The breakfasts and the long empty tropical beaches are what I remember. In the late 80's I went to the Bungalow Beach Hotel in the Gambia for the first time. It was August, during the rainy season, off-season for tourists. The nearly deserted beaches were excellent for long walks and even when the rain came it was a fine rain that didn't keep us from the beach. The breakfasts were hard rolls and butter, marmalade and honey, Nescafé and evaporated milk with sugar for a poor man's café au lait. I think there was Laughing Cow cheese, too, though that is not what I remember. I did learn my love for marmalade at the Bungalow Beach Hotel, but any breakfast tastes better when it's lazy. I was back many times after that, usually as part of a big group for our spiritual conferences, but it is those first lazy mornings that stay in my memory. My traveling companion, David Cuthbert, is long back in Europe, and married now, the last I heard. He did try his hand at making marmalade once we were back in Guinea. It was OK, but it wasn't that English marmalade in a lazy off-season hotel.
