Skill and Sev's Excellent Adventure: MY FAVORITE BEACH…AND EVERYONE ELSES

Loblolly Beach on the Island of Anegada is by far the most stunning of beaches. Both times I’ve been there, when I first reach the point where it comes in to view I stand there in a sort of stupor, transfixed and speechless. I’ve seen a lot of beaches and this one is the Gisele Bundchen of beaches. From sky to sea, the stratums of translucent colors defy even the watercolorist’s palette. The exact way I think a make-up artist looks at Gisele. Neither the girl nor the beach need improvement. And simply put, I stare at both with mouth agape and wonder how either came to be so truly flawless. But as stunning this beach is (or the model for that matter), my favorite it is not.

On the Spanish side of the islands lies my favorite beach, Culabrita. This beach, with its narrow band of sand hemming the long crest of turquoise shoreline is not quite as effortlessly stunning as Loblolly.

What proclaims this beach the clear winner in my pageant of beaches, would be its personality. While Loblolly Beach would be that beautiful blonde with an always pleasant and sunny temperament and politically correct answers, Miss Culebrita would be the kind of contestant that would tell the judges she planned to eat a bucket of chicken and French fries when the fictitious pageant concluded. Culabrita is the real deal.

Don’t get me wrong, Culabrita is a lovely beach in her own right, a beauty that deserves to be a contender in my imaginary pageant of beaches. But next to Loblolly, she would never dream of being crowned the actual winner. But Culabrita is the one I would cheer on for the win if I was sitting on the couch and eating cheese puffs and watching a Miss World Beach contest.

Besides Culabrita’s attractive shoreline, which spreads out in a white crescent shaped welcoming smile, it has two other inviting attractions—a lighthouse and a Jacuzzi. Loblolly has none of these--she's just pretty to look at which is her downfall. Culabrita's more than just show. Her lighthouse is now derelict which adds to it’s charm. The decaying brick building sits in ruins, a mosaic of encrusted oranges and reds, cresting above the green canopy on the top of its hill. Below, a natural pool forms trapping water like a bathtub with an occasional burst of tide crashing over it’s rocky banks churning the water inside like a jacuzzi. As you can see, Loblolly is a stunner but Culabrita is the one you want to date.

(Having trouble updating...next paragraph should say "it became clear we were NOT the only ones")

We set off for Culabrita’s beach mid-week. I wanted to get there before the weekend because I am not her only fan. On our last sail, we discovered the whole of Puerto Rico loves her too and they flock by powerboat to her beaches on the weekends. But this time I knew this little fact and so our plan was to beat them there and leave before Friday. As we rounded the point it became clear that we were the only ones wanting a date with Culabrita. There were already a handful of sailboats anchored in her bay. As we got even closer we realized that the whole of Puerto Rico was here too. It was then we realized it was a holiday week and it didn’t matter if we were here for the weekend or not.

I’m not sure the boys were happy about the place seeing all the people. Until they spotted the bikini clad ladies on the shore. Suddenly it became their favorite beach too and they were more than happy to set us up on a mooring ball.

By late afternoon all the Puerto Rican bound powerboats were leaving which left just us and the other sailboats.

Early the next morning (early for island time) Mark, Connor, Severin, and I made the easy hike up to the lighthouse.

Gone is the chain-link fence around the brick building and warning sign to not trespass. Someone finally realized the relic drew visitors regardless of the rules. This time we discovered not only had they torn down the fence but they shurred up the windows and doorways with 2 by 4’s rendering the place safer. The steep winding and rusting stairwell to the top has been made impossible to climb if you’re ten years old and afraid of scampering up six feet to the first useable stair. Luckily we are not ten nor afraid.

Here is Sev making his way to the first step. I was hoping his last tetanus shot was still effective…

His mom will be happy to know this is all the farther he went. Mark had just scaled up ahead of him, followed by Connor, when Mark came upon a thicket of wasps somewhere on the rusty stairwell. This immediately halted Severin’s desire to reach the top. He climbed back down to safety and that was that.

As for me, wasps are no deterrent for the Lighthouse’s breathtaking view of my champion of beaches Miss Culabrita, so I let Sev come down and quickly scaled up. Several flights of rickety rust worn steps later I reached Connor doing Lamaze breathing techniques to summon enough courage to thread the gauntlet of wasps ahead. I laughed at him and pushed past him and continued up. I called down to him that wasps don’t care about you unless you disturb them harshly and we were just passers by. Connor wasn’t calmed by my rational but dodged his way up behind me not wanting to have blog posts contain any notion that he is a chicken and his mom is not.

Once at the top we were rewarded with this view…

I must say, this is a very precarious spot on which to perch for someone spending so much time at sea. I had to hang on as the lighthouse felt like it was swaying and crumbling beneath me. Luckily it was just my sea legs.

Once all three of us had inhaled the view like a fine wine, in our case diet Coke, Mark and I headed back down. Connor was behind us but got hung up with the wasps. We were back down and had toured the old lighthouse rooms, had conversations with a local family, and a myriad of other activities before Connor showed up back on solid ground. Apparently he had more Lamaze breathing to do in order to brave the wasp zone. I have found Connor’s Achilles Heal—stinging bugs.

There is a new more sturdy structure just to the west of the old Lighthouse which houses the light for seafarers. This one was wasp and rust free and Severin seemed to enjoy the perch from up there.