Zupas Wisconsin Cauliflower Soup

Ingredients

Zupas Wisconsin Cauliflower Soup

• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 white onion, diced
• 2 teaspoons minced garlic  Coupons
• ¼ cup flour
• 2 cups milk
• 3 cups chicken broth (or vegetable broth)
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1 head cauliflower, chopped
• 1 cup shredded pepperjack cheese
• 2 cups shredded sharp white cheddar cheese

Instructions

1. Melt butter in a large pot. Add garlic and onion and sauté until onions are tender. Add flour and stir until mixture clumps up.
2. Gradually whisk in milk. Add broth, salt, and cauliflower. Simmer for 15 minutes or until cauliflower is tender.
3. Transfer soup to a blender and pulse until smooth. Return soup to pot. Add cheeses and stir until melted and combined with soup. Serve with extra cheese if desired.

References

Find out the orginal recipe here http://www.lecremedelacrumb.com/2014/10/zupas-wisconsin-cauliflower-soup.html

Church in Andorra Branch in Spain

When I travel I always try to go to church on Sundays. I have always found interesting people in all of my travels. It is also fun to see how this global church is so much the same no matter where I travel with some of the small differences. In my latest travels I got to attend church in Andorra. Andorra is a small country in the middle of the Pyrenees. The Andorran Branch was very unique in its own special way. This time I got to experience this with my wife and one of my sons, Dallin, that just got home from his Mission to Denver Colorado.

First the Andorra Branch is not in the country of Andorra but in Spain, specifically in a little town, Lleida. The Branch actually covers all of Andorra and several small towns and villages in the Northern part of Spain. We met the Branch President and his Wife, President and Sister Fower and two young men missionaries (Elders). The missionary couple are from Utah and this is their second mission. Their previous mission was to South Africa.  They have been out in this mission for 3 months. They have been called to help revitalize this little branch in the Lord's vineyard. The Branch has about 25-30 active members and would have more coming except for the long distances some people have to travel to come to church.. The Branch used to meet in Andorra but many of the Spanish members did not have passports to get across the border to Andorra each Sunday. So they switched the meeting place to Spain. According to President Fower, the plan is to strengthen this Branch and then get things happening in Andorra as well.

President and Sister Fower are doing great work for this fledgling branch. They actually live in a small farm house that the branch members come and help with gardening and take care of chickens. The Fowers bought the farm to help teach the members to be more self sufficient.  You can tell that the members absolutely enjoy working with the Fowers.

Sacrament meeting was great and we could really feel the spirit. Even though we don't speak spanish we could understand most of what was being said.  It is great to hear the saints sing the hymns as well. We did our best to sing in spanish and I am sure we helped contribute to this small branches music that day. At the beginning of the meeting, the branch president announced the program and over the pulpit asked Dallin, in Spanish, if he would get up and bare his testimony as one of the talks. For some reason we could understand everything and Dallin agreed. Dallin did a great job.

Overall, another great Sunday in a foreign land. As always the familiarity of Church always brings comfort and new friends.

DWP

Barcelona Culinary Video Oct 2016

Check out our experience in Barcelona with Food and Markets. We had a great time in Barcelona with our Son Dallin walking the Ramblas and the Gothic Quarter of Barcelona. What a great trip.

Check out more Blogs and Videos at http://darrenpulsipher.blogspot.com

DWP

Manti Pageant - A lost art of american history

We recently had the opportunity to take my kids to the Manti Pageant. This is a pageant as dictionary.com explains it: "a public entertainment consisting of a procession of people in elaborate, colorful costumes, or an outdoor performance of a historical scene." Manti has been the home of the Mormon Miracle Pageant for 50 years. This small town in central Utah, population of about 3300 people, swells to over 18,000 people for the pageant each night for two weeks except for Sunday and Monday. They estimate over 150,000 people come each year to see the free pageant. It typically starts at 9:30pm and ends at 11pm. You should probably have a hotel in one of the bigger towns near by or expect to sit in traffic for about 2 hours to get back to Provo, UT.

The Pageant this year was special because it was the 50th anniversary, happening right there on Temple hill. It was a wonderful evening. One of the things you notice when it gets dark is how many stars are visible. Being from a "light polluted" city in California, we don't get to see all of the stars that we could see in Manti. It was hard not to look at the beautiful night sky and ponder all the great things we have been given in this life.

