6:23pm, August 6, 2013, Tahiti

It was a most-excellent day. We took advantage of our rental car’s “unlimited mileage” and literally drove all the way around the island. Mind you, it is not that far, but when they mean unlimited mileage, it seems a bit silly when you’re talking about an island smaller than your county back in the states. When the rental car lady said it yesterday, Sweetie said he almost said, “Cool, because we are going to drive cross-country!”  I laughed at that because it was just so darned funny.

Since it is winter here, technically, and they thankfully don’t do “dumb daylight savings time” as I like to call it, it gets dark here around 7pm. As in pitch black, can’t see your hand in front of your face dark. I like it, actually, because I like it to get dark at a decent hour. I actually hate daylight savings time because I don’t sleep in the summer as well as I do in the winter. It I  just weird that it gets dark at like 9pm or something ridiculous like that, all due to some president in the 20th Century who thought it would be a great idea to change the time.

But today,it was a glorious day.  We went to several beaches, and I got some amazing photo shots. We went to a restaurant where the waitress spoke very little English, and the menu was entirely in French. Thankfully I knew enough to get us by, along with my handy tea isolator I downloaded before we left.  We also shopped in a small gas station quick mart, at the base of a beautiful hillside that you simply would not believe. The mountains look like they were hand-crafted from grass, trees, and maybe icing, they look so delicate yet rugged all at the same time.  It has been really quite fun to try out my dormant French skills while we have been here, as rusty and inadequate as they are at times.

Last night, we saw the Southern Cross for the first time, and yes, as the song says, we are glad we came this way. Today, we watched a little French boy play with marbles while we ate,and we watched one play with his father in the ocean today at a local beach where we were the only non-Tahitians in the mix. No matter where you go, the children play the same. It is merely the adults who behave differently. No matter where we have traveled, we have tried to be part of the place. We don’t eat at chain restaurants, and we walk and try things that locals do. As Robert Frost said, taking this road makes all the difference.

While I do not know what all the future will hold for either of us in our jobs,I do know this much: we will continue to travel,even if it means we have to save for many years to do so. No matter where I land once these months are over, it will be with both feet firmly planted on the ground, ready to spring up in yet another adventure.