Coconuts

We arrived at the Caribbean today and, naturally, my first priority was to crack open a couple of coconuts.  Ever since seeing this video of two ways to open a coconut, I've wanted to try it.  Apparently, I don't have the chops (or the machete) to open it like the awesome guy from Trinidad.  It took a little work but I did get it open and Beth was well-pleased with her coconut water which came from a coconut-package off of a tree rather than a carton-package off of a shelf at Trader Joe's. I plan on working pretty hard to perfect my coconut cracking skills while out here.  It's very important to have goals while on a long trip.


The coconut water from the fresh coconut was pretty good but I prefer the dried nutty coconut better so I went ahead and deftly cracked open one of those too.  It's pretty dangerous work whacking on a coconut with a machete but I'm pretty amazing with a machete so I wasn't very worried.  Beth was though.  When I started the advanced machete move of cutting back in the opposite direction toward my hand, I do believe that she called the move "stupid" instead of "advanced."  Beth doesn't really know a lot about the machete arts so I forgave her and, just so she wouldn't worry, I went back to the basic moves.





Beth and Lena took a break from playing "I grab your face" to munch on some coconuts. Lena was pretty suspicious of coconuts at first because I think she thought it was a vegetable.  Then she realized it was some sort of hybrid between a bone and a stick.  This is a very good thing for a dog, so she settled down to some serious coconut eating.   I plan to teach Lena some of the machete arts on this trip so that she can fetch and prepare coconuts for us and we won't have to remove our asses from hammocks. It'll be good for Lena to actually start earning her keep on this trip.  She thinks traveling is all fun and games and sleeping.  Well Lena, it's not.