That is part of the allure of the pageant, the setting. The pageant is held outside at the base of
the small hill that the magnificent Manti Temple sits. The temple is the backdrop to the stage that looks about the size of a football field. The pageant starts when it is dark. There are some spectacular fire effects and lighting that help tell the story of how the people settled the area. It is a wonderful story of how their faith, courage, passion, and drive led them to central Utah and how they built their Zion in Sanpete County.

This pageant has special meaning to me and my family as my family comes from this area. They came to settle in Sanpete county in the 1880's following the Latter-day Saints across the plains from Norway and Wales. They settled in this area and raised their families there. I still have many cousins that live in the area. One of my cousins was key in putting the pageant on this year.

One of the most moving moments was when the Angel Moroni is standing on top of the west tower of the temple (This is actually a person standing there all dressed in white, most LDS temples have a statute on the temple, but this is one that does not have the Angel Moroni on the top of its spire). It is a highlight of the pageant. The Angel Moroni standing on the spire of the temple,was the only thing lit up, when a shooting star streaked across the sky, right over his head. That was just an added bonus to a wonderful evening with my kids.

So if you ever want a great night out, with some fun and inspiring entertainment, check out a historical pageant near you. You might be surprised how entertaining and knowledgeable, they can be.

• https://www.lds.org/locations/pageants
• https://www.facebook.com/MantiPageant
• https://www.facebook.com/HillCumorahPageant
• https://www.facebook.com/NauvooPageant
• https://www.facebook.com/CastleValleyPageant
• https://www.facebook.com/ClarkstonPageant
• https://www.facebook.com/MesaEasterPageant

DWP

Facetime, Hangouts, Skype - Giving a voice to the deaf

I saw something for the first time at the Las Vegas airport this week. I was travelling home after a hot, 110+ degrees,  couple of days at the Nutantix .NEXT conference. I know what you are thinking. You saw something different in Las Vegas? Surprise, Surprise!!

As I normally do, I plugged in my head phones and listened to some relaxing music, today's choice was Turn Blue by the Black Keys. I know, not your typical relaxing music, but it is great to work to. So there I was completely in my programming zone. Nothing was distracting me. Something my wife can attest. When I am in my programming zone I am a total zombie. After about a half hour, I looked up for just a second, and I saw something I have never seen before.

 I saw an older man holding his cell phone in one hand about arms length, like he was taking a selfie. But he was not taking a selfie. He was signing to the person on the phone. He was using one of the many video calling technologies that are available. I only saw one side of the conversation but it was so expressive. It was actually moving to watch him communicate with his loved one through this little screen in his hand. What an incredible sight to see. Technology being used to actually bring people closer together, instead of being that easy distraction in someone's hand. I am sure the creators of video conferencing where not thinking about how the deaf could communicate with each  other, separated by hundreds of miles, but there it was happening right before me.

So I started thinking. The deaf have been using TTY services and technology to basically text each other for decades (started in 1960s). One of the things that was always missing was the emotion in the speech. Of course that was solved by emoticons which have become common place in text messaging today. My mother-in-law uses emoticons with every text she sends. Thanks Sheila. :-) But emoticons cannot show the expressions that I saw in the 5 minute signing conversation in the Las Vegas Airport. It was almost like watching an opera in a different language (Since I don't speak American Sign Language). So much expression and emotion was being expressed in that conversation. Something that a normal phone call or text just cannot show.

I am going to try and turn on my video camera more often when talking to people remotely. It will accomplish a couple of things. One it will force me to pay attention and only have one conversation at a time. (Think answering email during an hour long meeting). Second, I will get to see people's non-verbal communication during our discussion. Most emotion is shared through non-verbal communication. Lastly, It will give me an excuse to video call my granddaughter who lives 10 hours away, more often. So if you get a video call from me, answer it. Let's have a complete "emotional" conversation. Not just a non-emotional text or telephone call.

DWP

Nutanix is hot in Las Vegas

Nutanix had a great conference in Las Vegas this week. Over 2300 attendees. I have been watching this company over the last couple of years and it is great to see how they are growing and how their user/ potentiality user base is growing.

They have been targeting the hyper-converged cloud space with a focus on Software Defined Storage. They have had success in this space driving Server Based Storage as a replacement to traditional SAN devices. However, they have upped their game. They have a complete SDI solution including Orchestration, Software Defined Compute, Software Defined Storage, Software Defined Network and a self-service portal.

