Sunday, June 18th - Father's Day

I'm going to add the advice of all the "In the Knows" and tell you to "Do the Good!" Good Morning, Good Afternoon, Good Evening. It's a shame that in this day and age, everyday kindness seems to have gone by the wayside but on this sleepy little island, common courtesy still exists and is expected. I personally witnessed total transformations based on forgetting my island manners, walking in and talking to someone without a greeting first getting tepid responses, to the "Cutest Little Sh*t Imaginable" (that would be Lizard Boy) waltzing up right behind me with a sweetly enthusiastic "Good Morning." I can tell you first hand that it does make a HUGE difference and when he was the only one of us awknowledging the islanders with a "Have a good day" as we left, well just pin a medal on and give the little guy a kiss and a cookie! He honestly had the best manners out of all of us and I was sooooo proud of him he made me feel like his mama was raising him right. So moral of the story, DO THE GOODS and you'll have GOOD TIMES! Just do it!

On with the show. Today I didn't have notes on breakfast but I'm pretty sure we had Toast, Eggs, Bacon and Juice at the villa. The plan was to cruise the North Shore out to Waterlemon on a Dinghy this morning and since we'd never done it before, we thought we'd start off slow with a 1/2 day. We didn't have ressies but drove into town with the hopes that Noah's Little Arks would have availability. We arrived precicely at 8:00 and scored with a one spot parking right in front of The Beach Bar. Graduate Girl and Honey were feeling the hard riding effects of our joyous day on the waverunners (serves the little frickers right), I felt glorious! They both limped out of the car on legs that could barely sustain them and we grabbed our stuff and walked in and down the steps to find Noahs. I told them as we walked down to the beach that bouncing on the dinghy would help work out their bruised muscles, I don't think they found that funny although I sure did. I looked and looked expecting to find a little building or counter and could find nothing. Ok, so it's a cupboard people, right in front of The Beach Bar. A bright blue cupboard if I remember right. I was half expecting for someone to climb out of it and pin up an open sign. Just look for the dinghies, turn around and there you have it; only in St. John. Nobody's there and the cupboard is paddlelocked so we started wandering around, talking to the guy cleaning the bar, looking for something to spend Honey's money on, checking out the bikinis and looking for something to spend Honey's money on (yes I meant to say that twice), you get the picture. Before long, out walks a guy indicating that he did have a dinghy available and then proceeded to regale us with tales of his alcholic adventures the night before. He took our info, slapped in an information and safety video we had to watch on the tv, (yes I was looking for the kitchen sink in that cupboard), gave us a map, looked at the propeller saying he didn't want any new chunks out of it and and told us to climb on in.

We were advised to head straight to Waterlemon and then work our way back stopping at whatever beachs struck our fancy (that would be all of them). We were told it was a 45-1hr ride out to Waterlemon and as we bounced along, there were two happy fun-filled faces (that would be Bikini Girl and Lizard Boy) and two frowning bruised a$$ faces Hop-a-long #1 and #2 (I mean Graduate Girl and Honey). It had only been like MAYBE a half hour when we arrived at Waterlemon (lucky them) and found a tie on as close to the key as you can get. It was early so there were maybe a handful of peeps already in the water, a couple on the beach, and a few other boats just arriving. Everyone was taking their sweet time getting the gear on as I think we were all a little anxious. I kept waiting for the peeps on the other boat to jump in so that if they got eaten I would know to stay in the boat (kidding!). I did have some slight anxiety about Lizard Boy as I had read so much about the current there. I have got the funniest picture of Rash Boy and the Drama Queen hanging over the side of the dinghy with their bums poking straight up while sticking their masks in the water. I'm going to try (that being the operative word) to post it and some others at the end of my trip report in part XXVII titled St. John Adventures-A Pictorial. Kidding, but only about the part number. Had ya goin didn't I?

After those two jumped in, I figured Honey and I better hop in and we agreed to all stay together. I was relieved to find the current not that bad and the snorkeling magnificent. There were starfish, rays, a couple turtles, many different varieties of fish and some really nice corals. I saw some impressive elkhorn among many others. I can't tell you about the back of the cay because I didn't feel altogether good about towing the little man around it with us and no way was I taking any chances with the little tartlet. Snorkel Bob was fried cause he wanted to go though insisting that he'd be fine. I felt bad but still told him no and consoled him with the prospect of a visit to Donald Schnell's for the magical rock things. That shut him right the hells up! Next time we will DEFINITELY return to Waterlemon as it's a must do for our trip or anyone elses. Hopefully then, we'll get around the whole cay. Whatever you do, don't miss it!

We left Waterlemon and headed back for the North Shore beaches. I wanted to visit a few by dinghy and get some pics from the water's perspective. Believe me I made good. I have so many pictures of the beaches from the water that I almost can't remember which beach was which! On the way back, we were tooting along checking out the monstrosities on Peter Bay and not paying a speck of attention to where in the bay we were in releation to the map and the reef. Well, the reef jumped up and bit us in right square in the a$$. Yes, it definitely sounded like we took a good chunk out of the propeller just like we were told not to. The Idiot that use to be known as Honey immediately pulled the motor up as I freaked and started screeching at him, "OMG! we're in the no boats zone!" Yeah, we smacked right into the second largest reef area listed on the map, we're fricken Einsteins. He started bellowing at me and that did it, Nickie FREAKED and started to cry cause he thought the boat was going to sink. Graduate Girl started in with some OMG's and HOLY SH*T's and a few other choice four letter potty mouth words and then we all started screeching at each other. Let me tell ya, it was not a pretty sight or the least bit funny at the time but looking back on it now, we were in a three ring circus dinghy. I prayed to God, Budha the ancient Taino Sun God and every other religous figure that came to mind as we tentatively made our way to the first beach we came to.

