A buddy of mine from Key West dropped by for a few days so after hitting the usual St. Thomas spots, I decided to take him to St. John to do some snorkeling and beaching.

St. John is the smallest of the three primary islands that make up the USVI at about 28 square miles. Two-thirds of the island was set aside as a National Park. Although it gets its share of tourist traffic, St. John has managed the best out of three in regards to Ecology. Unfortunately, none of the three are even close to what I would call ecologically sound. Humans are the downfall of everything (I?m no different, I shuttled my car across.) Speaking of shuttling, there are car ferries and people ferries. Car ferries are cars that attracted to the same manufacturer ie. BMW to BMW, Honda to Honda, while people ferries are same sex attracted. HA HA, I?m so funny. Anyway?s, there are Ferry?s that dock on Charlotte Amalie (Downtown on the Waterfront), and also in Red Hook on the East End. From Downtown the trip takes about 45 minutes while the East End takes about 15 minutes. From Redhook you can transport your car round trip for $35-$42 depended on which of the three Ferry companies you use. The people shuttle runs $3.00 one way. I actually took the Ferry randomly when I just needed a change of pace. It?s a great stress reliever just like taking a drive in my car. It appeases the Island Fever that pops up occassionally.

We decided to hit a couple of the higher rated snorkeling places. The highest rated snorkeling spot is WaterLemon Cay. Not Watermelon, Water-Lemon. It?s a slightly out of the way spot that requires a drive to the North East End of the Island a short hike and a quarter of a mile swim. This was a small but a great area for shoreline access snorkeling. It is basically Boat Tour type quality snorkeling.

After a great swim and being wounded by a Sea Urchin (See my other post about those freaking things.) We did a few beach stops on our way back towards Trunk Bay. We stopped off at Cinnamon Baybecause of the drastic color change of the water. It looked kind of greenish but it had some nice soft fine sand and mirror calm water.

Next was the most commercialized beach on St. John, Trunk Bay. Basically a beautiful beach with a small cay right off the beach that has become so popular that they have incorporated a snorkeling trail. It was the only place that we went that was packed with tourists. For someone just visiting one beach, Trunk Bay would score high. When you compare the conditions of the underwater life between WaterLemon and Trunk, you can see the destruction that has taken from over use. The more extreme is the condition of St. Thomas? premier snorkel spot of Coki Point. A spot that gets pounded by hundreds of tourists on a daily basis and is about 30′ by 60′. We did a full tour and called it a day. The place is great in regards to amenities. Shower stalls, multiple food booths, picnic areas, trash bins, and plenty of staff to keep an eye on things. Overall, a good day.

The next day we also did a Ferry over so Travis could experience the standard Ferry as well as to do a little tourist shopping at some of the Tourist shops that line the streets of Cruz Bay.

Well, I decided to pick up a underwater housing for my digital camera. I actually gave up diving a while back because I just lost interest, but now that I have a new toy, and the fact that I will be hitting some new locations, it seemed like a good purchase.

Anyways, just like anything new, there is a learning curve. Camera care, settings, keeping bouyancy, making those freaking fish stay still…

Here are some photos that I took my first time out. It was actually a good sign when I waded in, stuck my head under water and there was this turtle just cruising along. Apparently it was used to people because it could care less that I was following it. The pictures actually came out pretty good. As I practice I will post some more here.

Day one (Hull Bay)

Okay, did a little internet research on this underwater photo stuff. Use manual settings to control the control loss from the water. Use sunny setting for down to three meters and cloudy setting as you go deeper. I am just snorkeling off the shore so no real issue with depth. I doubt I am going to do any deep dives with photos because you would then need strobes and other crap.

Day two (Coki Beach)

After Friday’s Children’s Parade, I was feeling a bit drained but was looking for some extravaganza. Flashy costumes, screaming music, dancing, and partying. I wasn’t disappointed. Standing out in the sun for 7 hours the day before had me wiped out Saturday morning. I had set the alarm for 9 am, but the value of the Carnival did not match up with my need for sleep. I used the “island time as my reasoning for taking another two hours of sleep.

