Adventure Sunday!

Adventure Sunday is a special dive day once a month with Chris Sawyer Diving. It's a long day trip to dive sites that aren't typically in the rotation.

Kaia did some dives towards her advanced certification and we dove with some good divers, rather than the typical bumbling tourists.

Our dive sites were on the Northwest side of St. Thomas, at Frenchie Pinnacle and Lizard Rock. We were hoping to see tiger sharks at the pinnacle, but we settled for beautiful scenery and abundant fish life.

Michelle joined us from St. John, and we met a bunch of other cool locals, including Igor - a three time Ultimate Fighting Champion. For such a tough looking dude, he was really soft spoken and friendly. I'm currently training for my no-holds-barred match with him in early 2008 (just kidding).

Took lots of underwater pictures, including lobster, pufferfish, angelfish, trumpetfish, butterflyfish and parrotfish.

GPS trail to Outer Brass, Lizard Rock and Santa Maria Bay.

Yaaay, CM is Here!

CM arrived last night, and this morning we headed over to St. John. We got lunch in Cruz Bay and took it to the beach. Trunk Bay parking lot was totally full, so we headed out to Francis Bay. We swam, ate lunch and laid in the sun. We had swam with wild dolphins here, but didn't see any today.

Trunk doesn't clear out until about 4pm, so we spent some time at the Annaberg sugar plantation ruins. Amazing history on the island, as St. John was the location of one of the only successful slave revolts in the Caribbean. Around the ruins there are a ton of crazy bugs, lizards and beautiful plants, including a large Flamboyant tree.

We went to Trunk Bay for the afternoon sun, and I took some pictures on the underwater trail. It was the first US national park trail that's underwater. Most of the coral has died now, but there are still quite a few fish, including a huge six foot tarpon that's lived there for at least 15 years. Trunk Bay is so quiet in the evening - we were three of only five people on the beach.

Trunk turns off its fresh water showers at 4:30, so at about six we headed over to Cinnamon Bay which has camping and showers open all hours. The outdoor showers are nice, you just have to keep an eye out for the mosquitoes!

For dinner we went back to the Fish Trap and had the whole fried two pound snapper for dinner.

All Saints

Today was another cloudy day. And even though the weather's warm, and the rain doesn't last long, the change from the sunny days is significant enough to want to skip the beach, skip the photos and just take a nap. Fortunately, Kaia was working at All Saints school today, so I reason to get up and out this morning.

As you can see in the photo, the kids love Kaia and are really exited when she comes by. While she was working, I walked around the school and took a tour with the principal. I even met two of my old teachers! Someone's car was broken into while I was there, but the police quickly caught the guy. All Saints is on the border of a bad neighborhood, and sometimes homeless/druggies will wander in and try to steal stuff. But we always felt safe at school regardless.
After the school, I took some additional photos and we headed home and out to Magen's for milkshake and sunset. Today was the least beautiful sunset yet, but the walk on the beach was still nice.

Tonight for dinner we're either making tacos or boil-in-a-bag Indian. There is a sizable East Indian population here, so there is plenty of authentic food to be found.

Tomorrow CM arrives, so we're very exited about that.

Rainy Day

We woke up this morning to heavy rains and claps of thunder. Rain isn't all that bad here, but it sure does put a damper on the beach activities. While Kaia was at work, I visited with Geeta and Navin downtown. It was nice to see them and we're all really starting to look forward to the reunion when everyone is down here.

This afternoon was cloudy, but the sunset was nice at Magen's. Didn't take any pictures today, but do have this one of a common sight living in the tropics. Geckos like to hang out on the outside of your screens, under the window louvers. Bugs are attracted to the lights indoors, and get trapped up against the screen and make for easy pickin's. I found a baby lizard in my suitcase/drawer today. Not sure why some people don't like them. They're really clean and eat a ton of bugs around the house! Plus they use inter-molecular Van der Waals force to stick to walls. How cool is that?

Island Life

This morning Kaia worked at Peter and Paul Catholic School. It's a nice campus, right in downtown Charlotte Amalie. We ran some errands around the island, and were hit with a power outage in a Costco type store. I also tried some Sea Moss beverage. It's basically made with agar from sea moss as a thickener, and this one was flavored with peanuts.

In the afternoon, I did some windsurfing and initially had some good breezes, but the constantly changing direction and power were frustrating. June and July are the second and first most windy months, so maybe I'll have some good days in the future.

The sunset was nice, so we headed over to Magen's for a walk and swim after buying coconuts from a Rasta with a machete. We met a guy from Puerto Rico who was fishing because of the full moon. He showed us his sock full of chum that he used to lure fish into the area.