New Technologies

Here is a list of new technologies they have developed:

• Analytics tools that administrators can use for capacity planning, what-if scenarios, and root cause trouble shooting. 
• Increased the functionality of their Acropolis Hypervisor so that it behaves more like a hybrid hypervisor, talking to multiple heterogeneous hypervisors at the same time.
• Migration tool for VMs to Containers. App-aware migration. So it is actually dissecting your VM for the applications running on it and then creating a docker container that matches. Very cool technology.
• Extended functionality of their Data Fabric technology to include traditional storage for Brown field and green field integration.
• Acropolis is supporting scheduling containers just like they have done with VMs. They are making data and compute optimized
• Nutanix is moving up the stack. They are talking more about application and services provisioning on infrastructure, than just infrastructure.
• Community Edition Nutanix was shown on Intel's Skull Canyon NUC. This is targeted to the developers of apps on top of Nutanix. They are building a development community around their software.

Impressions

Overall Nutanix looks like it has great momentum. This conference had 3 times more people than last year. It was not just developers at this conference. There was a good mix of developers, practitioners, and decision makers. From this conference it looks like Nutanix is here to stay.

DWP

American Rite of Passage 5th grade overnight field trip

CA poppies on one of the hikes

I recently had the opportunity to go with my daughter, as a chaperone, on her 5th grade overnight field trip. The trip reminded me of my 5th grade field trip I took so many years ago.  It was fascinating to me how some things haven't changed over the last 37 years and how different other things are .

The Same old thing

First, the camp focus and location.  My daughters camp was at Marin Headlands, just north of San Francisco. It was housed at an old Cold War missile base. It was a very cool location, right next to the beach. There are miles of hiking trails, places to see and wildlife everywhere.  My 5th grade camp was in the Sierra Nevada mountains, just south of Yosemite National Park. If I remember my camp, from almost 40 years ago, we talked about nature, ecology, and environmentalism. Things have not changed. They still teach the same things, but they sure made them more fun than I remembered, and gave them new names. Like Garbology. 

Garbology

Ice Plant on one the hikes.

That is right, the study of garbage. Specifically the amount of garbage the kids produced while at camp. This was brilliant! They assigned kids to sort the garbage after each meal. Liquid,  edible, and non-edible. They weighed it and then kept track. This taught the kids great scientific methods, and gave them a goal to achieve after each meal. In the evenings they would look at the results. Great lesson on so many levels.

Hiking

Hiking seems to be one of those things that all 5th grade camps seem to have. I totally understand the philosophy around this. It gets the kids out in nature, they get to see the beautiful world that we live in and most of all they are dead tired at night. :) As a chaperone I appreciated the exhausted kids at night. We really did not have to tell the kids to be quiet very often. Lights out at 9:15pm and by 9:30pm most of the kids were already asleep. Maybe we should do that with my kids at home. Hike them around the neighborhood for 6 hours and then tell them to go to bed. 

Suspension bridge to St.
Bonita Light House

The hikes at Marin Headlands are incredible. With ocean views and beaches all around, every hike had beautiful views and great learning experiences for the kids. Because Marin Headlands was an old missile base there are lots of old bunkers and batteries for the kids to explore and learn about. Most fascinating was and old gun turret hole that had been filled up with water and wildlife had taken it over. 'Newt Nation" as it is called by the camp. The kids got to see an ecosystem of newts, frogs, snakes, and insects and how they have overtaken something in a short 30 years since it was last used. 

One thing that one of the camp "Educators" mentioned, is that kids today are not as in shape as they have been in the last 15-20 years, the length they had been working at these camps. Too much screen time. The "Educators" are pretty good about pushing the kids and not listening to the complaining. And really only the first hike was the only time I heard complaining. But by the third day the complaining was back, but mostly by the parent chaperones. One of those may or may not have been me.

Home Sickness

Hawk Cove near Camp

One thing that has not changed is kids and home sickness. For many of these kids this was the first time staying away from their parents. And those are typically the ones that were having the hardest time. Luckily all of the kids made it through the first night with only a couple calls home, but no one leaving. I remember the same thing from my 5th grade trip. 

For many of the kids at the camp this was also the first time the kids have lived in a dormitory. One thing they learn quickly is they have no privacy. There was some difference from when I went to camp. The showers when I went were just an open bathroom with shower heads. Everyone was scared to take a shower. I only remember one or two kids taking showers in the three days of camp. I was not one of them. The showers for these kids were isolated stalls with shower curtains.  So we had more than half the kids take showers each day and about 75% took them at least once.

