We Finish Our Trip To St. Thomas

We headed out on our walk the next morning and remembered to bring our phones which would allow us to take panoramic pictures of our surroundings.

Panorama of Sapphire Bay

We have been hiking up a tremendously steep hill in Sapphire Village, and at the top we have an absolutely stunning view of the marina, bay, and surrounding channels and islands. We

The fish market

were able to capture that today.

After our walk and breakfast, we decided to head out to the west end of St. Thomas which we missed when we were with Brian and Janelle.

Fresh fish!

Brewer's Beach

The bitcin' Jeep

Along the way we would try to add to Jane’s St. Thomas bucket list item of visiting all 7 of St. Thomas’s beaches. This would be a good day to travel, because according to the calendar it was a rare day when no cruise ships were in port. Frenchtown on St. Thomas was highly touted on all of the maps and points of interest broaches, so we thought it was time to pay it a visit. Frenchtown is located along the waterfront in Charlotte Amalie and was historically where French fishermen sold their catches. Frenchtown didn’t offer much in the way of attractions, so we basically just cruised through.

Jane at Brewers Beach

We headed out and made our way to Charlotte Amalie and ran past the Cyril B. King airport once again. At the University of the Virgin Islands we stopped at Brewers Beach on Brewers Bay (yes, the university has its own beach, and it is beautiful!).

View from Botany Bauy

After the beach we headed up a major hill that gave us a wonderful view of the airport and adjacent Brewers Bay with its mooring field for the boaters. We got back on Rt. 30 and followed that to a final dead end at Botany Bay on the west end. We were delighted with this route as it was much less traveled which allowed us to stop and take some pictures of the awesomely scenic bays and coves.

Botany Bay view

Today there are also some shops for the tourists (naturally) and Jane was excited to visit this site.

Another shot of Botany Bay

Besides the fish market. We would have the roads and towns to ourselves!

Botany Bay again!

We took the northern coast route back to the condo. This took us to a junction on a road that went out to Coral World and Coki Beach. This beach was on Jane’s list and we headed down the road only to find that about 200 yards from the turnoff, we encountered a flooded road with about 2 feet of water. We saw some taxis come through ad figured the Jeep would have enough clearance, so we eased on through. Coki Beach was really nice and Jane talked about coming back for a visit. But Capt. Larry pointed out that we had our own private beach that was as nice or nicer and we didn’t need the hassle of visiting foreign beaches! We returned to the condo and headed for the beach.

Part of Jane's cache

Jane took off to do some shell and sea glass collecting, a new hobby that she became fascinated with and maybe totally consuming. Capt. Larry chilled out with his beer and his book. We finished the day with happy hour and some more grouper with a tomato/onion topping and Italian mustard potatoes that Brian loved so much. It was a great day.

The rest of her cache

At Mims Restaurant

View at Iggy's

The next morning we were up and at ‘em doing our usual. After we finished we decided to have a big brunch late in the morning and then just do a supper later. Jane had read about a gift shop above Magens Bay called Mountaintop. It is advertised as the “largest gift shop in the Caribbean” and the “home of the banana daiquiri.” roadmaps?) and missed it. But we would be able to travel on a mountain road that we hadn’t been on. Mafolie Hotel high atop Charlotte Amalie. Capt. Lindquist Beach for Jane’s sixth. We didn’t pay the entrance fee, because as we parked and walked to the entrance, a huge black cloud descended on the beach, and by the time we were on the raining it was raining hard. Back at the condo we had happy hour on the balcony and sighted a rainbow as the rain eased and the sun reappeared.

The pirate at Iggy's

Larry offered to turn around and work our way into the parking lot, but Jane was disappointed noting that there were only a handful tent shops and she thought it was going to be a much bigger production.

A view of  Botany Bay

She said there didn’t look like there were offerings any different from the tent shops in Charlotte. Traveling this road would allow us to claim that we had been on every major road (and a lot of feeder roads) on St. Thomas. We took off and made our way over a hair-raising road to Mountaintop. But we didn’t stop, because apparent the shop is on cruise lines’ places to visit, and the parking lot was jammed with taxis loading and unloading people.

We arrive at Mim's

We drove past and stopped at the

Our condo

We tried to visit this establishment when we were returning from Botany Bay, but took a wrong turn (guess who has trouble reading

The next morning we explored St. Thomas’s southeast side. Jane’s final beach, Secret Harbour Beach, was located in this area. We passed through some run-down neighborhoods and weren’t very impressed with the area, when suddenly we entered an area where the extremely wealthy live.

The beach at Iggy's

The mansions, houses, and estates were quite opulent and richly landscaped.