Banana Pancakes

This morning we're going to St. John and Kaia kindly woke up early and made banana pancakes. We had been listening to the song of that name by Jack Johnson, and it was really nice.

We met Katie and her boyfriend in Cruz Bay and eventually went on a hike to the Reef Bay Petroglyphs. These rock carvings are typical of the Taino people that inhabited the area before Columbus arrived. It had rained earlier in the morning and we were hoping that a waterfall would be present at the petroglyphs, but it didn't rain enough. Instead, the rain just left things very muggy for the walk, and we were drenched with sweat after the 3 mile round trip hike up a mountain. We had fun walking with Snap though, and we even saw a mother deer and two spotted fawns on the trail.

After the hike, we went to Coral Bay and ate lunch at Skinny Legs, a popular bar/burger place. Met some nice people from the DC area and told them how to get to Lindquist Bay on St. Thomas.

Kaia and I swam and took freshwater showers at Cinnamon Bay, and then met Katie where she was helping out for Greek Night at a local restaurant. We had great greek food and lots of desserts. After a great day, we headed back on the 10PM passenger ferry to Red Hook. We had a run-in with the ticket taker who was mad that we both used the coupons out of the same commuter ticket booklet. I offered to pay the $5 instead of using the cheaper commuter ticket, but the guy refused to give me back my commuter ticket. I'm quite opposed to paying twice for things, so this led to a standoff where the guy would let Kaia on to the boat, but said I had to wait an hour for the next boat no matter what I did or paid. I waited around to talk with the captain, and he was more sensible and let me on the boat. As usual, click on any of the pictures for bigger versions.

Today we went on two morning dives with Chris Sawyer Diving out of Red Hook. We got to go out with Chris himself as well as our buddy Larry. We've signed up for another series of dives with them, including the famous wreck of the USS Rhone, so expect more posts in the future. I got the underwater camera working better this time, but had an issue with fog-up halfway through both dives. Took some pictures that would have been awesome of a blue spotted moray eel. Next time I'll put a desiccant pack (or a small bag of rice) in the case to hopefully fix the problem. Not bad for a $40 digital camera + $40 underwater case.

The two pictures on the right are of a squirrel fish and a flamingo tongue snail. You can click on any of the pictures to see in more detail.

And the GPS tracks of our dive sites from Red Hook to the south of St. John - The Leaves and Booby Rock.

Today we went over to St. John briefly, but just ended up going to Happy Fish Sushi and wandering around town. I didn't end up taking any shots. After we took the passenger ferry back, we swung by Lindquist Bay, our favorite beach on St. Thomas. It has recently been acquired by eminent domain, and is now open to drive right down to the beach.

In the water, near where the waves break, there are all these fish that kind of swarm around you. Kaia feigned fear of them since they behaved so brazenly. Anyway, I all of a sudden got bit on the back by one and it was enough to make me stand up out of the water. I kind of joked about it and sat back down in the water, only to get bit again in the same place! "That's it - I'm outta here", I said. Kaia noticed my back was bleeding down to my swimsuit and we washed it off with fresh water we carry in the car. So yes, I was bit twice by tropical fish!

We thought they were Angel fish about 6" long, but it turns out they're Palometas, a member of the Pompano Jack family. They're actually called Palometa Piranhas by some. I will go back to Lindquist (with long sleeve rash guard on this time) and take some underwater shots of the little bastards them.

Keeping it Real

We've just been continuing the routine of breakfast, internet, lunch, work, windsurfing, swimming, St. Thomas Dairies and Magen's bay. I'm getting better at the windsurf and today moved up to a 4.5 sq. M. sail. There was barely any wind today and it rained a little, so it wasn't the greatest. Yesterday Kaia went to the gym and I came along and went shopping. I had to get a shot with me at the gym when I saw this mural on the wall. Just Keeping It Real...

We've seen a wedding or wedding photos every night at Magen's. Sometimes we comment on how the sunset was better the previous day, but we figure that for the people on their special day, it's always just gorgeous. I took a picture of Kaia at a wedding set-up the other night.

Shopping was interesting - I went to a giant store called Plaza Extra, and wandered the aisles. It's surprising the stuff you can get here - Amy's Organic Soups, boil in bag Indian food, bulk cereals. You can pretty much get anything here on the island at one store or another. One of the things the VI is famous for is duty free shopping. By and large, the rise of shopping in St. Maarten and the cheap online jewelery and electronics distributors in New Jersey have made shopping down here much less popular than it used to be. However, alcohol is still very cheap. You can take up to 5 bottles back to the states; six if one is produced in the VI. Local shopping tip: the cheapest place to buy is K-Mart.