Madeline and a WW II gun

Bunk beds

Bunk beds have always been part of 5th grade camp and this was no different. The only difference this time is as an adult, I had to share a room with 2 bunk beds and 3 fully grown men. Being 6 feet tall I would have thought that I would get the bottom bunk. But the other two guys I was with were taller. And because the bottom bunk did not have a foot-board or headboard I ended up on the top bunk. It has been years. I think my mission was the last time I was on the top bunk.

Luggage and Hair products

I have never seen so much luggage for 3 days and 2 nights in my life. I think there should be a rule that you must carry your own luggage. No roller boards. You have to carry your own stuff. Kids were coming with enough clothes to survive for weeks. I blame roller-board luggage for this. The problem with roller-board luggage is they do not work well in the grass or dirt. So we had several kids not able to get their luggage where it needed to be.

Madeline on the beach

Another thing I do not remember from my 5th grade days was the amount of hair products the boys had. Hair Gel, Gorilla Snot, Hair spray, etc. No wonder the kid's suitcases where so large, they had to bring everything from the bathroom with them.  Some of the boys were actually late to breakfast because they were doing their hair. Can you believe that? What is happening to our children :)

Right of Passage

In the end it was great to get to know these kids in an unfamiliar environment. Watch some of them conquer their fears and work together to solve problems. I especially enjoyed the time I got to spend with my daughter Madeline and watch her face challenges and overcome them. 

DWP

Church in Taipei Taiwan

In my travels I have the opportunity to see lots of different things. One of my favorite things is to

attend church on Sundays in the countries I travel. This last week I was in Taipei Taiwan. I do my best to find an English speaking ward so I can at least understand what is being said. And that is typically fairly easy in large cities through out the world. And Taipei was no different. The Taipei Ward is an English speaking ward and right next the the Taipei temple. So I hopped in a taxi and went to church.

One common thing I find in these expat wards is typically a little bit older ward with diplomats and expat executives attending the ward. This ward was very similar, but I did find a large youth program, larger than I have seen in most expat wards. I especially found a large number of young women in this ward compared to young men. I thought, wouldn't be nice if I had some of my boys with me on this trip. :)

One thing I found in this ward was that it was very reverent. Which is a nice change from my ward which is very loud during sacrament meeting (we have a large primary and 2 nurseries, :) ) I also noticed that much like my ward they loved to sing. I always enjoy wards that love to sing. It brings a nice spirit into the meetings.

Being Mother's day the meeting talks were all about Mothers and their roles in society. A family spoke as this was their last week in the ward before they moved back to the States. All of the talks were very good and reminded me how important a good mother (which I am privileged to have) to society. One of the best phrases in the talks was given by the 16 year old daughter that spoke. "If at first you don't succeed, do what you mother told you." I had to right that down it was so funny and os true. Look for something from Daisy Blossom about that in the future.



I then spent sometime after church walking around the temple grounds and took some video and pictures for Austin (my nephew) and Daniel (my brother) who both served in Taipei on their missions.

One of the best things about Mother's day for Mormon families is we get to talk to our kids that are missions on Mother's day. So, even though it was on Monday morning in Taipei I got to talk to Dallin via Skype on Mother's day. Something I always look forward to no matter where I am in the world.

DWP

Chinese Hawaii - Sanya China

Chinese Hawaii

I recently had the opportunity to travel to Sanya, China for work. I did not know anything about
Sanya before my trip. Just that I had a conference to attend and needed to get there. First it was not an easy place to get to. I could not find a direct flight from the US to Sanya. Instead I had to first land in main land China and then a connecting flight to Sanya. Since I had business in Beijing I spent a day in Beijing with meetings and then flew down to Sanya. From Beijing the flight is about 4 hours.

This time of year, May, is the slow season for Sanya as it is really hot and humid. It most definitely was their slow season. There weren't very many people at the resort and it was very hot and humid. I arrived at about 11:30 pm at night and the airport was crowded for that time at night. It seemed that that was normal for that time of year. It very much reminds me of Hawaii. Small airport. Lots of people and humid.

