#TURKSANDGOODYS2018 – THE GOODYS IN TURKS & CAICOS: DAY 1!

Day 1. Whoop Whoop. Aw yah. Siren noise!

Wait. Is it a siren noise? You know that noise that DJs use? Like that noise that makes you like, “Man, I hate DJs?” Yeah, that noise. I think it signals excitement. But it also sometimes signals making fun of people.

Man, I hate DJs.

Annnnyways….

Day 1 started early. Nah, like really early. Like URRR-LEEE.

We were up at 3AM. And Nickie said It was cold outside. And she handed me my raincoat.

…

…

No? No Matchbox 20 fans?

But yeah, early. While the rest of us were getting ready, this was Owen.

But we all had to do it. 6AM flight and all. So we dragged ourselves out of bed and shuffled down with our bags to the lobby…

And we somehow made our way onto the shuttle for the airport. Which was surprisingly crowded. We loaded all our bags and the shuttle brought us to the Delta terminal.  So all was well.

BUT WAIT NO IT WASN’T.

As we were unloading our bags, we noticed we had three bags. Which wasn’t good. On account of we were supposed to have four. So we got off the shuttle and informed the driver, who said he would go back and check at the curb of the hotel. So we just waited on the curb and remained calim

BUT WAIT NO WE DIDN’T.

We were freaking out. I called the hotel and they checked the lobby and the curb. And nothing. There was no bag. Freaking out.

Then, they called me back and told me the bag was still on the shuttle. Did I mention…

I mean, it was 3:00 AM. But at least, crisis averted. The driver dropped our fourth bag off, we made our way through ticketing, dropped our bags off and grabbed some Dunkin Donuts. On account of nothing else was open. But it did help with the whole waking up thing.

 

We boarded our plane at Logan and took the short flight to JFK for our connecting flight. I sat next to Owen and thankfully, we had TVs. Owen watched Frozen and I watched I, Tonya. Which I have been dying to see and LOVED. Like, I really loved that movie.

And before we knew it, we were on our descent into Turks and Caicos. The whole flight over the ocean, Owen was like, “where is the turquoise water and then, all of a sudden, we started hearing murmurs of “turquoise” all throughout the plane. And we looked out and saw this…

I feel like I was more excited than I expected to be. Like, so excited. But also, we were a little nervous. We were nervous about a few things coming into this trip:

• The weather report was looking extremely meh coming into this trip. I mean, we heard this place got like 360 days of sun yet our forecast was showing thunderstorms, rain, wind, and clouds every day of our trip.
• We had also heard on Facebook horror stories of people getting sick on the island – seemed like flu-type/GI symptoms were running rampant.
• We had heard stories about how crazy this airport can get. Lines out the door. Chaotic scenes. And I mean, coming in midday on a Saturday, we were definitely worried.

After the plane landed, the doors opened and we climbed down the stairs into bright sunlight on the tarmac. I could already feel my concerns lifting. And once we walked into the airport, we saw this…

Yeah, pretty empty up in thurr. So we walked through security to pick up our bags. And while an empty airport was nice, there was another situation to deal with. So we brought a total of 3 bottles of wine with us – a bottle of Alamos Malbec (leftover from the Drizly order the day before), a bottle of Murphy Goode Fume Blanc (Nickie’s favorite), and a bottle of Cakebread Cabernet (for a special celebratory drink).

So I have some good news and some bad news. The good news is that both bottles of red stayed intact. The bad news? The white did not survive the trip. When Myles went to grab our big black bag, he said in a very disgusted tone that it “smelled like alcohol.” The Murphy Goode was gone. It had shattered in the bag. The good thing was that this bag contained no clothes. All beach stuff. But, as I dragged it through customs, leaving a trail of Fume Blanc behind me, I could already feel I was on an island as I just sort of laughed it off and felt things would be ok.

We checked in at the Beaches podium and I emptied out all the broken glass I could into the trash bin nearby. I informed every attendant of our misfortune and they all sort of just laughed it off too. So I obviously had the right reaction. And like I said, at least it wasn’t the red.

We hopped on the shuttle for the quick ride over to Beaches, taking in all we could of the island on the way there. I actually didn’t realize islanders drive on the left side of the road until, well, I thought  we were going to die. So that was exciting.

However, we made it to the Caribbean Village lobby unscathed, were handed a cold towel, and made our way to grab our first rum punch of the trip.

Turned out our room wasn’t quite ready yet, so we decided to go get lunch. As we walked out through the door and into the resort, we were in awe. Seriously, this place was unreal to take in all at once. Over the next week, the beauty would continue to wow but that first time seeing it all around us, it really took my breath away.

We made our way down to Barefoot by the Sea, a restaurant in the Italian Village set on the beach where you sit at picnic tables with your feet literally in the sand. Looking back, I can’t imagine a more perfect first meal. We were tired and hot, but we were happy thinking about the week we had in front of us.