I hit the parade route around eleven and I was still early. People had already staked out their spots however, there wasn’t a colorful dancer in sight. I was finally getting it right. I hung out in the shade until the Governor showed up with his Goon squad. I made my way down to where I lucked out the prior day. Although there were people lined up along the retaining wall, I saw that my spot in front of the statue was still vacant. Megan, her family and friends were already there, but a few seats were still open. As soon as she noticed me she offered me a seat. I gladly accepted taking a chair right next to the news camera booth. Luckily for me, their umbrella kept me shaded until the sun shifted and even then the booth itself protected me. No sun for this woosy boy. I felt cool and calm the whole day. Actually, I would have to rate the Parade as a second compared to the hospitality that the group had given me. Not only did I get a nice chair in the shade, but I was also served drinks, snacks, and a lovely dinner of two types of pasta, game hens, and roast pork. It was just like being on a picnic. I left that night feeling as fresh as when I arrived.

The parade itself was laid out somewhat comparatively to the Kids Parade. As the day progressed the acts got bigger, brighter and louder. In total there were 49 entries each performing for between ten to fifteen minutes. The categories that I could decipher, were dance groups, floats, Kings and Queens, Steel Pan, Costume, and drunk people. I have no clue who won, but it was one memorable day.

Here are a couple of my personal choices from the different categories.

My baby got sick. Steve, baby, huh? Okay, no “baby”, but my only other major responsibility in my life, my car. Just randomly, and I am only saying randomly because it is only an object, an object that wouldnÂ’t act like a soon to be ex-girlfriend that is about to be dumped, but for some reason the month that I am going to sell the “object,” it decides to retaliate and up pops a check engine warning light. Simple to resolve thinks the main lander. Now opening up the phone book and scanning the fifteen plus ads for auto repair finds none able to work on BMWs. For some odd reason, BMW expects you to bring your car to an authorized service center. So checking the internet I find the closest available location is Puerto Rico. Great…. Now we flip through the yellow pages again to see how I am going to float this “piece of …” to Puerto Rico. IÂ’m in luck, there are four shipping companies that can do it. Now the not so good. $1200, 900, 750, and 600 shipping costs round trip. Ahhhhh…. Wait, it gets worse. The rep lets me know that since I am shipping out of the VI I have to pay taxes on the vehicles estimated value. Freaking great.

I have been reading a lot lately preparing for my trip. One of the common threads is the multiple uses for duct tape. The recommendation is to wrap a pencil with the gray sticky stuff and use it to repair shoes, backpacks, hang mosquito nets, seal a open wound, etc. Well, I have a new use. Cut a small one inch square piece and gently place it over any glowing symbols on instrument panel
of your car. There you go problem solved. Since I am diligently working on becoming a “new” Steve, I am going to have to send “baby” on a cruise to Puerto Rico. So instead of a 15 minute ride to the neighborhood shop, I get to drop $600 for the cruise, $250 for me to fly over there, $150 a night for a hotel (Puerto Rico is a bigger rip off that any island that I have seen.) God knows how much the taxes are going to be, and then pick up the tab for whatever is wrong. Ouch!!!

Now that is only one issue that islanders have to deal with. For a better idea, multiply that by anything that you canÂ’t purchase at Kmart or Officemax and feel the pain. Just pray for dear life that you donÂ’t get sick with anything beyond the flu.

There is one distinct difference between the different islands that I have been comparing. For some odd reason, The “US” VI is not considered the US whenever you want to do any type of banking or credit card purchases. Just try to order something via the net, because face it you cannot survive on Kmart alone. We are considered a territory and therefore a foreign country. We are not on the option on the little state pull down menu. Very few places will ship to the VI and when they do its at our cost. Even when you do find a company that will accept your order, when you try to type in your credit card info, surprise surprise, foreign based credit cards are rejected. Screwed. Luckily, I have a credit card that I did not change the mailing address so I use that card and then ship the stuff to my friends address stateside. He then takes time out of his day to stand in line at the post office and mails the packages to me. Island life………

Want more, I have not been cold in five years. Huh. Yea, cold. You know, put on a jacket, see your breath, cold. ItÂ’s either warm or hot. Now in small to medium doses that is fine, but five years without a shiver. Makes me want to get the flu so I can get the chills. Now for those people that are covered in snow you probably are not going to understand the pain. All I can relate it to is that I used to be an avid snowboarder. I just waited for those winter storms to hit looking for the fresh powder. It was heaven. Now even though it was so awesome, after a couple of months of the same thing, it would get pretty old.