I was met by "Feng" from the conference staff to make sure I did not get lost. Which was nice since I do not speak any Chinese and had no idea how to tell a taxi driver where I wanted to go. It was also nice to be able to speak English to someone. Because I was there for business meetings I had to bring my suit jacket. I made the mistake of wearing my jacket off the airplane. Which just made things hot and sticky, but I did get lots of looks from the locals. Feng started laughing when we got to the car and said that the local teenagers we passed walking to the car thought I was movie star or something because no one else would wear a suite jacket in the heat and have such "white hair." :)


We drove from the airport about 40 minutes to the Resort in Sanya named the Royal Begonia. It was one of the nicest resorts I have ever stayed at and about $120 a night it was a steal. In the high season the price can double to $240 a night, but that is still a great price. My room as huge 700 sq ft, which is bigger than my first studio apartment when I first got married. And the resort was beautiful, well maintained, lush, and grandiose. It was about a 5 minute walk through the gardens and past the pool to get to the beach.

Beach

The beach was very clean and basically empty (Remember the low season for the resort). I saw several signs at the beach that there was no lifeguard on duty and that it was dangerous to swim. The waves where not much bigger than 3-4 feet, much like the beaching in southern California on a normal day. There was also a long list of rules for the beach which I think was funny. It seems like they are trying to make sure that no one has fun at the beach. They have a green, yellow and red flag system and it looks like the red flag is up all of the time, it was heavily faded from the sun. :) I asked some of my work colleagues from China about all of the rule. They said that is normal in China. Lots of rules because they know most people won't follow them. But they might follow some of them.

I enjoyed walking down to the beach in the mid-morning before it got too hot and found a nice breeze at the beach that made it even more enjoyable. There was no one but a small family (Husband, Wife and their 3 year old son) at the beach. The beaches are kept really clean and there is several cabanas and lunge chairs to get out of the hot sun. Since this was the low season not all of the services were available at the beach, but they have great facilities.

Food

The food at the resort had a good mixture of local cuisine, mainland Chinese food and American food choices. Breakfast included a buffet spread that included local fish dishes, chicken feet, ox tail, Chinese dumplings, spring rolls, pot stickers, omelet bar, hash browns, sausages, baked beans and a huge spread of pastries. Since I love all kinds of foods for breakfast I loved the buffet. It was like dinner food for breakfast.

The dinner and lunch menu included traditional Chinese fish dishes, and the all american club sandwich and a bacon cheese burger. I think it is funny that no matter where I travel I always seem to be able to get a club sandwich and hamburger and fries. The universal food.

Communications

The language barrier was some what of a problem at times and I found the use of sign language very useful. If there was confusion, they typically would go find someone near by that could figure out what I was trying to say. There was only one time when I wish I new Chinese.  The phrase "please don't come in" would have come in handy.  I had just gotten out of the shower and was getting dressed when the house maids knocked at the door to clean the room. I yelled at them them to come back later. but they thought that meant to come right in. I almost fell over trying to get some shorts and a shirt on before they got a show. :)

Another thing that was frustrating at first but learned to enjoy it was the internet connectivity. The best I could get on my phone was 2G (Edge) and even then it was very spotty. It would drop in and out all of the time. And when I did have connectivity, via phone wifi on my laptop,  the Great Chinese Firewall blocked lots of my things. Including gmail, google maps, and anything attached to google. I had to rely on normal SMS messaging instead of google hangouts like I am used to. I quickly learned how dependent I have come to good/great internet connectivity. It was nice to not be notified of everything going on all of the time.

Overall the trip to Sanya as quite enjoyable, I only wish I had my wife with me and some more time to explore more of the island and spend more time on the beach.

DWP

Carnets and Lamp Shades (Experience traveling with declared computer equipment)

In a recent trip to China and Taiwan I experienced what a "carnet" is for the first time. I am carrying some computer equipment with me and needed to make sure it got through customs. I learned about something called a carnet. It is basically a passport for the equipment. But getting through the international borders can be some what tedious. My company uses a service to draw up the documents. Which are not trivial by themselves. Then they gave a set of instructions that needed to be followed.

1. Get the carnet signed and stamped in the US before you leave
2. When you arrive at your destination get the carnet stamped and signed in customer at customs in the foreign country.
3. When you leave the foreign country get it stamped and signed again by customs
4. When you arrive in the US get it stamped and signed again.

