I ran out of pictures on my computer and had to go looking through physical albums. SO glad we have them!

This actually is part of Norm Frampton’s Thursday Doors link-up. Go to Norm’s page and, after you’ve enjoyed his wonderful pictures, click on the blue frog button and see some more pictures from other parts of the world. Not everybody is as long-winded as I am here today.

One year, my mother got a call telling her she had won a trip to the Bahamas. Of course, it was up to us to get to Florida. We would have a cruise from Florida, spend three days in the Bahamas, and then return to Orlando and stay a night or two in a luxury condominium, and all we had to pay for was getting there and back, everything we ate, and an hour of our time while a condo salesman tried to sell us a time share.

If I never go on another cruise, I’ll consider myself lucky. Didn’t get seasick, but bored? Oh, dear ghod, yes. This was Mom and #4 daughter when she was wee-ish, and me. Mom and I took turns standing in the corridor with #4 while the other one went into the casino and dropped a dollar’s worth of quarters — Did that. Played a slot machine. Never have to say I didn’t do that.

We went to a floor show, and it was too smutty for a wee-ish one and not funny enough for us.

The cruise ship’s very own Dating Game? No thanks.

One of the chefs did a presentation of how to cut vegetables into garnishes that we found delightful. Show a hick some fancy work with a knife and a humorous vegetable, and you’ve got yourself a happy hick, right there.

We spent most of the cruise out and all of the cruise back at the rails, watching flying fish one way and playful dolphins the other way. THAT was worth the trip!

The Bahamas, or whichever Bahama we were on, were … was … ANYWAY, the poor place had been taken over by us tourists, our buildings, our services, our preconceptions. We saw a “limbo show.” We saw a “beach hut bar.” We went to a beach that had an algae bloom on it so bad my eyes swelled shut and I had to be led back to the hotel. A lady who came around selling hair braiding felt sorry for me and braided my hair for free, but I’d rather have had my sight.

A man shouted at us that everybody hated us, he wanted us to know that.

Everybody we met was really pleasant, helpful, and kind, though. The people who wanted to sell us things needed to sell us things because, as the shouting man said, there wasn’t a whole lot available that didn’t involve the tourist dollar.

We went on a boat, we went on a submarine, we swam with dolphins who supposedly had the option to swim away to freedom but chose to stay for the easy money. We enjoyed all those things, and we had some great food. But the shadow of the shouting man caused me to see beyond the shiny bits and I couldn’t wait to get back to where I belonged.

When we got back to Orlando, the disappointed condo salesman nevertheless recommended a destination that wasn’t Disney World (which we’d been to before), and which I’ll post pictures about next week.

Now, here are the doors to some of the tourist traps of the island we were on.

I don’t think we passed through any of the doors to any of these shops, but the landscaping was gorgeous!

And here is the door of our taxi. I loved this. It was kind of a taxi and kind of a bus. The driver either owned or leased the limo. He careened through the streets, carrying as many people as he could cram into the vehicle. If he saw somebody waving at him and thought he could fit them in, he’d screech to the curb and they’d sit or squat wherever they could. It was great! Everybody in the taxi-bus was nice to us, too.

A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: A character goes somewhere that’s supposed to be paradise, but finds it otherwise.

MA