. SKB is fairly strict about visitors filling out all the necessary information on this little form because they want to make sure that every tourist arriving is accounted for, and has a return ticket. Thankfully, I had experience with filling one out before, having been to the island in April 2010. 

About half an hour later, the plane was approaching St. Kitts. As soon as I saw the island, I was grinning from ear to ear. I couldn't have been happier to see my new home. In my head I kept thinking, "My island, my home," over and over again. I took this as a good sign. As we circled the island, I was able to re-familiarize myself with the different areas. I recognized the Marriott Resort, Ross University, the Atlantic Ocean, the Caribbean Sea, and I thought that I had even recognized Matthew's apartment. 

When we landed, I was a bit too warm—but not at severe heat stroke status or anything. I had dressed myself in yoga capris, a t-shirt, sneakers, and my GVSU sweatshirt. I knew I was going to be a little too hot when I arrived, but I wasn't willing to freeze while still in the US. I mean—what was I suppose to wear? I was not about to leave snowy Michigan in my bikini!

Inside the airport, there were about six long lines for Immigration. After about half an hour, I finally reached the counter, handed over my passport and explained to the lady why I was in St. Kitts. After a few more questions, she stamped my passport, told me she was giving me a 'month,' and sent me on my way. What she had implied, was that I only had a month until I would be deported, so I had better apply for my 'extended stay' VISA right away.

Once I was through Immigration, I headed downstairs towards Baggage Claim. When I arrived on the bottom level, I hurriedly looked around for Milo and Trooper. After a quick scan, I found them in the far back corner of the airport, still in their kennels, with their ears and eyes perked up and waiting for me. They were quite happy to see me—as I them—and I was so thankful that they arrived safely.

Soon after I located the pups, Dr. Henry, a veterinarian on the island, waved me over for a meet-and-greet. Matty called him ahead of time, so he was expecting me. I brought the doggies over to him so he could collect my paperwork, fees, and to check their overall well being. He was really nice and quite helpful. The dogs behaved really well for Dr. Henry, even after being in their kennels for about ten hours, but I figured it was because they were probably exhausted. 

Next stop was Customs. Now—this can be tricky. They will often go through your bags, question you about your items, charge you duty on items they feel are valuable, etc. And of course, I had all sorts of goodies in my luggage. Dvds, my sewing machine, fabric, crafting tools, my portable iPod player, dog hair clippers, etc. When Matthew shipped his bike down with him in April 2010, they charged us $100 US to get it through Customs. I was livid about that...and I did NOT want something similar to happen again. However, I knew I was going to get away with them not checking my bags because they'd be so distracted with my dogs. Also, I had a local help me load my bags onto a cart to be taken outside right away. Usually the loading guys push you through Customs quickly so they can get you out and loaded into your car. The sooner you're in your car, the sooner you tip them, and the sooner they can head back inside to help other customers. 

Once outside the airport, Matthew flagged me down and pulled his car up to the curb. After all of this time, the three of us made it, and we were very excited to begin our new island lives. Enjoy the photos.

My luggage and my loves. :)

What is this weather?! Wasn't it just snowing a few hours ago??

Matty's new ride...

Once we arrived at the apartment, we let Mizz & Trizz out so they could check out their new home and surroundings.

The large dog pictured is Pumba. He is owned by Matthew's landlords, who live above us.

To celebrate me and and the dogs finally getting to the island, we cracked open two Caribs—the beer of the Caribbean. 

Nicole and Trent's Birthday Bash

For Nicole and Trent's birthday, they decided to celebrate with a catamaran trip to the sister island, Nevis. Great idea, I say. (Thanks for the photos Nicole!)

Here come a few of the guests. See Matthew on the far left?

Headed to the Irie Lime. :)

Trent & Nicole

Hike to Mt. Liamuiga

Ooooooookay. Well, I never did document the week I spent in St. Kitts for Matthew's orientation. Procrastination kills motivation.

I am, however, going to work on documenting Matthew's exciting island activities whenever I can.

These photos are from Matthew's hike to Mt. Liamuiga. Credit goes to our friend, Tony, for the photos. He was nice enough to let me borrow them for this post.

Update—just a few days to go!

We head to St. Kitts in 2 days, 22 hours, 16 minutes, and counting...