Seems pretty easy. But As I have found the first step can be difficult if you are flying out of a smaller airport or one that does not have a customs office. Sacramento (SMF) for example only has office hours from noon until 3pm, 5 days a week. My flight left at 9am. So I could not get the stamp and signature I needed in Sacramento. My connecting flight was in SFO. They have customs officers 24 hours a day, so it was not a problem. But getting to customs was a bit of a challenge. Since customs is on the other side of the security you have to go out of the secure area. And find the back door to customs and knock on the door. I basically did a lot of asking around. Until I found it.

Once I got to the Customs officer things went pretty quick and it was actually entertaining to talk to these guys. They have some pretty funny stories about people coming in from all over the world, especially in San Francisco. One guy standing in front of me was being pulled aside because he just looked funny I guess. He was wearing a lamp shade on his head an a full length fut coat that looked like it was hand made out of some small animals. He carried a walking stick and was not completely coherent, but very talkative. He was an American that had come from Thailand. They said they pulled him aside because he had medicinal herbs with him. He was going to be there for some time with the customers officers.

Now with the carnet in hand I had find my way out to departures and go back through security and then to my gate. Total time from one plane to the gate of the other was about 1 hour. Good portion of the time as trying to find the back door to the customs office.

So overall if you have a carnet, plan on an extra 30 minutes to an hour at the airport and make sure that the customs office is open before your flight leaves. I also learned that if you just smile a little and laugh with the customs agents and the guy with the lampshade on his head you can have a fun time.

DWP.

Aruba Private Island Paradise

My wife and I had a great trip to Aruba this year and one the the things that made it so great was the private island that the  Marriott Renaissance had in downtown Oranjestad. The hotel is actually two hotels separated by about a 5 minute walk. Between the two hotels there is a pier and a great little shopping mall with lots of restaurants and touristy shops. We liked the location downtown. There were lots of things to do downtown at night and we found great places to eat. We stayed at the adult only part of the resort. This hotel is right next to the harbor and does not have access to the beach, but is right in the middle of town. So you get great access to all of the shops and restaurants.

Trip to the beach

Boat ride out to the island

So you are wondering why would we go to Aruba and not get a hotel on the beach. We kept going back and forth between staying in the High rise part of Aruba (All inclusive resorts right on the beach) or staying downtown where we would have to travel to the beach. We found out the Renaissance has a "Private Island" for its guests. It was a short 15 minute boat ride from the hotel to the island. So we decided to take the chance and stay there. We figured we could always go to the other beaches if the "Private Island" didn't work out.

The boat runs every 15 minutes starting at 7 am and ending at 6 pm every day. It is pretty consistent and we rarely waited longer than 10 minutes for a boat. The boats are small and prepare to get a little bit of ocean spray. It is a fun trip out on the ocean and really isn't very far. We met several people on the boat and each couple had a unique and interesting story.

One Island, Two Beaches

Paige making a new friend at Iguana Beach.
Look close it is plastic.

When you arrive to the island you quickly find that the island is broken into two areas Flamingo & Iguana Beaches. Flamingo beach is a couple minute walk from the boat dock. While Iguana beach is right close to the dock. The beaches are named after the animals on the beaches. At noon they feed the Iguanas on the beach and some of them are quite large.

Iguana Beach

Iguana beach has the rentals for water floats, snorkel gear and towels (free). They also had a restaurant. The restaurant burned down a couple of months previous. But they had a great little food shack as a temporary restaurant.  The food was great especially the Piña Coladas (Virgin of course). 

Iguana Beach was a great beach like every other beach we saw in Aruba. Beautiful white sandy beaches with clear blue water. This beach is for families so there where some kids on this beach. Even though there where kids, it was not that crowded or noisy (except for the sound of jets taking off from the airport which was about 2 miles away). We got on our snorkeling gear and went snorkeling There were fish everywhere we looked. Especially along the rocks on the edges of the little lagoon they built.

Flamingo Beach

Darren trying to ride a flamingo.

Flamingo Beach has flamingos. Yes they are real life flamingos. Just wandering around the beach. Not cages, not restrictions. You can even feed them. If you have food. They become your best friend very quickly. 

Flamingo Beach was for adults only. So you didn't get the noise of kids so it was somewhat more relaxing.  The only downside is the restaurant is on the other beach. A two minute walk away. But they do have waiters that come by periodically to make sure you are hydrated. More Pina Coladas :) 

We went snorkeling again on this beach and found even more fish. We spent most of days here sitting on the beach, snorkeling, eating and sleeping. Needless to saw if you want a relaxing day this island is the place to go.

