Crocodiles!

Good Riddance Isla Cabuya!  The road to get to our house was so rocky and bumpy that the poor van had some serious issues going on.  The tires were not in the center of the wheel well anymore and the bumper was dangling by a thread from scraping on the rocky bridge every single day.  (Plus Adam accidentally backed into a palm tree trying to get out of the palm tree-lined "driveway" thing through the yard...).  We called the owner of the van, Mario, and told him we were afraid to drive the van anymore because we knew something serious was wrong.  The stuff that got welded a few weeks before were broken again and the whole underside of the van was rusted out.  Mario agreed that we should not drive it, so he had a tow truck come pick up the van and he came with his own van and personally drove us 5 hours to our next location while our van got fixed!  His crazy driving assured me that the problems with our van were not because Adam drove poorly.  I was swallowing carsick vomit for an hour!

 The van ride was long and the kids needed some entertainment..........

On the way we stopped to see some gigantic crocodiles.  Holy smokes they were huge!  The only way to see them was to park at a little shop and then walk on this little cement path along a busy highway bridge.  It was a touristy thing.  One side of us was trucks zooming past at 50 miles per hour, and the other side was a 50 foot drop to hungry 15-18 foot long crocodiles.  We've done adventurous things, but this just plain scared me.  In fact, when we first arrived, Lincoln jumped out of the van and went running at full speed into the street. My mother heart jumped as I saw him run and could also see a truck coming and I pictured him getting smashed by the truck.  It's amazing how fast your brain can work!  I screamed at him to stop, and luckily Adam was right there to grab him before he ran into the street.  Scared us to death.  

The crocs were cool though, and the kids bought crocodile tooth necklaces.  

This iguana didn't look so big anymore!  A crocodile snapped at it as it scampered by, but didn't catch it.

And here is our house.  This quickly became our favorite house of the whole trip!  It was well stocked, huge, and everything was brand new. We had warm water in the shower and it was all so clean!  We could even wash dishes in warm water!  The little joys:). This was the first house that we couldn't drink the water though.  We got in a rhythm of boiling the water and filling water bottles every night, so it wasn't a huge deal. There were even a couple of dogs that hung around the property, and though we are not dog people, we really liked them!  We named one Fluffy and he even came with us on a 6 mile run!  He'd follow us to the beach and was excited to see us when we came home from church.  We've never wanted a dog, but he was super cute and we almost wanted to bring him home!

The road to the house was all dirt and it quickly became evident that we were not in a tourist town. We were far from anything and LOVED it!  We just walked a few minutes on the dirt path to get to the beach, where we were nearly alone the whole time!

It was so nice to have a family room where the kids could play and do school work!  The only downside to the house was the endless tile.  We broke every single glass cup by the end of our stay!  Oops!

These cute girls are so different, but after sharing a bed for a few weeks, became so close. They would stay up late reading and giggling and discussing plans to buy Lily an American Girl doll.  What?! Lily?!  Yep.  It's good for her to have the influence of an older sister.  I'm so grateful they could spend time together.  One of the many blessings of this trip.

 Brigham loved getting photos of all his Lizards that he caught.

Lily thinks she's doing a tire foam commercial.. We noticed her doing this in a few photos.  Funny Girl!  We created many happy memories at this table!  So happy to be here!