"Keeping It Real" in the VI

During the week Kaia works at local schools, so we haven't done as much activity as we did last weekend. We do, however try to walk on the beach at Magen's Bay each evening. It's a nice way to transition between the day and the night - to clear your mind of work and other activity.

I swim every day at one beach or another. Today, I researched Scuba operations and tracked down a guy who rents windsurf boards and kite surfing equipment. I started at Sapphire Beach which is one of the main areas you can rent equipment. It's really tourist oriented though, and they only have a small selection of hourly rentals.

I considered renting scuba equipment and doing beach dives off various locations, but it's not really safe without a partner, so I opted to rent a windsurf board on a weekly basis ($200) instead. It's located at Vessup Bay, on the east end of the island, and I have keys to unlock the board and sail and go whenever I want. I also have my choice of sails and boards, so I can move up as I get better. I started with a 3.5 sq. M. sail, and will move up to a 4 and 5 sq. M sail by the end of the week hopefully. The larger sails are more difficult to control and pull out of the water, but they get you moving a lot faster! Kaia and I are also interested in trying kite boarding, but we've heard it takes longer to become proficient at. I'll get some pictures windsurfing soon. I'm also considering taking my splashproof GPS out on the board to get some crazy tracks. We'll see!

Sapphire Beach - there's a decent coral reef on the right for snorkelling.

Sapphire Beach Hotel

Sapphire Beach looking East to St. John.

The entire length of Sapphire Beach

Kaia at Magen's

Magen's is an OK beach... :-)

Kaia says the water looks like mercury this time of night

Kids playing ball at 7PM

After our scuba dives we went to a great sandwich shop in Mongoose Junction. We got a call from Katie who was surfing with her boyfriend out at Reef Bay on the south side of the island. Kaia and I had never been out there, so after several wrong turns up driveways and scraping the bottom of the car, we stumbled upon the beach trail. We were down on the beach a little while and this guy showed up and asked if we wanted to learn how to surf. Apparently he teaches local kids how to surf there. So I helped him carry two longboards down the trail and after a little on-land instruction, it was Kaia's turn. She did a great job - standing up after just 4 or 5 tries. "Surfer Gary" then helped me catch waves by pushing the board in, while he was instructing Kaia how to paddle and catch them herself. We had a great time and really want to go again. We were pretty tired from all the paddling afterwards though!
Katie's boyfriend left early, so when we were done surfing we drove her back to her house. She actually bought the land with the semi-temporary house on it. As you can see in the pictures, it's similar to the tent cabins, only much nicer. The roof is held up with a ships's mast, and there's actually a table that can be raised up the mast and out of the way with a pulley. We also got to meet her 2 year old pit bull "Snap". He loves people, but you have to watch him around other dogs.

After our tour of the "tree house", we headed down to the ferry dock and back to St. Thomas.

This morning we got up early, checked out of Maho Bay, and drove to Cruz Bay to go on a two tank morning dive at Low Key Diving at 8 AM. We met Michelle there and one other person who was diving with us that morning. We were told we were going to go to the wreck of the General Rogers, but ended up going to two coral dives not too far from the harbor. I got to try out the underwater case for my old digital camera that I bought on Craigslist for $40. We took it down to 70 feet and it worked fine! Most of the pictures had the classic blue tint because I don't have a proper underwater strobe, but I did find a photoshop action that did a pretty good job of color correcting the photos. Of course there is only so much color available down that deep, so I'd like to find a good strobe or underwater light solution that I can use in the future. Overall we had fun on the dives, but didn't feel like anyone who worked for the dive company really wanted to be out with us, and they tried to rush the whole thing along. I've been on dives where I was the only diver and been treated much better. Low Key was professional, and well set up, but I think next time we'll go with another dive operation.

Our two dive locations, Congo and Carvell Rock

Hovering over a conch shell scuttling along the sand

A large ray - yes, we all thought of Steve Irwin

This fish was hovering over the ray, trying to pick off fish that the ray startled

This morning we went out to Coral Bay, a small settlement on the east end of the island. It's not much more than some houses and a few restaurants. There is a nice new shopping center that contains several stores featuring island made crafts and a good restaurant that we ate breakfast/lunch at. Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures in Coral Bay or at Cinnamon Bay, where we later swam and worked on our tans. We'll be back in St. John next week, and will do more photography at that time. For now, check out this satellite picture of St. John overlaid with our GPS tracks for the day. The yellow track is our trip to Coral Bay, and the circular track on the top is our drive to and from the campsite. The main town of Cruz bay is at the West end of the island. Although only about 8 miles from Cruz Bay to Coral Bay, the drive takes about fifty minutes because the road is so windy and hilly.