DWP 

Flamingo getting ready to attack.

Aruba lighthouse restaurant

One of the first places we visited on our trip to Aruba was the California lighthouse on the northern tip of the island country.  The light house is named after the SS California which ran a ground over 100 years ago.  They built the light house to warn other ships  of the rocks and reef on that side of the island.

Romantic Evening

We asked the navigator (concierge) at the front desk about the light house and places to eat near there.  She suggested a nice Italian place with great views right by the lighthouse.  Sunset would make it even more romantic.  So we booked a table for an hour before sunset.

One thing you should know about Aruba. The weather is the same everyday. 88 degrees for a high and 78 for a low.  Oh and the wind blows about 15 to 30 mph. Being new to the island we heard of the year winds but did not understand them until our romantic evening outside at the lighthouse.

When we arrived at the restaurant they seated in the best place to see the sunset. Which happen to be outside on the terrace. It was a beautiful spot,  except for the 20 mph winds that we experienced for the two hours of our dinner.

Many of the women on the terrace with us tried everything they could to keep their wind blown hair out of their face or food. Bobbi pens, pony tails and in the case of my wife the cloth napkin that was on the table. 

It was quite funny to watch people as the tried to deal with the wind when taking pictures with the sunset in the background.  The wind was blowing up skirts and dresses, and making a mess of hair. But since Aruba is "One happy island" and everyone was on vacation, there was lots of laughter and smiles.

The food 

Like most of Aruba, the food was great. They serve traditional Italian food with lots of seafood options. Dinner came with great bread complemented with butter, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar. We also tried the brushetta which was amazing.

One of the difficult things during dinner was when we finished all of the bread,  the bread basket started flying away in the constant wind. That just gave us an excuse to ask for more. 

This is a must go and see for a romantic evening but I would suggest not sitting out on the terrace. It was far too windy. Or if you do be ready to be wind blown hair look and food that will cool off way too fast.

DWP

Zeerover Aruba Restaurant Review

Local Restaurant 

In a recent trip to Aruba my wife and I found a great little local restaurant to get fresh fish about 5 miles south of the airport in a little town called Savaneta. There we found Zeerover. A great little fish market restaurant where the fish is loaded off the ships that morning and served that day. If you like "fish fry" you are going to love this place. Part of the restaurant is the whole experience.

Be prepared to wait

This is a really popular place especially on Sundays. The wait to order your food can sometimes take 1 1/2 hour, but we were lucky this Sunday because we only waited for 30 minutes. Waiting in line just increases your appetite and everything tastes better when you are hungry.

Ordering the simple way (Cash Only)

Zeerover Menu

This is a cash only business. So be prepared to pay with Cash (USD or Aruban Florins) they do not take a credit or debit card. Their boat captains get paid cash for bringing in the catch of the day, and they expect the same from their customers, Cash only.  When you finally get to the counter to order. You have a couple of choices. Corn bread, Fries, Shrimp (typically a little over priced) and Fish. What kind of fish depends on what the boats brought in that morning. You pick from an ice chest right there at the ordering counter. You can pick  how many pieces you want. and they weigh it and tell you how much you owe them. You have no idea what fish is available until you get up to the counter. When they run out of fish for the day they are done. So don't get there too late.

They also don't post any prices, but the prices seem to be pretty reasonable. I thought the shrimp was kind of expensive, but the fish was most definitely a good deal. For two people it was about $30 USD. Which in Aruba is a pretty good deal.

Incredible food

Fish and Shrimp fry

We ordered Fish, Fries, Shrimp and Corn bread. We could have skipped the corn bread it was more like a corn pancake, and we did not care much for it. The rest of the food was great.  If you like fresh deep fried food this is the place to go.

Great Location

If you like the sound of the a busy restaurant next to an ocean, you will like this place. My wife found the perfect spot right next to the water. In the morning the boat come right up to the restaurant and unload their fish.When it is time for lunch every part of the dock becomes part of the restaurant. All of the tables are outside and most have some kind of shade. No need to worry about rain, because it never rain on Aruba. Or so I am told by the natives.

DWP

Attending Church on Vacation: Aruba

Everyone needs a vacation! We all need a break from the busy lives that we lead. A chance to rejuvenate. Get away from all of our responsibilities. Pretend if only for a moment that there aren't science fair projects to get done, bills to pay, kids to run from music lessons to sport practices, deadlines at work.... My wife and I actually do a really good job disconnecting from the "Normal" world that we live in when we are on vacation. One of the things we don't take a vacation from is our religion.

