De Islands, waterspouts, iggies, cabbage heads, etc.

Just got back from the US Virgin Islands (USVI), mainly in St. Thomas, but we made it to St. John and the BVI's also.

Yes it is hurricane season, but that made for some very un-crowded beaches and attractions. We lucked out in that the weather was either 86 or 87 each day with a passing afternoon shower.

The trip down was a three hopper with stops in Houston and San Juan. The final leg in a Cessna 402 (small plane) was a 25 minute flight at 1850', during which Marlys sat in the co-pilot seat and we flew by a waterspout, which was pretty cool.

The trip thought Charlotte Amalie to Cowpet Bay where we were staying was pretty slow since it was Saturday night and there was a parade. I had thought about renting a car, but after a few minutes of riding on the left side of the road I figures driving it could be problematic. Beyond that the hills and curves even give a Coloradoan pause.

CK and BK were waiting at check-in and the island living began. CK, of course, had the clown bag with her so there was no need to pick anything up, just ask and it appeared.

We spent the first few days on the beach, literally just floating in the surf. We did do a dinner cruise to Christmas Cove on St. James. So called because Chris Columbus celebrated XMAS here in 1493. Which is surprising in that the latest book by Steve Berry (The Columbus Affair) would have you believe he was Jewish and only came over to hide the Temple Treasure.

Tuesday we headed to the British Virgin Islands and specifically "The Baths" on Virgin Gorda. This is a National Park and probably provides many of the the tourist brochure pictures for BVI.

From there is was off to snorkel, lunch and then to off to the Soggy Dollar on Jost Van Dyke. This is a island hopping stop where there is no dock so you need to swim in and then take your soggy dollars to the bar for a vanilla painkiller (rum drink that is very dangerous). Another swim out then on to St. John to clear customs and re-enter the USA. This was a 90 nautical mile loop around the Caribbean (south of the Virgin Islands) and Atlantic (north of the USVI).

Spent most of the week hanging at the resorts beach and watching the local fauna wonder around, which at first was pretty shocking, but the local iggies were pretty laid-back.

The iguanas were pretty much everywhere when the sun came out, eating a berry/plum that fell off the local trees. They would just walk by and look at you, but if you scared one they would stand tall on all four legs and run.





We did go over to the Virgin Island National Park on St. John. The main town is at Cruz Bay. Not very big mainly a tourist type place.







Trunk Bay is probably one of the nicest beaches anywhere. Except that Marlys ended up getting a Jelly Fish sting on her back. It was from a Cabbage-head, not a Portuguese Man-O-War, which can be trouble. Even though we saw a number of JF while out snorkeling she didn't even realize one got her until we showed the welt to the lifeguard. Rubbed wet sand on it to remove any barbs and then re-applied the sunscreen and back into the water.

Trip back to Colorado was un-eventful except that Marlys got to ride shotgun on the jump to San Juan and I had a baby kick my seatback for the 4 1/2 hour flight to Houston.