I am happy to report that everything is falling together quite nicely. All that's left, is to pack and weigh our bags to make sure they don't go over the weight limit of 50 lbs per bag.

We started the packing process on Sunday, which may seem a bit premature, but when you're moving out of the country, it's probably a good idea not to wait until the last minute...right? Anyway, we picked out everything we thought we should or would want to bring. I was doing a good job of keeping what I wanted to pack to a minimum, but that soon ended once I found a tub of clothes in the back of our closet that I had not seen earlier. Oops! Matthew's clothes and school items are much more important than my vacay outfits (sigh), so we will pack his things first, and then I'll just fit in what I can. I suppose that's fair since he's moving there before me.

I did get a chance to set up the web cam and microphone for Matty's laptop, so he'll now be able to skype with me (and anyone else who wants to partake). I had never tried skype before, but my friends Holli and Andrea helped me out with it. It's going to be such a luxury to see each other even though we'll be in different countries. Thank you modern and innovative technology.

The next time I'll get to blog will probably be when we're on one of our flights...it's amazing to think that moment will be in just a few days!

Matthew's Future Island Apartment

We're this close to securing an apartment for Matthew. Yay! We're hoping to have all of the little, but very important, details taken care of by the end of this week. Once the apartment is officially his, I will allow myself to get a bit more excited about our trip.

The apartment is located in Frigate Bay, which happens to be our choice location. We're told that it's the safest part of the island, but we hear different things from different students all the time. However, the area is conveniently located by all of the shops, grocery stores, hotels, night life, restaurants, nicest beaches, etc. The only drawback is that Ross University is about seven miles away...so there's a little bit of a commute. The driving part might be a little tricky though because in St. Kitts you drive on the left side of the road, and the driver's seat is on the right side of the car. Yikes—I suggest lessons.

Here are some photos of Matt's future apartment. From the photos, it seems really small, and that's because it is. It's a one bedroom, one bathroom, pet-friendly rental with a washer AND dryer (yay!).*** Matt and I will see how small it really is when we visit in May, but we're not too worried about it. It will be a perfect spot for him, and once the dogs and I get to the island, we can look for something bigger and less expensive.



Front door to his apartment

Street view.

Backyard and view of the Atlantic Ocean in the distance.

Driveway.

Shared porch area with our neighbors.

Inside the apt...kind of small, but clean!

Another view of the inside.

***You may have read in a previous post that Matt was going to have a roommate to begin with, but that hasn't worked out as well as we had hoped. Shane, his would-be-roommate, may not be able to start school until September, so he told us to go ahead and find a place without him. If everything works out for him, and he does attend in May, he might end up being our future roommate again, but in September instead.

Surprise: NO ON-CAMPUS HOUSING

Okay...so it's Monday, and we've got 53 days left until we fly out to St. Kitts (according to my dashboard countdown widget).

Completing Matthew's to-do list for moving and beginning school in May has been going smoothly. He's gotten all of his vaccinations done, except for his Rabies titer—which he'll get done when he arrives on the island. We filed our taxes, completed the FAFSA, figured out our budget, and were about to give ourselves a pat on the back, when last Monday, we received an interesting little email from Ross University.

Due to some renovating, on-campus housing will no longer be available to the incoming Ross students for the May semester. Although we are getting our way, (because we had wanted to live off-campus from the start), this really just puts another few items on our checklist. Now we have to find a place to live as opposed to already having a place. We also now have to pay first month's rent and a deposit, whereas we didn't need to worry about that before. Fortunately, RUSVM has an off-campus housing department with plenty of housing experience. (Before the on-campus residences were built, all of the students were housed off-campus.) Having a department willing and able to find us housing makes me feel a bit better about the situation.

The dogs and I will still follow plan B, and not move down until September.  But don't worry about Matt.  I had screened a few of the incoming students and have found him a suitable roommate. (No, I am not a complete control freak...ha.) The roommate's name is Shane, he's 34, and actually a Naturopathic Doctor...so he's been through grad school once already. He seems to be laid back and serious about studying, which is perfect for Matthew. I had eavesdropped on their conversation (over the phone) last night, and it seems like they'll get along just fine. Having a roommate will help keep the rent and the utilities down, but it'll also provide a study buddy for Matthew. In addition to that, I will feel better knowing my husband isn't all alone in a foreign country.