For dinner, we met two of Kaia's friends who are teachers at a school in St. John. They were somewhat camera- phobic, but I managed to get this shot of them walking around town (L-R Michelle, Katie, Kaia). We went to a nice restaurant called La Tapa where we had local tuna ceviche, cashew goat cheese salad, and paella, and afterwards splitting several desserts. The dinner's total cost surprised us all but we had a great time and great food.

It turns out Michelle is divemaster certified, and we met the owner of Low Key Diving, so we set up a dive for the following morning. I didn't take many other pictures other than the bar next to Low Key Dive shop.

For the weekend, we took the car ferry to St. John. It costs $40-$50 round trip and takes maybe 20 minutes. There is basically no schedule - the barge leaves when it's full. I didn't get any pictures on the boat or of St. John harbor. It was kind of hazy due to dust from Africa, and I wasn't motivated at the time for taking photos. I'll take some next week.

In St. John we stayed at the Maho bay campgrounds. They're an eco friendly set of about fifty cabins with tarp roofs and screen windows. The off season cost of $80 per night or $105 per night for high season (Winter and Spring) is pretty expensive for what you're getting. We were fortunately able to use the 50% local discount. The cabins are screened, but do benefit from your own mosquito net, given that there are gaps in the floorboards and on some of the tarps and screens. You can see my sweet "Tropic Screen II" mosquito net on the bed - this is a must for doing any kind of low-rent traveling in the tropics. Our tent neighbor was really worried about the lizards in the room, which was surprising considering that they help eat the bugs, and there are a lot worse things (roaches, spiders, mosquitos, beetles) that we saw in the room. The shared bathrooms and toilets are pretty nice, and the staff was friendly.

You can get around St. John in Safari busses, which are open air taxis that take a set of people to common locations (and don't like to take just you alone to some place off the beaten path). They typically have custom airbrush work on the back and this one is no exception.



In the afternoon we went to Francis Bay and and swam, because the no-see-ums were killer on the beach. I didn't bring the camera, but Francis bay is the beach on the left side of the CaribbIan banner photo on the top of the page. Maho Bay Campground is actually on the point of land between the two beaches in the banner. For dinner, we went to a great seafood restaurant in the main town of Cruz Bay called The Fish Trap. Dinners on St. John are pretty much $25-$35 pp everywhere but we managed to share a whole fried snapper, rice, beans, veggies and coconut bread pudding for only $20 each. The barracuda in the painted picture is one of many "cute" fish paintings on the walls.

We walked around town for a while after dinner and watched a local reggae band perform. It was quite dark, so I didn't get many pictures at night, other than the one for J's place, a bar shack in town. Nightlife pretty much consists of people getting completely drunk and obnoxious, or locals hitting on tourists (and in some cases the other way around). Not really our scene, so we headed back to the tent and bright stars under a moonless night.

For the next few weeks I will be a guest blogger on the site, and as Kaia's big brother, will motivate her to post as well.

I arrived in St. Thomas today and took a few shots so far. The trip from Seattle takes about 12 hours - I flew from the equivalent of 3AM till 3PM. When I arrived, Kaia had a guava tart waiting for me as a snack, and had finally got a VI resident's card which provides a hefty discount for locals at hotels, dive shops, etc. Apparently you simply show your driver's license from whatever state, and that's enough proof to get an ID! Well that and $15.

After a quick stop home, we headed out to St. Thomas Dairies and Magen's bay for sunset. They have doubled the admission price of Magen's to $4 per person, and $2 if you're a local. It's the only beach on St. Thomas that has an entry fee, but luckily, before 8am and after 5pm there is no charge, and this is the best time to go anyway.

I should relay some info we found out about Jamaica from a guy at St. Thomas Dairies. I commented on how everyone says it's dangerous there. He told a few stories and explained how if he drives to any other area of the island, he never comes back on the same road he arrived on, and preferably, he'll stay overnight at the place to prevent bandits from robbing him. He was pouring homemade "bitters" into his beer, so I trust that he knows what he's talking about. Bitters are a homemade rum and medicinal herb tonic.

Ended the day with a visit to Molly Malone's in Red Hook for dinner and visited Lily who was hostessing.

St. Thomas Dairies

J on Magens

Kaia at Magens

People were having wedding pictures taken when we arrived