I think IÂ’ll stop now. Looking at it from the outsiders point of view, I think there are some people who are going to be a little agitated about me complaining about paradise. I guess it could be worse, I could be in Kansas.

Oh by the way, anybody wanna buy a car. What? That gray stuff? Thats speed tape, it comes from the factory that way.

After the 4 am J’ouvert, I was pretty beat. Came home and zonked out. I’ve been trying to get some scenic shots to add to the prior entries but it has been overcast for most of the day. Soooo, I hung around the house and did the bum thing. One of the sideline activities for Carnival is the VI Calypso Competition. Haven’t really listene to any professional Calypso so it sounded interesting.

The Vi Calypso Competition was sponsored by Coors Light and the co-sponsors AVIS Car Rental and Bellows International. Now I only bring the sponsors up because it was one of the events where you know there was some sort of contract that stated Coors Light must be announced at least 75 times throughout the night. Anyways, the Calypso Competition consisted of one universal band, last years winner and 10 challengers. Its kind of a free for all type competition. The participants are graded on the Calypsoness (Steve word), lyrics, originality, and performance. Last years winner was Brother Mudada. His challengers this year were Super T, Mighty Pat, King Kan Fue Plentae, Spade, Lollipop Man, King Generic, Mose I, Joey B, Coach, and Renegade. They did two halves with each getting to perform twice. That’s the Calypso Competition. Oh yea, Coors Light.

My night started off at 8pm. The competition started at 8, but I know island time so an arrival at around 8:30 should get me there about a half an hour earlier than the most likely start time of 9. My estimation was that this was going to be a decent event so parking would most likely be a problem. Instead of doing the parking lot search I figured I would save myself some time and head to the far side of the strip. So did my thing and made the twenty minute walk to the stadium. At the gate I find that you have to purchase a ticket. Head on over to the ticket counter and they want $20 for a ticket. No problem except that I have a grand total of $15. Son of a bitch. I could hear the music and saw that the stands were pretty full and I thought great. Now the old Steve would have just figured it wasn’t meant to be and would have gone home to watch tv. Now with this blog and an open book into my life, I couldn’t end the day with “and I watched tv.” So I high tailed it back to the car, hit the bank, and decided to see if I could find a closer parking spot. As I got close to the stadium I took a little side street and entered a not so nice area. The only spot I could find was in front of a house with a couple of sketchy guys in front. I think the sign up front said something like chop shop or something. Oh well, I’m vested in this thing and I’m going to see some Calypso. By the time I finally got there it was 10. I got to catch the last two songs of the first half. I wandered around and grabbed some food, checked out the crowd, then took a seat in the grand stand. About a half an hour later they started back up again and I got to see some Calypso. The only was I can describe it is a Caribbean style free styling. They don’t actually sing melodically, its more like a soothing rap. Most had that Caribbean accent so I wasn’t able to decipher all that much. Although it was a refreshing night, by the time midnight rolled around and there was still four more singers to go, I had enough. The Childrens Parade was at 10 the next morning so I wanted to make sure I got there early (yup, still can’t tell island time.)

4:00 a.m. BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ. Actually, it wasn’t too bad waking up. I was actually happy it was time to get up, its not like I had to go to work. Working sucks. Why do people work. If I had to wake up at 4:00 am to go to work, I would be on the verge of mass depression. Even though the official start time was 4:00 am, I am a long enough resident to understand “Island Time.” I figured 4 means 5 so I worked it out to hit it around 5. Headed down to the Waterfront and noticed the lack of people. Now there were people walking around and there was decent traffic, but nowhere close to what I would consider a lot based on something as large as Carnival. Well, my “Island Time” still needs to be dialed in. Although the crowds increased there was still no dancing or even any music. We just sat there and sat there saying “good morning” to a few people I knew. Around 7:30 the music kicked on, finally. Now an added benefit to island life is the surprise rain storms. As soon as the music started, it was like a rain switch turned on. We got drenched but it only added to the fire. It was cool when a rainbow popped up. Anybody who plans on doing the J’ouvert, let me clue you in on some helpful hints.