Benefits of Church on Vacation

Okay, I know you are thinking this is going to be preachy, but many that know us know that our religion is part of who we are. So one of the things we always do is go to church on Sunday. Not only do we get a spiritual booster shot, we get to enjoy the company of people in the place we are visiting. Because we have something in common with these people, our belief in Jesus Christ and his Gospel, we quickly make friends and have something to share. We have never had a bad experience doing this. Just the opposite. Many times we have found some connection, albeit sometimes a very distant connection with someone there.

Finding the Church in Aruba

There are great resources on LDS tools, the meeting house locator (https://www.lds.org/maps/meetinghouses/)  to find where churches are and when they hold church. So if you have a smart phone or even a computer, you can quickly find out where and when church is held. You can also find out what language the meetings are held in. This was very handy in Aruba because they speak 4 languages on the small island. Papiamento, Dutch, English, and Spanish.  We had two choices. A branch in Oranjestad (Spanish/Papiamento) or in San Nicolas (English). We chose the English speaking branch in the town of San Nicolas. It was about a 20 minute drive from our hotel in Oranjestad. 

Strange looks from the tourist

We got dressed in our Sunday best and headed down from our hotel room through the lobby. A lobby filled with vacationers in their swimsuits and beach gear ready for another sunny day on the beach. To say we had strange looks from people is an understatement. We had several questions from people on where we were going. Many people asked us where the wedding was being held. We just mentioned that we where headed to Church. You should have seen their looks. Some were  "good for you", others gave a look of confusion. Anyway, we used it as a small missionary moment. We hopped in the car and headed south on the 10 mile drive to the other side of the island. It was another beautiful day in Aruba.

Every Branch has its own Culture

Every time we have gone to church on vacation we always find something unique and special about the wards or branches that we go to. The San Nicolas Aruba branch was no different. We walked into a branch building which we quickly learned used to be a house at one time. It is a cute building that you could tell had several great branch activities and you could feel a closeness of the members of the branch. We looked at pictures on the the wall of their branch activities, baptisms and a missionary plaque of a missionary recently sent out from the branch to the Paris France mission.  We took our seats in the makeshift chapel which was mostly just chairs (enough for 40 people) in what used to be a family room in the house.

Before the Sacrament meeting started, we were greeted by the branch president, several other members of the branch and the missionaries. Of course we have a soft spot for the missionaries because Dallin is out on his mission. They were a very friendly congregation and we felt right at home. We also met another couple that were there on vacation as well. They where from Utah and were there on a get away from life just like us. (Great minds think alike).

Bi-lingual Church

The San Nicolas Aruba Branch is an interesting branch because their meetings are in English and Spanish. We found this out from talking to the missionaries. They told us that Sacrament meeting would be in English and Spanish. All of the announcements would be given in both languages and then there would be a Spanish talk and an English talk. The Elders and some members of the ward would translate to people that only spoke one or the other languages. Most people in Aruba speak 3 or more languages so the only translating I saw being down was to us on the other couple there from Utah.

Music Loud and Reverent

Anytime you go to another ward or branch you always find a big difference in the musicality of the congregation. We have been in some wards that sang so quietly you could only hear the organ, others you could not hear the organ at all. As we started the first hymn we were shocked at how loud this small branch of 30 people sang. It was awe-inspiring. When they sang the hymns you felt they really meant what they sang. It was loud yet reverent at the same time. You could really feel the closeness and spirituality of the branch. What would it be like if all of the wards/branches in the Church sang like this small branch in Aruba, with conviction, reverence and volume.

The music was also sung in both English and Spanish at the same time. So they always annouced the hymns numbers in Spanish and English. It was very interesting hearing the hymns sung in two languages at the same time.

Surprise connection

With every trip Paige and I take we always find some kind of connection. This of course is even
more prevalent at church. Well we found that there is an Elder Sheppard (Paige's maiden name) in Aruba. It is such a small name in the Church so they started looking at how they are related. They did not find a connection but of course being true Sheppards they hit it off great.

What a great trip and a great experience. I can't wait for our next trip and to find new people to talk to and learn more about how the Gospel is influencing their lives.

DWP

PS.
This trip inspired Paige to create a new product for her shop. Daisy Blossom Creations.