We “quickly” sailed downwind to St. Thomas to pick up Corey and Jamie in the large harbor of Charlotte Amalie. It’s a large flat sandy harbor so we picked any old spot away from the ferries only to find that seaplanes had their own unofficial runway at our stern, which we found to be entertaining. Their plane landed right as we anchored so we jetted straight to the airport…. And just in time I might add…. As we bumped into good ole Corey & Jamie at the airport (who had been giddily sipping free rum samples), they immediately steered us over to a long line for car rentals…. Asking us if we recognized anyone… and by George …of all the gin joints… our college friend Sarah whom, we both met through NEUs outdoor club NUHOC, was standing there! We had traveled thousands of miles away from home over the course of 6 months and, still, we serendipitously bumped into friends from home. Everyone was engulfed in hugs and disbelief asking the same dumbfounded question “Wow, what-the, when, how are you?!?!?!”Because Mike & I were so organized our first order of business was to go grocery shopping in St. Thomas. Fun! Our first night we ate out in town, arriving just in time for happy hour. With beer and cocktails in hand, we made a game plan for the next 5 days – Circumnavigate ST. JOHN! Before leaving we meandered the town of Charlotte Amalie, known for its jewelry district. I found the Dutch influence in architecture to be of far greater interest; the buildings were made-up of old weathered stone walls with thick heavy wooden doorways and fat metal latches beautifully fashioned from a time period I can only imagine.

St. John, day 1: We beat into the wind (‘beat’ is sailing jargon for bashing the bow of your sailboat into or close to the wind – aka not fun sailing) to St. John and hooked onto a National Park mooring. We snorkeled the area, spotting several stingrays and a turtle and the next morning we ran the dinghy onto shore in Reef Bay. 

 
There are ruins of an old sugar mill in great condition complete with an old steam engine built in Glasgow, Scotland. Being the hiking fans we are, we chose to keep hiking and explored the petroglyphs of Reef Bay. These stone carvings are thought to represent a spiritual place for the Taino, Arawak people from pre-Columbian times (anywhere between 600-1,000 years ago). As a kid, I like most, wanted to be Indiana Jones. So crouching down on this uneven rock near a flat pool of water, it was… exciting… to think; 600 years ago someone in this exact spot was carving this image into the stone to honor the spirits and that’s how they spent their day. We spent the rest of our day grabbing a mooring in Salt Pond Bay and hiking Rams Head and snorkeling crystal clear waters. Rams Head is a high jagged bluff on the south east side of St. John and has a bloody past. In 1733 a great slave rebellion took place on St. John, lasting for several months. French & Swiss troops eventually arrived putting a stop to the insurrection. The grim denouement of the rebellion ended with a group of 300 slaves jumping to their death at Rams Head point instead of returning to the overlords and torturous life of a slave. We arrived at the SW summit and looked around at the steep and dramatic cliffside and jagged rocks below. An impending rainstorm brought strong winds tearing over the summit so we looked around silently and quickly returned to the boat in awe. A tiny lizard attacked me on the way back, jumping onto my hand for an instant before flinging itself off into the bushes. Taking me by surprise, I screamed. Mike laughed and recounted the time a flying fish almost hit me in the cockpit on our passage to Bermuda.

Our next anchorage was a sporty sail into Coral Bay where we made an impromptu stop at a floating bar. We were only going to check it out but the proprietor was so damn friendly…. And how do you say no to rum punches at a floating bar, I have not yet found the strength or craziness to say no …. So out of the dinghy onto the floating pontoon. There was a bed on the other end with a long curtain to partition his room off and in the center there was a circular glass floor under a glass table. At night, you could turn on underwater lights and watch the tarpon swim underneath. There was a full kitchen/bar setup, bathroom, and even a second floor to sunbathe on. He explained how he built the entire set up from scratch and wanted to put it up on a B&B site.  He plans to offer a package deal where he’ll captain the vessel out to anchorages around St. John and leave you with a couple kayaks, then he would return and move you to a next destination. For a more adventurous demographic, I could see this working out beautifully.

Our last few days we explored Jost Van Dyke enjoying pain killers from the Soggy Dollar Bar, (supposedly where the recipe was created) and danced on the beach with a bunch of spring breakers having a good time. The Soggy Dollar gets its name from boaters arriving, throwing down their anchor, then swimming to shore for a drink; there’s even a line with clothespins to dry out the sopping-wet tens and twenties. After enough partying we spent the night off Maho Beach and dinghied into Cruz Bay where by Corey and Jamie’s combined worldly knowledge won trivia night! Technically we didn’t win win, the bar tenders won but they had won every trivia night for the past month and we had the severe disadvantage since teams were allowed to buy the moderator drinks in exchange for points…. Bartenders won again but team Masshole Sailors came in second place.