From bad to worse and back again...

Where to begin....
Well we made it to the island. Yeah!!! Had the same pilot that we had last November, David is his name. Quick trip..nice landing. Thank you once again David. I have some video of the flight.








Called Martineau and had their driver pick us up at the airport. She was quick..prob only took her 10 mins to get us. Got the paperwork signed and then found out that there was a problem with our Jeep Liberty. Seems the previous customer broke the back hatch latch and now you can't open the back hatch. Hmm...ok. Passenger side door handle was about broke off. Ok. Then the guys tells me, "Since your car is not working properly I'll give it to you for $50 day." Well now that's OK!

So we have kind of a clunker this time, not nearly as nice as Maritzas wranglers...but hey they were $90 a day. So I'll take the extra $560 ...no problem. Now we're exicted...we've got our Jeep and we're on the island. Next stop Tradewinds, well not quite...we have to make a quick stop for gasoline. $55 tops off the tank. On to Tradewinds.

We go into the office knowing that we're really early. It's only 10:30am and check out is 11:00. But we're thinking maybe we can go ahead and get the paperwork filled out. The office is part of the little souveneir shop that's in front. Kinda cramped..but not a big deal. We nose around looking at the merchandise while the lady behind the desk is waiting on another customer. I'm eves-dropping on their conversation, mainly because there's not much in the shop for men. The lady is telling the guy she doesn't have his reservatinon and he needs a confirmation #. Oh shit...I don't have a confirmation #. Can't remember ever getting one. She tells him she has no rooms today, tomorrow or the next day. He leaves...I don't know if he got his room or not. Next it's my turn. "Um...I've got a reservation for one night."

"When are you checking in?" she asks.

"Oh..today..the room is for tonight"

"What's your confirmation #"

"Uh...I don't have one..I never recieved one."

"You've got to have a confirmation. You can't make a reservation without getting a confirmation number. We don't work off of credit card number we give confirmation numbers. What's your name, maybe they'll be something."

So I give here my name. I can tell she's aggrivated. Maybe it's because the guy before me didn't have his confirmation number. Maybe nobody had there confirmation numbers today..I dunno, but she's not happy and I can tell I'm not making the situation any better.

" I don't have any reservation under that name. (she says) Are you sure you have a room with us?"

I'm thinking jeez...when I called and gave my credit card number someone most have forgot to make the reservation and now we're not going to get the room. I tell the lady "we made this reservation back in November and it is only for one night".

For some reason that flipp'd the switch and she says "I remember you. I took that reservation. Now where is it?"

Then she finds it. Ah success....but it doesn't last, "You can't check in now. Your too early. Check-out isn't until 11am. Your room isn't ready. Check in is at 2pm" She's back to being aggrivated.

So I tell her no problem we'll just come back later.

I tell Lorrie "why don't we just drive around for a bit? We drive out west of Esperanza to find the entrance to Quinta Jabali, which we do with little effort. (the place looks just fantastic from the road). Then Lorrie suggest we drive out and see if we can find Casa Blanca. We had almost rented it but finally decided against. Well we found it and it's way out. It's much more like jungle near the house than what I thought from looking at the google shots of it. Very private and probably some really nice views. We also drive by some really nice places out there....the only one I can remember now was Banana Wind. It was over the top.

So now it's about 1pm and we decide to go back to Esperanza and try to check into our room. When we head back to Tradewinds there is literally no place to park near. Finally we find a spot up the street and I go back to see what kind of mood the innkeeper is in now. She had everything ready for me and was in a decent mood. Finished all my paperwork and got the key to the room.

and this was the good part....