St. Thomas to St. John USVI

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.Read more