Just Another Day in Paradise

We spent Christmas day in Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, USVI, along with 18,000 of our closest friends aboard the six cruise ships that were in port. We spent the day performing an experiment: if we drink more, does St. Thomas get better? Sadly, no. Fortunately rum is only $4.59/liter, so it was an inexpensive exercise. Experiment failed, we consoled ourselves with holiday gifts of new sunglasses capped off with a traditional holiday dinner of tater skins and conch fritters.

Adult Swim

We picked up our good friends Mike & Allison in Charlotte Amalie and then high-tailed it out of there to spend the night in Christmas Cove, a beautiful little island right between St. Thomas and St. John. The next morning I attempted to kill our good friends by taking them (both beginners) snorkeling on an open water sea-mount (underwater hill that comes to just under the surface) in enormous swells. Between the swells and his faulty equipment, Mike nearly drowned (Just to be clear, I'm referring to his snorkeling equipment. I have no knowledge of his other "equipment"). Death cheated, we motored the mere two miles over to St. John for a lovely day exploring, a good nights sleep, and some more reasonable snorkeling the next day at one of the park beaches. St. John is 80% US National Park land, and there are no cruise ship docks, two reasons we highly recommend it.

Please Lady, Don't Hurt Me!

Our plans for New Year's Eve were to go to Foxy's on Jost Van Dyke for what is supposed to be the largest New Year's party in the Caribbean. Each time we had told that anyone that we were heading there on our own boat for New Year's they began, in a rather obvious manner, to question our sanity. It is reputed to be a mad house; too many boats in too small an anchorage, mixed with too much alcohol. There is even supposed to be a "dinghy-swapping" party on New Year's Day so that people can reclaim their dinghies, them having been swiped by some inebriated neighbor at some point the previous night. So we put on our game-faces and sailed over to Jost Van Dyke.

Rather than brave Great Harbour, where the Foxy's party is, we opted to stay in White Bay, home to Ivan's (of Kenny Chesney fame) and the Soggy Dollar Bar (birthplace of the Painkiller). Mooring balls were as scarce as Dodo's, and with the hard-packed sand bottom and WAY too many boats in the Bay it took over two hours to get two anchors down and set. Having now finally left the United States, the next day we headed over to Customs & Immigration for our first experience clearing in. With no idea what to expect, we walked in and presented ourselves for approval. The first lady pleasantly directed us to a second, less pleasant lady who instantly began yelling at us unintelligibly. All I could understand was "I no checkin' in 'tis damn boat wit'out a permit. I sick o' dis bullshit, an' I not gonna do it no mo!" SHITE!! I gingerly stepped up told her I didn't know we needed a permit, and she said "Wuz I talkin' to you? NO! When I talkin' to you you'll know." Whew!

Hurry up, Buddy!

New Year's was an all day/all night affair that, in the end, was worth the effort. One of the folks in the group we met there smoked too much of a stranger's weed and got so paranoid he wigged out, so we had to call it a bit of an early night at Foxy's and head back to Ivan's and our boat. We spent the next couple day's exploring the BVI's before dropping Mike & Allison off in Road Town (thanks for coming guys!!). We promptly headed over to Nanny Cay Marina to meet up with our other friends Micheal and Dina, who had far-too-graciously rented a slip for us for two nights at the marina! As we're pulling in to the slip Lizz barks out to Micheal, who is walking leisurely down the dock, "Hurry up, Buddy, I've got my spring-line ready...". Which would have been great, except this wasn't Micheal. This poor nice Aussie guy was nice enough to help us into the slip anyway.

The Fat Lady Rocks!

With Micheal and Dina we've been exploring Virgin Gorda, including the Baths, which has been great! Virgin Gorda (Fat Lady) was named such by Columbus because from sea the island looks like a fat woman lying on her back. From here we head to Anegada before returning later in the week when we'll leave Mike and Dina and depart for Dominica! The current weather forecast is good, and we'll send an update when we get there.