First, don’t go at 4 am. Hell, don’t get up until around 7. It might be tougher to get parking since a lot of the streets are blocked off, but it in no way compares to the strain of getting up earlier. Secondly, this is not a grab a lawn chair and sit and watch as the parade marches past you. This is best watched as a participant, elbow to elbow, well make that elbow to ass as that is what the dancing is all about. The parade actually starts down by the Cemetary, so you might as well head down that direction first thing. There are 4-5 18 wheeler rigs carrying these huge ass speakers and a bunch of band equipment. They crank up the tunes until your heart starts beating in a different rhythm. The crowds pick a trailer and surround it while “shaking that ass.” The truck cruises at around a half a mile an hour giving everybody a chance to get their grind. Its not the big costume party as one might imagine although there were a lot of people dressed up, but it was primarily a chance for people to participate. Well the whole parade lasted about 4 hours. With my eyes still vibrating from the girations of some pretty good shakers, I dragged my less that active ass home. Sleeeeeeepppppp.

Here are a couple of short vids to get you in the Carnival mood.

parade vid 1

parade vid 2

parade vid 3

parade vid 4

What good timing for taking a vacation before I quit my job. I get to go to Carnival. Usually when I am working, the job comes first. Two hurricanes, Office Max stays open. I mean what is going to happen when a Hurricane comes. People are going to need pencils. Don’t ask me why, but they do. My dedication usually involves me missing any important event because I always believed that as a leader you should be the first one to make sacrifices. Well as thoughtful as it sounds, (Old Steve talking,) it allowed me to hang that over my associates head for the other 364 days of the year. “What do you mean you need to have your Kidney removed, don’t you remember that time I let you and everyone off to go to the parade!” What a bastard I was (the new Steve.)

There are actually three carnivals for the VI. St. John (June), St. Croix (January), and St. Thomas (April.) The Carnival actually runs the entire month of April starting with the nominations of Ms. VI, and the Prince and Princess. In the middle are a ton of musical and dance events. This cumulates into the big finales of the Cultural Fair, Jouvert, and a Parade, Children’s and Adults. The Cultural fair consisted of a bunch of Booths serving native cuisine including, Vienna Cake, tropical fruit juices, fried Johnny Cakes, salt fish patties, and neighboring foods from the Dominican Republic.

I stopped by the market place and grabbed some food. I got a late start but it turned out better since they had a live band. I hung around until 11 pm thinking that it would shut down but it was still rockin when I left. 11 o’clock and your whining? Okay, let me move forward a bit. The next big activity is Jouvert. Now Jouvert is basically a parade with a lot of dancing and partying. The kicker is that it STARTS at 4:00 a.m. Thats right smart asses 4:00 a.m. Yes, I am old and I did not do an all nighter, but come on, even some heavy duty party goers would have thought twice about that. So at the weak hour of 11 pm, I went home to grab some shut eye.

Since I have a week left at work and then a free month of rent, I guess I will use the time to practice my blogging skills by writing about my current home. The good thing is that I am lucky enough to live in a place where people go to have an adventure and write their blogs about.

The US Virgin Islands are made up of 3 main islands: St. Thomas, St. Croix, and St. John, as well as 50+ small cays. The population consists of a mixture of Native Islanders (African descent), US mainland expats, Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, Danish, French, and one Japanese guy from Fresno. To find us on the map we are located half way between Florida and Venezuela/South America. We are just east of Puerto Rico. That is about as much general geography that I can muster. I sucked at Geography so I rely on visiting everywhere to see for myself.

Now for some Steveography.

I moved to St. Thomas at the end of May 2004. After spending almost three years in Key West, I needed a change of pace so I moved to another island. Smart huh. Actually, there was a huge demand for pencils in St. Thomas that was not being met so the company sent me there to increase the average pencils per household.

Luckily for me, I get to cheat a little and insert a link to a write up I did for a website involving my move. If your new to these types of blogs, click on the ?move? in the prior sentence and it should direct you to my article.

Now that was easy. Maybe I can create a whole blog that is made up of links to other peoples information on places that I visit. Oh wait, that would be the ?Old Steve (lie, cheat, and manipulate).? Okay, moving on.

