Cloudy and rainy for most of the day today. After 3 days of hard dancing it was nice to just hang out, rest the feet and catch up on the sleep I was missing. Tomorrow will be soon enough to get back into some other type of outdoor stuff. Today was nice to read, nap and watch an Elvis movie.

   Bought a pound of lentils the other day while at the store so it seemed like a good day to cook up a big pot of lentil soup. Sauteed a big old onion and some carrot, added in a bunch of turkey ham and a hot braut that was hanging around the fridge and then a couple of cloves of garlic. Would of been nice to have some chicken stock to add but made do with 6 cups of water and a whole bunch of appropriate herbs. Cook it up for about 30 mins and then add in a couple handfuls of fresh spinach, simmer and then eat two bowlfulls for lunch and another for dinner. Yum! Still a couple more meals worth left in the fridge, but it'll get eaten in the next day or two. I think a bowlfull along with a hot grilled cheese sandwich sounds good if it is still raining tomorrow at noon.

    The photo's below are the last from the week of dancing on St Croix. Will have to go out and hunt up some thing else to take pictures of next.

Dancing on St Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands - Feb 2013

You would think that a week long contra dancing vacation in the Caribbean would generate at least a few dancing pictures. Interestenly enough I generally dance most of the time instead of taking photo's. But I did get a few daytime pictures of the dance tent and some of the people there. This is the tent where we would dance every night. The portable wooden dance floor is set up and taken down every year and is laid with rubber supports under the whole thing. The crew that sets up and takes down everything seems to have it all down to a science.  

I think this is the Friday afternoon dance that we did so we would have the night off to go downtown to the 'Jump Up' street fair. I heard from George that the weekend was full this year so somewhere between 150-175 people either dancing or as part of the band or cooking staff.

Most of us like dancing at night better than anytime during the day. It's a bit cooler at night and the sea breeze seems to blow a bit better. But as you can see a little heat doesn't stop us, there were still enough dancers for a full four lines.

The band 'Wild Asparagus'. I've danced to this band many, many times over the past few years and it always seems to hit me that they are much better than I ever remember. An amazing group of talented musicians, they seem to be able to write at least one new dance tune everyday they are there. Over the years they have created many wonderful nuggets with a lot of them having a hint of island music in them. Note that George Marshall is also a part of the band, and often plays with them when he isn't calling.

A few of the dancers.

Our leader, George, explaining some dance move before queuing up the band.

You can always tell contra dancers.... they're the ones with the huge smile on their faces while they are dancing. You just can't help yourself.

One last photo for the week. This is the dining tent where we would all come and eat dinner, and a few other meals, together. Located just outside the pool area at Sugar Beach Resort it was wonderful to eat wonderful food with all your dance friends, both old friends and new. Thanks to everyone who made it such a wonderful week.... I can't wait for it to happen again next year.