St. John

2/16/07-2/19/07

Culebritta was magnificent. We hiked up to the oldest light house in the Virgin Islands at sunset. I can’t say it was the safest thing to do but the view was well worth it. The stairs leading up to the light were rusted through in many spots and left us wondering if the person in front of us would be the last to make it up safely. From the top we could see clearly in every direction. St. Thomas was lit up in the distance and the sun was setting behind Culebra in the opposite direction. In place of the old candle lantern, there stood a modern revolving light bulb and lenses with solar panels and batteries creating a self sufficient system. Although the system looked brand new, the light never turned on. After waiting an hour or so to see the light turn on we headed down the stairs to a buffet. Each boat brought a little snack and drinks on the hike. Some brought more than others. We were in the others category, but we helped out in the eating side of things for more than our share so it all evens out. Tni brought a gourmet assortment of appetizers that would be welcome at any fine restaurant. The hike down was a spectacle. The night was very dark and we had a limited supply of flashlights. The result was 8-drunk-person follow the leader. We stumbled over rocks as well as our own feet but made it down unscathed. We retired to Aurora for a game of Pit which is a very loud stock market game in which aggressiveness is the only option.

The 17^th was a day of arrivals. We traveled from Culebritta to Lindbergh Bay on St. Thomas. Our outboard engine had failed us the day before so we were forced to row in to the beach to pick up Hal and Everett. The sparkplug failed on the engine and after much ado we managed to diagnose the problem and break the pull cord at the same time. We spent the night at beach restaurants with the two newbie’s.

Anika departed on the morning of the 18^th after a smooth and exciting stay. We traveled to Frances bay on St. John that afternoon. We spent some time snorkeling and checking out the turtles before heading in to Cruz bay for dinner. The dingy motor was fixed but the pull cord snapped again forcing us to be towed in to Maho bay by Rosario. Maho bay camp grounds were beautiful. They are situated in a very lush area of St. John and the cabins are connected via an elaborate system of wood stairs. Climbing up them at night it gave the impression of walking through a tourist path in a rainforest. The people at Maho are all granolas. The entire walk up smelled like Foss hill at Wesleyan on April 20^th. We ate at Morgan’s Mango in Cruz bay and spent the rest of the night walking around town. The return trip was as exciting as our time spent in town. To start off while getting in the dingy I fell off a sand ledge getting my shorts soaked. Just as I regained my balance and started to climb in the boat a rogue wave struck the dingy. Now I know you’re probably thinking it was just wavy and we were unprepared but that isn’t the case. It was flat calm and this wave just appeared out of no where. It smashed into the side of the dingy soaking everyone and pushed us back to shore. To top it all off we had no tow back because Rosario had already returned to their boat. We were forced to paddle from Maho to the far side of Frances. We were as uncoordinated as two paddlers can be. To say we went in an S-curve is an understatement. We turned from one direction to the other making very little headway in the in term. Finally, we arrived home after our night on the town.

The following day we sailed to Newfound bay. The winds were light allowing us to swim behind the boat while we sat motionless with full sails. Newfound bay was beautiful. Although there was little or no beach the coral we found was fantastic. We were surrounded by green turtles the moment we set the hook. It was a great little day anchorage. After the days snorkeling we popped in to Coral bay and tried to set a hook in Round bay but the holding was poor. On the plus side while trying to manually set the hook with a snorkel I saw a beautiful spotted eagle ray. We motored on to Coral Harbor and dropped our hook. We lucked out since it was movie night at Skinny Legs. The blackened mahi burger was fantastic as was the company.