Now there are no hard truths about island life versus ?real life.? What I have learned about this discussion is that there is no set facts because it is totally dependent on the other persons perspective. What I see can be totally different than what someone else does. With that in mind I have come to a resolution. The perspective that we will use is the person who has the log in and password to this blog. Now that was easy.

Island life.

Whether it be Hawaii, Key West, or St. Thomas, the best correlation I can give is to that of a small town. Make that a small town in some rural area. The reason being is that these islands are often times physically smaller than good old small town USA. The only real difference being that on an island, the cities boundary will in fact drown you. .

Who moves to the island. There are a ton of reasons for moving to the islands. I can tell you one main reason that seems to be a common thread, is to move to the farthest reaches as possible from someone or something. Everyone has a story. I?ll leave it at that. The positive effect of being on an island of outcasts is that the mentality is truly different. Again, a whole new can of worms that I won?t get into here. So, if you just don?t fit in where you are, or your world has crumbled, come on down to the islands, refresh your batteries, and see the world in a whole new perspective. Trust me you won?t be judged because your peers will be as looney as you. Island humor.

Real life St. Thomas. Each of the islands that I have lived are actually quite different so this will be more focused on St. Thomas. Now St. Thomas is one of the move visited Ports of Call for cruise ships in the world. If you?ve been on a few cruises, you most likely have stopped here at least once. Well, that is not real life St. Thomas. The 10 hour stopper or even the vacationer who never steps foot out of the all-inclusive resort never gets a chance to see St. Thomas. Here is just a little bit of Stevespective. Maybe I will limit it to some of the more unique aspects.

We don?t have running water. Whattttt no water. What I mean is no piped in water. Most of the homes utilize a system of catching and storing rain water in cisterns. Basically, a huge barrel holds the water that has run off the roof. During times of low rain, we have to buy water and have a water tanker fill up the cistern. We do have electricity and phone lines, but that water thing is definitely different. I thought the outside showers in Key West was weird.

We drive on the left side of the road. The cars are all left hand steering, but we just drive on the left. Basically, the island was bought and sold a few times from different countries before the US got a hold of it so that part never got americanized.

The native islanders speak English. Now its not main stream English, but it is English. There are different dialects that have meshed together throughout the years so it is definitely not proper English. The closest that I can relate it to is speaking with a lot of slang. It takes a bit to get used to, but its gone over my head more than once.

There are some world class beaches here, although over run by tourists, but with the exception of the handful of beaches, there is not a lot of access to the water. Where Key West is pretty much a flat piece of land not rising more that a yard or two above sea level, St. Thomas is much more mountainous/jungle. Most of the island has rocky cliffs that drop off into the ocean. My ears actually pop every time I come down the hill. Key West on the other hand actually has no real beaches. The few that are there are actually man-made and would rate very low on the beach scale unless one of the judges is from a farm community in Kansas who has never seen the ocean.

Activities rate low on the fun scale when you take away the beach/ocean activities. As much as every little town would like to think they are main stream, they are not. It?s pretty much a boring small town atmosphere with the occasional 5000 tourists dropping by for ten hours. Not too much in regards to cultural activities, not withstanding the local culture. If you take away the booze aspect, St. Thomas is actually a very big snoozer. After 10 pm with the exception of a couple of clubs, this place shuts down.

Cost of living. Naturally since you are paying for the view housing costs more than average. It?s definitely more than average when you take into consideration the quality of the houses. I hear that finding good contractors and workers can be very tough. Factor that in to material availability and the fact that most houses are built on the sides of mountains, (mi casa,) the quality that I have seen are somewhat poor. Definitely would not hold its value if placed on the mainland. Beyond that, with an exception of a few food items, everything else is fairly equal. In fact, it might be even cheaper when you take into consideration the moderate temperatures year round. Shorts and t-shirts are the only necessity in this climate. No need for fancy dancy duds or that whole fall wardrobe. Although, the dress here is more on the conservative level, long pants and shirt, no super casual wear. Just that and the cost savings in air conditioning and heating would offset any extra housing expense. Salaries are much lower here than in the states so the work force gets pretty much screwed, so I guess that is the offset to the wardrobe thing. Supposedly St. Thomas has one of the largest differences between cost of living and salaries. Since I am not a big drinker/partyer, I pretty much banked a crap load of cash while here. My entire expenses for the month was only 25% of my salary. That is a big reason why I feel comfortable taking a year off without going broke.

