Beach Daze - The Coconut Chronicles: Two Guys, One Caribbean Dream House - page 139

Secret Beach (Pata Prieta)
We call it The Big Bathtub : sheer heaven for soaking away your cares.
The prize spot, in our opinion, is at the far end of the crescent, where the beach swoops
to a graceful finale in a tumble of slate-gray boulders cascading down into the water.
Fringed by an ancient gnarled tree, it's a natural refuge—no beach umbrella required.
Today we were lucky. The beach was totally empty. Within five minutes we had
claimed our coveted spot and were munching our bakery sandwiches, sipping our sodas,
and gazing in wonder across the still blue water.
Paradise decidedly found.
☼ ☼ ☼
The next morning we headed to Blue Beach, which we'd also visited on several occasions.
Renowned for its beauty, this beach was reportedly even lovelier before the U.S. Navy
decided to play war games up and down its length in the 1950s. One sunny afternoon the
65th Infantry, determined to defeat its faux foe at any cost, had ruthlessly hacked down the
thick grove of coconut trees fringing the beach and laced the stumps with barbed wire to
prevent the “enemy” from landing.