Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

We got to do a couple of really cool things that we weren't expecting - like this chimney. The surge through it was difficult. It wanted to push us up and shoot us out the top. Changing depth was not my long suit (I really struggled with going down, especially), so I wasn't too keen on that part of it. But it was really awesome to get to swim so close to the rocks like that and get to this completely different side of the site.

We also got to do a couple of swim-throughs at this site. It had some rock formations that had gaps large enough for people to pass under and through. They were totally awesome, although I was glad our instructor was with us. At one point my tank hit a rock as I was swimming under it, and for a second I thought I was stuck. I wasn't really, at all, but it still made me think about what it would be like to be trapped in a wreck, or by coral or a rock.

As part of the certification process, we had to practice taking off our tanks and weight belts and putting them back on, so if I had been stuck, I probably could have done taken my tank off, and then gotten it un-stuck. No need this time!

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

That's Ryan

Photo credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006 

Photo credit: Richard the Dive-Master-In -Training 2006

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

This fish reminded me of a shirt to wear out on the town - all black, but then a little bit of purple sparkles around the top.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Bubbles are good

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Me again

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Now for the really cool photos

Ryan rented an underwater camera for the last dive of our scuba certification process. Everyone said that underwater photography is really hard and that the photos always look washed out and colorless, even though your eyes will see this great rainbow of fish and coral, so we shouldn't be disappointed.

That said, I think Ryan did really great - some of his photos were washed out, and none of them were as good as what he takes on land, but they definitely capture some of the really cool stuff we saw.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006

Icebergs

These were two climbing wall/slides/beach toys anchored just off the beach at the Westin. It was actually quite hard to climb up them - I thought it would be no sweat, but it took me a while to figure out a technique, and even then, I was tired enough by the time I got to the top that I only got to slide down once.

Photo credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006

That's me!

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006

Taxi

This (minus the painting on the side) was what all the cabs on St. John looked like. They loaded up as many people as were going in the right direction, and made stops along the way. There were basically only two roads on the island, so almost everyone was always going the same way.

You can't really tell from this picture, but the painting was a cohesive piece of art. I think this one was flowers and mountains, we saw one of an underwater fish scene, and there were several others. The rest were plain brick red.

The cabs were most definitely there only for the tourists - many times our cab would stop to let a local on, the local would ride over the hill (there was a very steep hill between the Westin and town), or just a short distance, and then hop off.

We also had one cabbie once who had his kids along. We were coming back from somewhere that was on the far side of town, which was full of one-way streets. We paused at an intersection, and the cabbie's 10-ish year old kid jumped out. Then, we circled around the one-way streets and eventually got back to a corner just down the street from where the kid jumped out. He jumped back in, carrying a sandwich and a slice of pizza.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006

Check out what he's eating

On our very last day, we were walking over to the restaurant for lunch, and we say this egret land on a bush - yes, that's a big bush he's walking on. We walked over to check it out, and the bird was hunting anoles! Amazing. He wasn't even all that perturbed by us being there - I have a decent zoom on my camera, but we still had to get pretty close for a photo like this.

Photo credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006 

The View

Those rocks down there are actually one of the places where we went scuba diving - it was totally cool to see them from above. And you can sort of see the different kinds of ocean bottom we swam over - rocks, sand, coral. Very fun to see it up close and personal underwater, and then from above in this giant overview.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

That must be me

since Ryan had the only camera, but I'm so far away I can't see me. Yikes! It wasn't actually as scary as I'm making it out to be. Granted, I didn't let go of the handles after I was higher than about 10 feet, but it was so spectacular, and a completely smooth ride, that it was overall way more fun than scary.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Hold on!

Here I go! So they drive the boat up wind and let the parachute out, close in to the boat. Then the "sailors" climb out on this big platform in the back, wearing a harness that sort of looks like a swing. They clip you in to that bar you see above my head, and then they let the chute out, and up, up, up you go!

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Self Portrait While Parasailing

Is that a grin of fun or of fear? Actually, since this is Ryan, I'm sure it was of fun. But mine was definitely a mixture...it's very cool to be up there, but it's so very high.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Parasailing!

This is the parachute we used when we went parasailing. We had actually tried to go the first day we were in St. John, but it was too windy. Unfortunately, when we went out, it wasn't windy enough for both of us to go together.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Look closely - check out the bigger version, and you should be able to see a whole row of petroglyphs just above the water line.

