Wow, what a packed Saturday we had! Since the time zone is -2 hours from Texas, we have been getting up at “normal people” hours of 8-ish, so we get a lot more into a day. We got dressed and walked down to this little coffee & breakfast bar called The Cow’s End and grabbed a squishy for Dean (Harriet’s for word a smoothy that Dean has adopted) and a coffee and pastry for me. We headed down to the beach to see the ocean for the first time in the daylight, and it was amazing! The water was dotted with surfers for as far as the eye could see, and the water was COLD at 70 degrees. It was also very windy at the beach. Even with their wet suits, I dunno how they could stand it! But the waves were the biggest I had ever seen at a meager 7 foot and we watched them all pick their swells and ride them to the beach.

Afterward we walked back towards our apartment, planning to visit all the shops. There are a few T-shirt souvenirs I wanna get at some point, but they can wait. We veered off the road onto the path next to the Venice canals just to see where they went, and wow was I glad we did! Along the path were the most Kaston-type homes I had ever seen; all very modern with a bungalow twist, usually with 2 or more “uneven” stories and bright colors. Dean looked up what they were going for - a few were for sale, and I had guessed half a mill - but they were going for around 2 million! How does anyone afford that?!

We got back to the apartment and met up with Dean’s co-worker Joe (he was offered the same deal as Dean) and headed back out - this was about 12 now - for some lunch with him. Joe forgot his sunglasses, and since we had stopped by all the shops earlier, I knew just where to take him. Joe has a thing for those giant 80s cop sunglasses, but I think they just make the wearer look like The Fly from the movie with the same name.

We went and ate at a Greek place and headed out the to beach again to watch the waves and surfers. By now, most of the surfers were gone and the beach was moderately crowded with families and kiddos building sand castles. No adults were swimming - the water was too damn cold - but the kids did not seem to mind. The sand was really hot, but it felt great since the sea breeze was really cold. Dean decided that if he was going to be in all this sun, he needed some sunglasses too, even if it meant he could not see. So we got him and me some matching ones and headed back to the apartment.

We all decided to go down to the pool, which is smaller than the ocean, but was about 20 degrees warmer! To our delight, it was a salt water pool! We swam and smelled the barbecue the Jamaicans were making, and then laid in the sun. My face got a little red. I will use sunblock next time! Joe had the idea to go work out, so we headed back and changed and went off to the gym.

I had the impression that everyone would be stick thin from regurgitating their food, so I would not feel bad about myself for being a little “healthy” weight wise, but they are not at all! This place is not called muscle beach for nothing! Everyone is really in shape, so it has motivated us to do the same; we plan on going to the gym every day in hopes of looking like “Californians” by the time we go back to Texas!

By the time we were done, we were exhausted but hungry, so we went to Joe’s and ate some watermelon followed by going to get some NYC pizza. It was yummy and we were tired! We took a nap at 7 and did not get up until the next day!

Now we are heading to the clubhouse to get free breakfast and we will see where the day goes from there!