It happened to be Jumbie, one that we were planning to hit today (bonus!). Honey sprouted wings and flew out of the boat as we pulled up to the beach to inspect the damage. No chunks were missing (thank you Jesus) but one of the propellers was slightly bent. I should probably keep this next part to myself but it's so comical in a four stooges kind of way looking back that I can't stand to keep it a secret. Honey asks me for a tool, can't remember what tool but a fricken tool for God sakes! Yeah sure, let me reach in and pull one out of my...whatever! He must have been in shock poor thing. He then scours the beach, finds two choice rocks, a flat and a beater and proceeds to hammer the hells out of the propeller trying to knock it back to the appropriate curve. This is all going on while Lizard Boy is digging for crabs, Graduate Girl was babtizing herself out of a pottymouth and Bikini Girl was broiling on the side of the dinghy. There also happened to be 4 or 5 people on the beach and can you just imagine what they were thinking? I was so messed up, I avoided eye contact with everyone.

After what felt like an hour or so of careful rock pounding, Honey announces to the entire beach that we're back in business. Just let me crawl under one of those rocks please. Well by now of course everyone of us was in the very best of moods (NOT!) so I insisted we head back to Noah's. All four of us had our eyes peeled to every direction of the dinghy and none of us said one fricken word to each other. Now before you start thinking we're deceitful, the first thing we did upon returning was confess to Party Paul about hitting the reef and what we had done. If we're one thing, we're honest. He concernedly skip sprinted to the propeller and said "looks good to me, your good to go!" Right the hells on! We flipped him a $20 and as we we're leaving he says to come back and he'd give us a great deal if we wanted to go out again. I needed a little therapy over the ordeal so in my head I'm screaming HELL NO while politely declining and saving another dinghy for next trip. Up until the reef incident though, it was probably one of our best days and we will DEFINITELY rent one again for the entire day next time now that we're Caribbean reef positioning experts. Damn that was funny!

We were starving by this time and decided to go and check out Starfish Market for a few provisions. We were in the process of choosing a couple steaks to throw on the grill at the villa when Picky Food Girl says to come have a look see at the hotbar selection. I must have been craving comfort food cause those homemade Mash Potatoes, Mac & Cheese, Sweedish Meatballs, and B-B-Q Chicken looked damn good to me. Ixnay on the steaks, we're gettin the hotbar! We seriously loaded up (one container can feed two) and left the counter girl with a sweet little "have a nice day" from Lizard Boy. Her face lit up and I could tell that she was impressed. I was too. We took the goods back to the villa and I think I had a fork dug in before I even kicked off my flip flops and plomped my bum in a chair on the deck. OMG! Sooooooo gooooood! Everything was YUMMY! I loved it, Graduate Girl loved it and Lizzard Boy inhaled his. Honey didn't feel like comfort food so he had leftover pizza from Donkey Diner. Honestly it was one of our best meals and also the cheapest by a landslide. I know it sounds lame but it was all that and a bag of chips and you know if there are 23 locals in line, it's gotta be the bomb!

After we ate, went for a swim and rested, we decided to drive over and see Annaberg. When we got there, the counter was just closed and so we walked right in. It was pretty cool and of course you should see it but BEWARE OF THE BITING THINGS! I was freaking out cause I could feel the creepies biting me but as I went to slap I could never see anything. A very nice local man was going for a walk-a-bout and snickering as he walked past he said "Good Afternoon miss, you need to keep moving." I'm getting the crawlies just thinking about it now. Believe me I moved after that! Of course there were Milipedes, Lizards and the most gorgeous caterpillers all over the place and so Lizard Boy was in seventh heaven. Running this way and that, in the bushes, up the trees, a real hyper unit. I called to him to get over by me and all I got back was a "in just a minute." An adorable little voice ran up and said "I'll get Nickie" and off she went. The two little angels were kindrid spirits who were attached at the hip until the minute we drove off on our separate ways. Why does he only find that kind of friend on vacation? A true boosum buddy. This is the second time it has happened on vacation. They just had a deep connection. You could sense it, it was sad and wonderful at the same time. We love you Harper!

Back at the villa later I made Jambalaya for dinner and it was gooood! After dinner Honey, Lizard Boy and Graduate Girl decided to go for a soak in the hot tub. I just wanted to couch potato on the chaise for a spell. Before long Honey, and the kids are bellowing for me to hurry and come here. I melted into a puddle off the chaise and became frighteningly aware that Mr. Hairy (as in hairy Turanchula) came to go hot tubbin. Woke my a$$ right the hells up. Now I don't like creepy crawlies but the Drama Queen was working herself up to a fever pitch frenze complete with jumping feet and flapping hands. I will say that it was the ONLY spider I saw at the villa the entire time we were there but he was on the hot tub and I could hear him saying to all of us in his Clint Eastwood voice "go ahead, make my day." I'll spare you the unfortunate details but we all slept pretty well that evening. What a day and that is an understatement! Next up, BVI's. More to come...