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Beach

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The best vacations are beach vacations. But not just any beach. Waikiki is just too commercial, with too many skimpy bikini's and Speedo's on people who should only hit the beach fully clothed. It can be fun to walk down, but get me to the other side of the island, please. Venice Beach is also fun for an afternoon of people watching, but these are not the kind of beaches I recommend vacationing at.

Rent a beach house in the Virgin Islands, or Hawaii, or, to my mind, the best of everything on the Caribbean side of Eleuthera. Or somewhere off the beaten path, which is really hard to do in the Continental US.

The beach house on Eleuthera was less than a decent hotel and even had air conditioning in the bedrooms. It was about 100 yards from the beach, which was private and had a hammock. Swim, sleep, read, snorkel, drink Goombay Smashes, and if you really want to, go the other side of the island where the beaches are made of pink sand. Just don't expect to see many people unless you go to the north end of the island (Holiday Island), which has high-end resorts and so on.

Or go to one of the Sandals Resorts, which is half way between a crowded beach and the solitude of Eleuthera.

People often go on about communing with nature in the mountains as if there is no nature at the beach. To be honest, I like the mountains too, but they do not have a lock on nature.

Watching waves, watching the tide go in or out (or both), looking at the fish, watching the activity in the tide pools, sitting on a chair facing west as the sun goes down and watching for the green flash are all high points. The smell of salt water, the FEEL of salt water, the cool breezes. This is the way people should live.

And, if you are on an island, usually, there are mountains around if you really want to spend a day away from the salt water and sand.

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