Photo credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006

See the reflection? According to a National Parks service sign, the Taino indians based a lot of their religion on the duality of body and spirit, and they think that this reflection is their way of portraying that duality.

Photo credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006 

Can you see them? Try clicking on the photo - it should come up larger. There is one large one right under my left foot, and then several more just above the water line on the right side of the photo.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

The Petroglyphs

This is the pool that is right above the petroglyphs - in wetter parts of the year it is a waterfall. It's totally beautiful, and in a place where fresh water is so scarce, I completely understand why the Taino indians thought this place was sacred.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006

Is that a cactus???

Yup - that's a cactus. St. John is actually covered with them. It doesn't rain very much on St. John; I think it only rained three times in the 7 days we were there, and each time the rain lasted for just a couple of mintues. Fresh water is a precious commodity on these islands.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Self Portrait

This is us on our private beach at Reef Bay. It was really cool, after being overwhelmed by tourists at The Baths, and even being annoyed by the number of people at the Westin, our hike down the Reef Bay Trail was blissfully unpopulated. We saw a total of 6 other people, and they were all headed up by the time we were going down. So we had the beach and the ruins, and most of the trail completely to ourselves.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Hermit Crab on the Run

They didn't move ALL that fast, but you still had to be paying attention or they would disappear into the tall grasses.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Doing Nothing's BIG Brother

Ryan's shoe is included for scale. This guy was quite far from the beach - maybe 100 yeards, and we saw several more that were a mile or more from the beach. Impressive.

Photo credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006 

Steam Engine

This is the steam engine that ran the big crusher wheel (I think) that used to smoosh the sugar cane. You could actually see quite a bit of the old machinery, and they had lots of signs posted explaining the process. Very interesting.

Steam power was added to this plantation in the late 19th century, and by the early 20th century, sugar production was no longer economically viable. The Reef Bay Plantation was one of the last factories to close.

As a random side note, this steam engine looks very, very similar to many of the steam boilers I see in nyc basements. It's amazing how little the technology has changed.

Phot credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006 

Bats in the Reef Bay Sugar Factory

There were lots and lots of bats hanging from the rafters of all the buildings in the old sugar factory at the bottom of the Reef Bay Trail. They were squeeking and sort of milling about. That one with his wings open couldn't get comfortable.

Photo credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006 

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Reef Bay Trail

This is a cool tree we saw right towards the beginning of the Reef Bay Trail - check out the size of that root!

Photo credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006 

Bordeaux Mountain

Ryan wanted to go up to the top of the island, and a different taxi driver (they became our local pals and guides) recommended this lookout. It's somewhere near the top of Bordeaux Mountain, which is the highest point on St John, but I don't actually think we were at the top - the road definitely seemed to curve up from where we were standing.

This is the view looking north - that's Great Britain right up at the top of the horizon. Who knew you could see all the way to England from the US? :) I think all of the separate islands you can see from here are in the BVI - they are less than 2 miles from St. John.

Photo credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006 

Adorable Anole

One of the million anoles we saw. They were so cute! And they were everywhere. I swear we saw more lizzards than insects. That can't really be right, because I think the anoles eat insects, but it definitely seemed that way. I'm not complaining - I'll take cute anoles over creepy crawlies any day!

Photo credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006 

At the Westin

This is the view from our room. We had a little porch with two chairs and a table. The place where we took out sailboats and paddlewheel boats is just to the right of center in this picture; the pool and restaurants are over to the right.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

Caneel Bay

Our third lookout spot - Caneel Bay Resort. I think it must be in Hawksnest Bay, but I can't seem to confirm that. At any rate, it's a super-fancy, exclusive resort that didn't have as nice of architecture as the Westin. :)

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006

Trunk Bay

This is Trunk Bay, rumored to be the most beautiful beach in the Virgin Islands. Having only seen a couple of the beaches, I can't say for sure, but it definitely looked lovely from above. And it was definitely one of the most photographed beaches - every postcard stand had several variations of this shot. We thought about snorkeling there, but our taxi driver thought Leinster Bay would be less crowded (it was!) and that the snorkeling would be better. We were glad we followed his advice, but we were also glad he was willing to pause and let us oggle it from afar.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006

This is another shot of Cinnamon or Maho Bay.

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

On the way back from Leinster Bay

we asked the taxi driver to stop at this out look we had seen, where we could see one of St John's beaches from a long way above. Our driver took our request to heart and actually stopped at three different lookouts to show us the view.

