The New Year Begins

On New Year’s Eve, Richard took me by boat to Placencia so I could get online at the Business Center.  I had not been able to check my work email since Dec 15^th when I discovered that the international plan I had on the 4G Samsung Galaxy Note for this very purpose did not cover data any longer.  I had racked up a whopping bill of $1600 dollars in 6 days accessing email and downloading documents!  Fortunately, since the contract AT&T had with Belize Telecom had changed without my knowledge, AT&T decided to waive the charges.  Whew!!!  We also did grocery shopping to last us for 10 or so days.  I scored big at the Fishermen’s Cooperative – they had just finished cleaning the morning’s lobster catch.  I picked out 2 nice ones to have for New Year’s Eve dinner and bought some frozen conch for later.  Also got to a produce stand just as a new delivery was being unpacked and was able to get nice fresh veg and fruit, including okra, plums, and sapodilla – a real treat.

Soon after we returned from the trip, the heavens let loose with a massive downpour.  We were thrilled because our water vats, in which we collect rainwater as our only water source, were getting low.  We had more rain throughout the night.  For New Year’s Eve dinner, Dennis baked the lobster with butter, chili powder, and Kaffir lime leaves off the tree we planted some years ago.  I made flat bread with garlic, similar to garlic naan. We opened a bottle of French white table wine.  Wine is expensive in Belize and the quality and variety are spotty.  This was a decent, reasonably priced wine that we will have again – if we can find it …

Dennis, happy with the flat bread.  ;-)

A nice wine to complement lobster.

Dinner is served.

We, including Max, managed to stay up to welcome the new year, listening to music from my IPod and watching from our veranda as the moon rose over the Caribbean.  The sea was quite rough and the moonlight was wildly shimmering as it was reflected off the baffled sea.

Sapodilla with a piece of white fruit cake from Joy.

Today is the first day of 2013.  We have stayed close to home, just puttering around getting settled in.  For brunch we had an omelet using leftovers.  An inauspicious start to the year you might say, but you would be WRONG!  We used leftover lobster with free-range eggs Christian Beck sells at the banana farm store, flavored with a smidge of truffle oil. Followed with sapodilla fruit spooned right out of the skin.  Imagine the flesh of a perfectly ripe pear combined with a slight butterscotch flavor and you have a rough approximation its taste and texture. Life is good.  J