Work. Work is work is work. In big towns and small towns. If someone has to pay you to do something, then it is work. Just because you can see the ocean from your house, doesn?t mean the bills stop coming. Just like anywhere, if you want to play you gotta pay. What I do warn people though is that moving to these exotic places does remove the safety net that a lot of people take for granted. Mom, Dad, relatives, friends, are no longer next door. It?s a 4 hour $500 flight away at the minimum. You make a mistake here and it truly can be life changing. If you read my other write up on my move to St. Thomas, you will see that it is not cheap and you aren?t going to even survive the first month without a good plan and financing.

Creatures. Bugs, lizards, fish, spiders, roaches, iguanas, chickens, a few snakes (non-poisonous), and pretty much your usual jungle creatures. No monkeys though, now that would be cool. They even have deer here. I get along fine with all the above. The only negative are mosquitos. There are a few here. Follow the basic rules and its not a big deal, but they still annoy the hell out of me. Again read my other post to see my war on those bastards.

Food. Not the best choices in the world. You have 5-star priced restaurants and you have the hole in the wall places (and Mc Donald?s of course, there are three.) The problem is that there is not much in between. Selection is not that great because of above so unless you have a $100 a day food budget, the food scores pretty low. I live on Mc Donald?s (sushi wrapped Big Mac remember) so its not a big deal for me. On my off days Sprite and butter (inside joke to those who know me. That tends to be the only thing that I have in my refrigerator.) Now in regards to exotic fruits, oh yea. This place is awesome. Just visit any of the roadside stands for produce picked right off the vine/tree. Just to get an idea of what is available, just in my front yard I have mangoes (hybrid and local), lemons, limes, bananas, almonds, and avocadoes. There are a ton of other types of exotic fruit available but I have yet to try all of them. Mangoes are just starting and hopefully I will get to catch the early part of the season. Avocadoes and mangoes, I could live off of just those (with the occassional Big Mac of course.)

Fishing. I throw that in because it is one of my salvations in life. That single hobby got me through three years of hell in Kansas (sorry Kansas but you gotta admit.) Fishing kind or correlates to the food topic. If you have the cash to charter a big boat to take you out chasing Marlin, you will rank the VI as tops. Now if you are like the other 99% of this world, the fishing sucks because there is very little access. Like I reported before, there are very few beaches and those tend to be packed with tourists. The other areas are not very conducive to good fishing environments. Now Key West kicks the VI?s ass. If this one fact had been known before, I might have never moved here. Luckily in Key West one of my managers husband (Captain Carl- LooneyTunes) was one of the top charter captains in the Keys. He taught me the ropes of fishing for big stuff. Now I am no slacker when it comes to fishing because my parents taught me well as I grew up, but blue water fishing is completely different. The fish I used to catch before we would use for bait to catch the bait that we would use to catch the big fish. I learned enough to rank myself as a half of a half of a first mate. I even got offered tips when I would mate for him on some of his charters. Since I am vacationing this last week of work I have done a bit of fishing. I found a cool little spot that has a bunch or 24-30″ snook. Just have to figure out what they are feeding on. In Key West, my secret spot I would catch 3-5′ Tarpon off the bank. Now that kicks ass.

Island hopping. There are about 5 or 6 islands that are convenient enough that you can take a ferry to. For the next month I hope to do a lot of island hopping. I will report those as I visit them.

Beyond that, no different that any other place. There are good neighborhoods and bad neighborhoods. Good people and bad people. Just like everywhere else. The only real difference is the view. For a saying that I have adapted to fit the island life- “Life is like a box of chocolate, you never know what your going to get, (and here’s the Steve-a-phrase) but you know its going to be chocolate.” Since we are having a sale on Steve-a-phrases, you get two for the price of one. “Island living is like Mayberry but with a view.” You know Andy Griffith…. whatever.

For Mom- Whenever I think about fishing I remember that time when I was what maybe 4 or 5 and I fell into the creek. I floated along that creek until someone dragged me out. I don?t remember even being scared. Just thinking about how cool that was. The other memory was when you took me and Mike Noel out fishing to the Kings River and you made us plain hotdogs on white bread. We both thought that was the greatest food we ever had and we weren’t even stoned.