We think this first one must be either Cinnamon Bay or Maho Bay, which are directly west of Leinster Bay on the north coast of the island. Look how clear the water is - you can guess at what's on the bottom from way above!

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006 

more Leinster Bay

There's Ryan snorkeling. Neither of us brought a watch to St. John (no need when you're on island time!), so we were using Ryan's camera to make sure we were back in the parking lot to meet the taxi driver when he came back for us.

Our trip to Leinster Bay happened after our first day of scuba lessons, on which we did not wear wet suits. We both (me especially) got pretty chilled while diving, which put a bit of a damper on snorkeling. It's hard to imagine being cold in 80-degree water, when the air was 85 or more, but I guess the diving had lowered our core temperatures too much. So we spent the last part of the day chilling (or warming, rather) on the beach.

Photo credit: Betsy Jenkins 2006 (with Ryan's camera) 

Leinster Bay

Everywhere we went the water was extremely clear - just spectacular. We saw a 3-1/2-foot reef shark while snorkeling here - almost scary, but beautiful, too. And there were millions of fish. This was one of the few spots where we saw sea grass, so there were lots of fish feeding on it and playing hide and seek in it. We saw a herd of sea stars and another herd of hermit crabs.

Most of the fish seemed much less impressed by us than we were by them. They basically ignored us unless we chased them (which we did occasionally, especially for particularly large schools). But if we swam slowly and didn't move our heads and arms too much, we could swim right among them. So awesome!

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006

We went snorkeling at Leinster Bay on the recommendation of our taxi driver. It was a beautiful beach, about a 15 minute walk from a parking lot just off one of the two main roads on the island.

All the signs look just like the signs in other national parks I've been in. It makes sense, since most of St. John is a US National Park, but it was still sort of trippy to be driving along in the left lane and see a brown and white sign proclaiming "Leinster Bay".

Photo credit: Ryan Jones 2006

BetsyBlog

Important! Almost all of these photos were taken by Ryan. I'll try to make a note of which are which in the future, but for these first ten, I only took the second and third pictures of the Baths - the two showing only rock, no water or people. All the rest were taken by Ryan.

 

 

Three days into our trip, and no sunburn yet! Gotta love those dark swimming t-shirts and wide-brimmed hats. 

 

 

The Baths

We went to the BVI to see The Baths, on Virgin Gorda (the Fat Virgin, in case you were wondering...I'm not sure why she was considered fat, but the Baths were pretty cool). In case you've never heard of the Baths, as I hadn't before we went to the Virgin Islands, they are this really cool set of huge boulders in shallow water. We only had an hour and a half (and we lacked a watch), so we couldn't explore too much, but what we saw was great - it made me want to spend days there climbing and bouldering and exploring the less well-traveled areas (the part was saw was swarming with tourists...I got rather annoyed by them...I'm over it now). 

British Customs

Yup - that's right! That yellow building with the pink roof is British customs. We didn't even have to get off the boat...we just handed our passports to a crewman who jumped off and took care of it while we puttered about the harbor watching pelicans dive-bomb unsuspecting schools of fish. It's totally cool to see them suddenly stop flying, sink like a rock head first into the water, and pop immediately to the surface. Then they sit there for a while, as if searching their bill with their tongue (I know, birds don't have tongues, do they...) to find out if they caught anything, then with a big gulp and swallow, they take off to repeat. 

On our way to Britian

The BVI, that is...we saw lots of amazing boats on this trip - I think the Virgin Islands are a sailor's paradise. They don't have tides - 8" on a good day (I asked the captain of our boat to the BVI)! I was boggled by that, but it certainly made it easy to cram a whole bunch of boats into the harbors.

I'm not sure why these boats had their sails up like this - we saw several like that. Any thoughts? Dad? 

Christmas in the tropics - what a strange concept! Definitely no snow here. This was the tree in a small park in Cruz Bay. All the taxi drivers hung out here and asked us if we needed a ride every time we walked by.  

Westin on St. John

This is the Westin from the ferry as we arrived on the first day. It looks really fuzzy to me...the original picture is fine, so I don't know what's going on. Eventually I'll get the hang of this. At any rate, all those beach chairs were occupied when we first saw them, then we saw the rain hit, and they emptied like a someone had yelled "fire!" The rain only lasted 3.5 minutes. And since it was 85 degrees, I didn't particularly mind. 

here we go

This is a trial run - my first blog, and my first attempt at using Hello to share pictures. If it works, I'll try to keep it up. Otherwise, this'll be all you get.