Making yummy homecooked meals, making new friends with Mona the camel, going sea kayaking, watching Orcas, getting good nights sleep and still being productive

Our time here on the Island has been restful yet productive. It has been remarkable how well I sleep here -- 8-9 hours straight, no problem and completely dead to the world. Marc has been more disciplined and will get up by 6am each morning and either head off running while others are still in bed, or start working straight away until other folks begin rousing. He has probably been the most productive of the four of us, but that does not mean the other 3 of use have not been. I've managed to do quite a bit here, crossing almost all items off my to-do list and generally feel pretty good about the state of things.

The meals have also been great. We've had Blueberry scones, banana-chocolate muffins, Eggs San Juan (Sharif's version of Eggs Benedict with Black cod, poached egg and Hollandaise sauce over an english muffin), Pancakes, French Toast, homemade granola, for breakfast the past week here. Dinners have included freshly made pasta with scallops and pesto, bake salmon & veggies, crabs & artichoke, plus lots of salad and yummy bread. We did have dinner out one night at Duck Soup Restaurant (one of the most populat places in town -- which had some really dishes such as a chocolate-chilli soup, scallop ceviche in coconut milk, baked escolar, BBQed shrimp, and corn bread souffle). Our lunches are basically free-and-easy, as we typically are all in the midsts of work and are on slightly different lunch-time schedules.

Besides work, we make it a point to go out of the house and do some fun things each day. Sharif had a funny episode with Mona the camel (belongs to the San Juan Vineyard about a mile from the hosue) which resulted in being covered with a lot of camel saliva. Yesterday we went sea kayaking, which involved more time spent trying to get the kayaks secured to the car than time actually in the water! On the way home, we were lucky to finally see the Orcas (killer whales) playing out off the coast -- we spotted a group of 6 of them together, but there were probably others -- a pod typically has about 30 or so and they travel together as a social group. That was great!

This afternoon we will be taking a ferry back to Seattle and spend a day and a half there before going back to North Carolina. Wish us good travel luck!

~ Shuwen