This is taking longer than I thought........this work thing keeps getting in the way! Don't they know I have a trip report to get out??!?

Day 2, Wednsesday

One of the good things about having a corner room, is you get the sunrise in the morning, and the sunset in the evening. One of the bad things about having a corner room, you get the sunrise in the morning – right in your eyes, no sleeping in here, and you get the sunset in the evening – no sitting on the balcony and watching the sun go down, it’s really hot! What a dichotomy! Double edged sword, or any of a dozen ways to put it.

So, up early in the morning, and every morning for that matter, and ready for the day! I had baked some scones before we left, and packed them in my backpack, so we had coffee, and scones for a few mornings. Pretty good, even if I do say so myself.

Time to go to Christiansted to explore and see if we remember things from ’97. We were met at the ferry dock by Freddy, who handed us freshly home made pastries wrapped in tin foil, that were delicious! Quite unexpected. They were some kind of coconut wrapped pastry. And they cried out for a cup of coffee to go with them, but I couldn’t wait, I ate it on the way over to the Christiansted side of the harbor.

Since we were going to walk the town, we got some bottled water and put it in an insulated carry thingy that had a strap I put over my shoulder. I highly recommend this to every one, as it gets hot and you really need to keep hydrated.

First stop: Sonya’s! I got the original hook bracelet the last time we were there, and Sonya offers an upgrade for the difference in price. Sonya’s is still in the same place, same rather small shop area, still not air conditioned, and still had people hanging out the door waiting to get to the glass counter to look at the bracelets, rings and other jewelry that is on display. I got in, got the larger silver hook bracelet with more gold wrapping, and $30.00 later, we left for other shops and stores.

Time to move on to the second thing on our list…Buck Island. We found Big Beard’s shop (it had moved since the last time we were there) and asked about the all day trip. This includes a sail on a catamaran to Turtle Beach for the novice snorkelers to practice, and the capt to prepare the fish for the beach cook out lunch. This is also the time when Sammy the Sting Ray comes up and plays with the people, and gets the fish left overs that the capt throws overboard. After Turtle Beach, you go to the back side of the island and pick up a moor, and snorkel the grotto and the reef, then head for St. croix again for the beach cook out. It leaves about 10:00am and gets back around 4 or 5:00pm. A nice all day excursion.

Well, they were booked up for the next two days! Unbelievable. This is supposed to be off season. Let me tell you folks, the line between on and off season is becoming very blurred indeed! My biggest fear is that there will one day be NO off season! No more cheaper prices, smaller lines, restaurants with less crowds…..AAAGGGGGHHHH! All the reasons we go during the off season! That and the fact that it is a lot cooler there than it is here in Dallas during the summer. We ended up booking for Saturday, and it was less than half full. Whew! We lucked out on that one.

We went to lunch then at Paradise Café. Two reasons we chose that one, we were hungry and we needed someplace with air conditioning. Most of the eating places on the board walk and around town are “open” air, outside, or just with the doors open. The stores and shops are all pretty much air conditioned, but not so the restaurants. We just had cheese burgers and fries. Nothing special, good price, very eatable. I had my obligatory Carib with lime, Barb had iced tea, came to about $20.00.

After lunch, we told some people back here we would stand in front of the web cam at Rum Runners. It can be found at www.gotostcroix.com. We stood around, held up a sign that said, “wish you were here”, you know, the usual stuff. We couldn’t get any more touristy if we tried. I didn’t have to try, my lily white legs gave me away immediately.

We messed around visiting the stores and shops the rest of the afternoon, then caught the ferry back over to HOTC to clean up for dinner. Normally, when we rent a villa on St. Thomas we cook a lot of our meals in to save money, but it is not possible to cook a lot in a microwave and toaster, so we ate out every night. Actually, it was a good thing because we discovered some wonderful cuisine, which I will be describing later.

We returned to Christiansted and had dinner at the Christiansted Brew Pub (I think that’s the name of it). We just had some burgers and fries, not feeling too expansive that evening. Since it was the real first full day, we were tired and decided to head back to HOTC to regroup and plan our adventures for the next day. Man, on island for a day and a half, and not been in the water yet……that would have to be remedied by the next day!

End of Part 2