 

For lunch, Nickie and Myles both got the Cuban sandwich.

Owen got a ham and cheese pita pocket from the Kid’s menu.

And I really had a hard time deciding between the fish tacos and the jerk fish wrapped in foil. So, eh. I got both. ALL-INCLUSIVE UP IN HERE.

 

Oh and of course I got a Mai Tai. Because. Of course.

I will say that fish was one of the best things I ate this week. It was a super yum lunch.

After lunch, we decided to head back and see if the room was ready yet. But before doing so, we wanted to try and book the glass bottom boat for both the next day and later in the week. Turns out you can only book for the next day and that unfortunately all the slots were already filled. Good to know. We figured we would just come back and try to book for another day.

We got back to the Caribbean lobby and checked in at the desk where William behind the desk told us our room was, in fact, ready. Before we went up, though, we wanted to book our dinner at the hibachi restaurant, Kimono’s, as we heard that was the only place we needed to reserve and we should do it right away. We visited the culinary concierge and made a reservation for Tuesday night as our whole party would be there that night.

We then went up to our room with William. And we got our first actual taste of the service at Beaches Turks & Caicos. Man, William was awesome. He took us through everything in the room and answered every question we had. He was really great.

We got the room we requested – 261. And the room was really great. I didn’t mention this before, but we had also heard Caribbean Village was pretty blah compared to the other resorts. But we got a nice big room (which worked out with all the floats and what not) that had a King bed, daybed, and a trundle for the four of us. And we had a pretty awesome view of the basketball court, Cascades pool, and the ocean beyond.

I couldn’t leave without unpacking and handling the whole broken wine thing so I quickly packed up our drawers and cleaned out the bags. Then we got our suits on and figured the best way to really get our bearings was via pool bar. I mean via pool. I mean, we visited the pool bars but I mean. Yeah. Pool. We made our way through all the villages and pools checking everything out along the way.

We started just outside our door at the Cascades Pool in the Caribbean Village…

And then headed just a little bit over to the Iguana Pool, also located in the Caribbean Village.

We of course HAD TO check out the ocean.  I mean, look at this water.

 

Then it was over to the Italian Village Main Pool. This place was straight-up Vegas. Without all the shame and broken dreams.

Key West Village was next. And we walked by a wedding as we did a lot throughout the week. But I caught this nice shot.

The main Key West pool was being treated so we couldn’t swim in it. And rather than swim in the main French pool, the kids really wanted to check out Pirate’s Island Waterpark. Who were we to arrrr-gue?

Get it? Arrrr-gue. Pirates.

Whatever.

We jumped on a quick slide and then hit the surf simulator to do some body surfing.

We then grabbed some ice cream at Bobby Dee’s, the 50’s diner inside the water park, and jumped in the hot tub close by. As my astute sister-in-law said, “Owen is living his best life here.”

We were already feeling vacation big time, but we had to start getting ready for dinner so we walked back to our room. And while getting ready for dinner is fun enough, it’s even better with a little Powerline.

Since the Celtics were playing in Game 3 that night against the 76ers, we wanted to try and catch at least some of the game. We had heard the Irish pub, The Cricketer’s Pub located in the Italian Village, would be our best chance. We headed out into the night…

And made our way to the Italian Village. Thankfully, they were showing the game and we got to catch most of the 4^th quarter and the overtime the game ran into. It was a really REALLY great game. And the pub was great.

They had a pretty good beer selection (I got a Guinness…which was from a can, but still.) And we got some apps – chicken wings, potato wedges, and some bread and cheese. The wings and potato wedges were especially good though I seem to have only gotten a picture of the wings. Oh well, trust me. I did eat these things.

For an entrée, I got the Fried Chicken burger. And this thing was REALLY good. I can’t quite remember the sauce that was on this thing, but it was YUMTOWN, population: ME.

Also while at Cricketer’s, we ran into some friends from the Facebook Beaches Turks & Caicos groups – the Robbins family were watching the Celtics game and, like, wearing Celtics gear so obvs….fast friends. And we ran into the Shuberts as well…who we kind of kept running into pretty much all week. Both super nice families. And like, we like meeting new people. Because they haven’t heard all our jokes yet.

For dessert, though, we wanted to hit up the Café De Paris in the French Village for some French pastries. The service here was a bit slow but there were definitely some good options here. The carrot cake and the coconut custard thingamawhat was pretty great as well. The banana cake thing? Not so great. I know. I was surprised too. I am usually B-A-N-A-N-A-S for all things banana.

All in all, it was a really fun first day. We got to have some really good food, drink some really good drinks, and explore the resort. But being that we were up since 3AM…

…we were pretty tired by 10:00, so we all went to sleep to get a good night’s rest before our day tomorrow when we get our first visitors. YAY!