Most of the driveways were gated. Not really being able to follow this on a map, and not knowing where we really were, we followed a road until it dead ended at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel and Resort. Since we weren’t guests, we turned around and traveled the other fork until it also dead ended in a residential neighborhood.
The views of the harbors below were spectacular. We turned around and made our way back and were able to see Jane’s beach, but couldn’t figure out how to get to it. We drove some roads that looked promising, but not luck. She finally settled for some pictures of the beach and we headed back to the condo.

The last mandatory thing we had to do before we left St. Thomas was to treat Jane to a Caribbean lobster dinner.

View at Iggy's

We hadn’t dined out very much, preferring to eat our own cooking at the condo, but were going to enjoy this meal. We had inquired of several sources and learned that Mim’s Bistro in the Watergate Condominium Complex had the best lobster dinner on the island.

Enjoying dinner at Mim's

Jane figured that she needed a pedicure to eat lobster. Capt. Larry dropped her off at a spa in Red Hook and would pick her up after the pedicure and some shopping time. We were told that Mim’s started serving at 1700, but when we arrive shortly after that time (it’s not good to be traveling late on St. Thomas) we were told that they didn’t start serving until 1800.

Coconut curry lobster

We opted to have happy hour at Iggy’s Beach Bar on Bolongo Beach next door. We walked over to Iggy’s and ordered some drinks and appetizers. Located directly on Bolongo Bay, Iggy’s is a popular night spot featuring live music, dancing, and island festivities. We enjoyed our drinks and food- Capt. Larry finally got his conch fritters, and headed back to Mim’s for dinner.
We enjoyed mango rum punch drinks and a crab dip before the main course came. Jane had ordered a stuffed lobster, and Capt. Larry’s was cut up and cooked in a coconut curry sauce. Both came with steamed vegetables and rice pilaf, and both were delicious (the curry could have been a little spicier). With all of the food we had consumed, dessert was not an option. We were really pleased with the service, food, and the seaside ambiance. We headed back to the condo and crashed for the evening.

We spent our last couple of days just hanging around the condo. Jane ventured into the Red Hook boutiques a couple of times, while Capt. Larry was content working on the blog.

Ducks in the pool

He also spent some time photographing the beautiful flowering plants and shrubs that landscaped the complexes. Jane spent time at her newest hobby- collecting sea glass.

Having their way

This soon became a preoccupation and Capt. Larry was left spending beach time alone while Jane shelled. After several days she had accumulated a fairly impressive collection and was looking online as how to fashion these pieces into jewelry. Capt. Larry was always being asked if he could drill glass and wire pieces together….. It was a really relaxing final couple of days and we were wishing that it wouldn’t end, but it must.

The iguana comes to the pool

On our last day we started packing things up. Of all of the places we’ve been, we have not enjoyed one place more than we have St. Thomas. Maybe it was just the relaxing time we had, we do not know, but we will miss spending time on this island. But then we have other adventures already planned- so stay tuned….

The Coconut Man And Magens Bay- We're Just Chillin'

No safety lines!

We were halfway through our morning walk when we heard someone call out to us. But the voice was coming from above us. We peered into the palm trees, the sun blinding us and making it difficult to see, and there was a man clinging to the tree trunk and harvesting the coconuts. He said, “I am the coconut man!” He

The Coconut Man

posed for us while we took his picture, then we thanked him and continued on our walk. Looping back around, we found him back on the ground. He told us that the coconuts are harvested before they start naturally falling and hitting people, and he takes the coconuts into town to sell. We declined his offer to purchase some and thanked him again and finished our walk.

Looking for something to do before beach time, we decided to return to Magens Bay and check the beach out. Always trying to find a different route and roads, we took some roads we hadn’t been on and eventually

Beautiful Magens Bay

made our way to the beach. We had to pay to use the beach ($4 pp + $2 to park), but we thought the clean restrooms, outdoor showers, lifeguards, and plenty of picnic tables to sit on made it worth the price.

Soooooo relaxing

Staying in the swim zone

These excellent facilities also make this beach popular with the cruise lines for shore excursions, and there is a continual loading and unloading of taxis. We shared a picnic table with an Illinois couple who were on an "oldies" cruise. They were excited because tonight the 60’s group, The Guess Who, was playing. We dipped into the cerulean and sapphire waters which we found to be warm and relaxing. Finishing our swim, it was time for our cruise line friends to return to their ship.
Jane took a long walk to the end of the beach while Capt. Larry had a couple of beers and people watched.

Having too much fun!

It was amusing to watch the lifeguards try to enforce the swim zone perimeter, since many swimmers ventured outside the designated area. After Jane returned, we sat for another hour and decided to return to our beach for the rest of the afternoon and happy hour. It was a great relaxing day.

