(Cacti grew all over the island and were quite beautiful, although one needed to watch one's step in some areas as some cacti grew like... watermelons, low on the ground.)Our Mustique holiday, as our photographs might do best to depict, was a fabulous success. The island is beautiful, Cotton House was gorgeous and gracious, we snorkeled plentifully on often secluded beaches. It was a peaceful week. While many people on the island told us that we must come back during peak season, when there are more people holidaying on the island and so, more things to do, we enjoyed being on Mustique during the "off" season. It's easy to party in New York, or in many other cities we find ourselves for work. The restful fun we had in Mustique, however, is difficult to find just anywhere.
(David and I at the Firefly for a lovely, leisurely seafood lunch. The Firefly is a more enclosed resort than the Cotton House and far smaller -- boutique -- with only 5 rooms. It sits on a hill and overlooks the harbor.)We did, of course, manage to party in our way, a bit, while on the island.
For one, we discovered an "exclusive" club called the Mustique Martini Club. It is a club created at the bar at Firefly, the other resort on the island. Basically, entry to the club is given to those who drink all 14 of the Firefly's martini variety within ONE YEAR. This accomplishment is then rewarded with a polo shirt with a martini glass and the words "Mustique Martini Club," thus attesting the polo owner's membership to the club. It is said that the polo shirt has been worn all over the world, from humble BBQs to some of the most elite functions (probably true, given the demographic of the people who own holiday homes on the island) -- and their photos can be seen on the hotel's website.
David and I had dined at the Firefly Restaurant a couple of times before we heard of this club. By the time we heard of it, we had only 2 days to go before our departure -- which meant, of course, we had 2 days to complete our 14 martini mission.
The truth is, a mission such as "drink 14 martinis" begins as some silly fun (i.e. "We like martinis anyway, let's see how we go") -- but by the time one realizes that, over the course of 2 trips to the Firefly, one has drank 8 of the 14 martinis already, the stakes rise higher.
A question arises:
How shall we complete the challenge and not look like drunken jerks?! (Mustique is, after all, an elegant island, where one wears "resort wear" to dinner.)
Fortunately for us, we are truly gifted martini drinkers.
Although David was ready to throw in the towel on our final visit to the Firefly, things changed when we discovered that we had one less to drink than we thought. Turned out we had drank one extra martini than we'd thought while sitting at the bar the night before and making new friends! (And this discovery explained our headaches that morning.) This meant I only had 2 more to go, David 3. So acquiring our Mustique Martini Club polo shirts turned out to be a breeze, and we were much congratulated for our efforts.
Incidentally, I think I quite impressed the older, more stuffy guests as well as the staff who serve the older, more stuffy guests, for finishing my martini journey in top form with my martini rocking petite self. Little do they know that that I wield martini glasses like a SAMURAI!
(The bartender and the martini drinker phenom.)
(David quite proud of crossing the martini finish line and getting a polo shirt.)
(Me and the "Three Amigos" of Firefly - Omar, Marlon, and Aran. I am, obviously, their Martini Princess.)Now I shall take our polo shirts as we travel for the show, take photos of ourselves in various locations, then send them along to the Firefly website.
P.S. The "record holder" is apparently an Australian man who drank all 14 martinis in 36 minutes. They lined up all 14 on the counter and he drank them one after another.
Earlier that day, before we finalized our dreams of being part of the Mustique Martini Club, we took a day trip to the Tobago Cays. Because it is currently "off season" on Mustique, snorkeling trips off the island are difficult to arrange. The Cotton House managed organize a private boat trip for us, however, which worked out well. During the cocktail party on Tuesday (a weekly schmoozy event at the Cotton House for guests on the island as well as property owners and investors), we had befriended an American couple on their honeymoon, Neil and Lauren. They had just gotten married in Dallas, Texas, and were friendly and eager to make friends with us, who seemed to them another honeymooning young couple on the island (they are both 27 years old). They were up for a snorkeling trip, too, which worked out great for us, as we could share the cost. So that morning, we met at the Cotton House dock with our picnic baskets arranged by our respective hotels and hopped on "Love Struck," a boat captained by a man from Canouan named Kelly.
The excursion was fantastic -- and we were glad to have arranged the trip to get there. Tobago Cays is gorgeous, and it lives up to its reputation as being one of the best places in the world for snorkeling. (Check out the view from above at Wikipedia.)
(Approaching Tobago Cays -- apparently, parts of the "Pirates of the Caribbean" were filmed here.)
Upon our arrival to the Tobago Cays, we stopped at a grassy area where sea turtled reside. Unfortunately, we did not see any turtles, although we did see the largest trunk fish we have ever seen (about 3 feet long). Then we moved onto the coral reefs, which were beautiful. The reefs in the Tobago Cays are quite shallow, compared to, say, the Great Barrier Reef. But we did manage to see a couple of reef sharks, about which David was pleased.
(David in his balaclava, sea legs and the rest of sun protective gear.)We had a lovely time with Lauren and Neil, too. We shared "how we met" stories, details of our weddings as well as vodka and rum aboard the boat. Originally, both of them are from the South -- she from Dallas, he from Atlanta -- but they now live in Chicago, so we hope to keep in touch with them and maybe catch up with them when we are in Chicago next year with the show.
We met some lovely couples on Mustique. Besides Lauren and Neil, we met an Australian journalist who lives in Brooklyn, on holiday with his New Yorker girlfriend -- she is in PR and apparently gets to travel to luxury resorts for work. They were on the island only for a few nights, and we didn't meet them properly until their last night. There was another couple, Simone and Justin, whom we met at the Firefly bar. They are British and live just outside of London. They, too, were on their honeymoon, but they were a bit older -- they have two sons, and finally tied the knot and found the time to have a honeymoon. They were lovely, too, and we had a great time chatting to them (they were a major reason why we consumed more martinis than we'd thought that one night).
(Three couples, friends over drinks: Justin, Simone, David, Tomoko, Lauren and Neil.)And so went our week in Mustique. We could have stayed yet another entire week... but so it goes. We came back to New York rested and mellow, very much satisfied with our holiday. It was the first holiday where I took an entire week off and did minimal work -- just checking email each morning to make sure there were no disasters to be taken care of. But anything more... we were simply too far to fret about anything. We got to know some of the guests, and recognize the faces of many; we befriended many members of the staff, and were sorry we did not go to their "village" and party with them island style (we had been invited, but the party was canceled due to a thunderstorm); I learned to drive the "mule" and learned to not fear reef sharks in the water; David discovered that he loves rum in the Caribbean, although he doesn't drink rum elsewhere... it was a productive holiday week. We are already trying to figure out when we might be able to go back to Mustique or another island in the Grenadines. Hopefully, sooner rather than later.
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