On the drive back home, we noticed THOUSANDS of smooshed carcasses all over the road - which we eventually identified as crabs! Some of them were FUCKING HUGE and you had to swerve to avoid them because they were definitely big enough and sharp enough to potentially pop your tire! I finally pulled over to get a closer look at one of them!
After making it through customs, we picked up the rental car we'd reserved and headed out to Compass Point, the diving resort that we'd booked a week at.
I'd found Compass Point while I was on TripAdvisor.com trying to figure out where we were going to stay. All of the reviews about Compass Point said it was a beautiful, remote resort with amazing accommodations and an awesome diving staff. The reviews for the place were so over-the-top positive, and their prices which included accommodations PLUS two SCUBA dives per day were so reasonable, that it sounded almost too good to be true (which had us a little worried).
And we're off! If I remember correctly, it was like a ninety-minute drive from the airport to the hotel where Tara and Greg's wedding was taking place.
The place we'd booked to stay out was a gated-off resort-type place so we decided to rent a car because it would give us more freedom to explore the island. I'd driven on the left side of the road before and figured it would be no big deal. WRONG! Too bad no one told me that Jamaicans, who are reknowned around the world for getting high and being all friendly and "No problem, mon!" turn into crazy people as soon as they get behind the control on anything that has wheels a motor. Seriously, they are hands down the craziest drivers I've ever seen (and I grew up in NEW JERSEY!).
...and drove to nearby New Milford, CT to pick up Vin at his parent's house and bring him back down to NYC (coincidentally, Vin and The Fatty both grew up in New Milford).
Despite only getting a few hours of sleep, we managed to pick up the van and be heading beachward before noon. Here's me, Meredith, Grant, Rachel and David and Miye in the back! Rented van, wooooooo!
We scored a rental car and headed to check in to our...oh, wait, did I forget to mention that our resort check-in date wasn't until Saturday and we'd decided to party the first two nights and sleep in our rental car? Hahah. Ok, so here's the story. Keep in mind, we went on this trip because my Uncle Bruce had a week at a luxury resort that he wasn't going to be able to use. That meant that we had a free place to stay from Saturday to Saturday. When we went to buy plane tickets, we found out that if we flew in on Thursday (instead of Friday or Saturday), our flights would be almost $600 cheaper. Considering we were both trying to save money (neither of us were working at the time), we decided that we take the cheaper Thursday flight and and just sleep in the rental car until Saturday when we were able to check into the fancy resort.
The whole idea of stopping in Iceland on the way to London had been Grant's idea. So right up until this point we'd been laughing at the irony of the fact that he'd been missing out on all the fun - but the Blue Lagoon was so amazing that it just stopped being funny. Sorry you weren't there to see it with us, Lil' Buddy! We missed you! After we were done up taking pics on the hill, we climbed down, grabbed our car and headed back towards the airport at Keflavik.
Me pulling an exicted face at the bag of donuts Grant was holding up as I pulled in. (They got me a treat! Who's more thoughtful than them? Who's luckier than me?)
Thelma & Louis (hehe) on the run. (Look at Louis in the background...see that serious face he's making? Yeah, that's because instead of enjoying the ride, he was responding to emails via his Blackberry messenger.)
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