Lots of big boats

The next morning we were up and enjoying our walk, a route that always takes us through the Sapphire Beach Marina and the adjacent condo complexes, Sapphire Village and Sapphire Beach Condominiums West. We always enjoy our walk through the marina as it is primarily filled with larger, ocean-going boats.  Boats come and go regularly and it is always

Island cacti

interesting to follow the home ports which indicate that many of the boats have come a great distance.

We had absolutely nothing planned for today, so it was going to be a day of beach time and relaxing. Jane wanted to do some snorkeling and hit the water in the early afternoon.

Jane gets to snorkel

There are coral reefs at our beach that extend almost completely to the shoreline, so one doesn’t have to swim very far from shore to view the coral.

Capt. Lar's feet watch the ocean

However, many snorkelers swim quite far from shore and few use any type of flotation device. Jane stayed close in and had a great time. We spent the rest of the afternoon sitting on the beach and reading. After happy hour we enjoyed pasta with a marinara meat sauce listened to music the rest of the evening.

Panorama of Sapphire Bay

Revisiting Our Park And Meeting Friends For Dinner

Cinnamon Bay in Virgin Islands N.P.

We awoke the next morning to a fairly steady rain. It doesn’t rain much here this time of year, but one will see frequent, light, short showers from cloud convection.  But this was a little different and could possibly alter our plans. Today we wanted to return to St. John and do some more extensive touring and exploring the park prior to meeting up with Diane Pick and her niece for dinner. Hoping to spend almost the entire day there, we were disappointed when the weather didn’t clear until almost noon. We had some lunch, gathered our things, and headed to the ferry terminal to salvage what we could. Arriving on the island, Jane wanted to return to a shop she was in the other day to pick up an item she spotted, while Capt. Larry purchased our return tickets to save time, if dinner with Diane ran long.

Cinnamon Bay Beach

Meeting up again, we hailed a taxi that would take us to Cinnamon Bay where the park’s campground and Diane’s cabin were. The ride was a short 4.5 miles, but the scenery of the bays and beaches were magnificent, to say nothing of the ride. It had also rained in St. John that morning and the roads were still wet.

Beach and gift shop

Twice our driver slid the rear end of the vehicle into the other lane with rear tires spinning as he struggled to ascend hairpin turns on the tortuous, twisted, precipitous road (get the picture- it wasn’t flat and straight!). Only one other road that we had ever traveled on came close to matching this.

Cinnamon Bay

We arrived at our destination, slightly nauseated, and paid our driver. We walked down the bay’s beautiful beach and found the campground. We weren’t scheduled to meet Diane until 1700, so we decided to head across the road and explore the ruins of an old sugar mill.

The sugar mill boiling house

This mill ruins were interesting and provided an image as to how the cane was processed. The Danes were the first white inhabitants of St. John, arriving in 1717. They quickly started to process sugar cane (mostly to make rum!) and eventually planted the entire island in cane.

Boiler ovens

Production started to decline by the early 1800’s and virtually ceased by the 1820’s. The mill we explored was the largest on St. John.

Tyre palm

Bay rum tree

We found two interesting trees that were featured by the park- the tyre palm and the bay rum trees. The tyre palm is found only in Puerto Rico and the Virgin islands and is a tall slender palm that reaches heights of 20 feet.

Sugar mill ruins

The bay rum tree is native to the Caribbean and is known for the essential oil it produces that is used in cooking and the production of bay rum cologne.

We finished our walking tour of the mill and headed back to the restaurant to meet Diane. We were early so we decided to begin happy hour without her (exploring ruins works up a mighty thirst!).

Finishing the walking tour

She arrived early, with her niece, Jessica, arriving a few minutes later. We were so happy to reunite. We started to reminisce, but thought that we should really order our dinner, because this could go on all night. We were deep into stories about the parks, Antarctica, Alaska and our coincidental travels together when dinner arrived.

Diane and Larry

The food was awesome, but the company and stories were better. Diane also has visited all of the national parks, and many 2 or 3 times, so she has a very rich knowledge of the park system. After we finished our meal, Jane and Capt. Larry found themselves talking more about their Great Loop trip than anything else, but were prodded on by continuous questions from our hosts. We talked about both past and future plans.

Jane, Diane, and Jessica

We had decided that we would like to catch the 2000 ferry back to Red Hook and realized that we would be cutting it close. We bid our farewells and promises to keep in contact then headed out to the taxi stand. Unfortunately there was no taxi immediately available, and we had to wait 20 minutes for one to appear. The driver promised that we would make our ferry- something we really didn’t find reassuring given our ride out to Cinnamon Bay in the daylight! True to his word, we did arrive with 10 minutes to spare. We ended our day with a nightcap and a really restful sleep.