Last Saturday we went for a final ride around the island. Sharon was leaving on Tuesday, so we had an elaborate plan all staged out for her starting last week with the boat cruise on Gordy's boat and ending up Monday night at Calico Jack's.

Lee from Vespa Cayman joined us this time, and Eleni had to give it a pass so she could pick up her mom at the airport. Lee was riding a sweet-ass Vespa GT250ie in arrest-me-red just like mine, but faster. :) Sharon had her camera with her this time, so we took a right-turn and headed out past Pedro Castle to the bluff. We parked the scooters and went for a walk over the ironshore down to the water's edge, 40-odd feet below and took some pictures.

Following our little detour to the bluff (which was better than a detour to see the world's largest ball of twine, thanks anyway, Mr Griswold) we got back out on the road and headed east. Once we got through historic Bodden Town the speed limit increases to 50mph. Just before you get to Breakers, the road is new, smooth and flat. Sharon was in the lead, with Lee in the middle and me bringing up the rear, and he and I both had the same thought: when we hit that stretch of road, let's test the governors on the Vespa engines :) Lee got the jump on me, and on that 250GT there was no way in HELL I could catch up to him. I opened it up and going into the wind I got my 125LX up to 59MPH. Lee said he got his the GT250 up to 74mph. In what seemed like just moments, we were at the Lighthouse at Breakers, and the speed limit drops to 25mph so we slowed down and made the turn in to the Lighthouse's carpark. Sharon toodled along about a minute later (her ET50 tops out at about 42mph). We lined up the scooters out front and went inside to belly up to the bar. The Lighthouse makes good iced tea! The first time we got on our scooters together and headed east, we stopped in at the Reef Resort and had iced tea there, and it was TERRIBLE. It tasted like old nasty coffee. YUCK. None of us could drink it, no matter how much sugar and lemon we put in it. We finished up and started to head back, and I mentioned to Sharon that we would stop somewhere to take a little dip in the ocean, as it was HOOOOT out. Little did she know...

Little did she know that it was all part of the setup. While we were taking her out for a scooter ride, all our friends were congregating in South Sound at Robert's Treehouse. MJ and I were talking about having everyone over for dinner one night before she left, and then we looked around the apartment and saw that it was pretty small for having more than two or three people over at once, so she came up with the idea of having a cookout at the treehouse instead. Perfect! We pulled over and parked the scooters, and she asked where we were. I told her we were at a secret little swimming hole that I knew about. She said "there's an awful lot of cars here..." and I said "well I'm not the only one onthe island who knows about it..." as we were walking down the trail, you could hear people and music and she said "Is this by chance Robert's treehouse?" and I said "what? no,of course not!" just as we rounded the last bend and were faced with, well, the treehouse! "OK, Im a big liar" I told her.

Once we were there and everyone said hi and had a beer, we gave her her two going-away pressies. First up was the Nikkor 55-200mm telephoto lens for her Nikon D50 that she just got a few months ago. Two weeks prior, we were sitting on the beach talking about cameras and she said she wished she had the 200mm lens for her camera, but that The Camera Store was sold out of it and backordered til after she was gone. I took note and filed it away. When Jules asked me later that night if we were going to get anything for Sharon, I suggested the lens, and then went shopping for it online, looking for somewhere that had it in stock. B&H Photo came through again not only with stock but the best price, too!

After she had a moment to recover, we gave her her other present: a photo album/scrapbook filled with pictures of all of us and the places we used to hang out together with her here, along with little notes from everyone. I wasn't close enough to see, but John said we were about a half-second away from tears! Mission Accomplished! We hung around the treehouse eating, drinking, splashing in the water, feeding beer to a passing horse (more on that when I get a photo of it) and watching the sun go down.

Around 8:00 it was time to scatter to the winds for a quick shower and change and get back into town to Aqua Beach for Ratskyn's saturday night performance. The gang was all there, including the girls from Legendz who were occupying one the tables near the stage. The place was packed, as it usually is for Ratskyn gigs and right at the beginning of the second set, Zac called Sharon up on stage and then got the rest of us up there to pose for a picture before singing her one of her favorite Pearl Jam songs. Once again. we were milliseconds away from tears, but no go. :)

We stayed until we closed the bar (not hard on a Saturday, they all close up at midnight). Seb wanted to stop at Al la Kebab on the way home, and I think they did. I was behind but the line looked too long at Al Le Kebab so instead I got a slice of pizza at the new place, Gino's Pizzeria next to the Lone Star and ate it when I got home. Mmmmm pizza...

Sunday was a regular Griswold Family Funday Sunday and despite the rain earlier on, Sharon, Jules & Jellybean and Matty showed up for some beach time in the late afternoon and then we waddled over to Legendz later on for dinner. I was pretty exhausted so I left shortly after eating, right when Paul & Catherine showed up and apparently Gordy and John were on their way there, but I was beat.

I headed home from Legendz (all 100 or so yards of it) and another weekend was in the can.