Buck Island

At 07:00 Explorer was passing through the West Gregerie channel into the Baye de Grigri on the southern side of St Thomas, one of the US Virgin Islands. This being our earliest port call, and the previous night’s party having been well attended the promenade was quiet on the morning coffee run, but soon the ship was waking up and we were rushing to the 08:00 meet up for our day’s excursion: snorkel and sail, hosted by Robert Piccardo. We sat in the theatre scoffing a breakfast of pears and vegetable wraps and reflecting that carrying on past 01:00 again might not have been the wisest.

We headed out to quayside a few hundred meters from where Explorer was tied up, where a large catamaran with its sail furled arrived to take us on our trip. Soon 120 unshod trekkies, Robert Picardo, his family and our all girl crew were on the 40 minute or so boat trip to Buck island. Robert was very clear that we were to be careful as he only treats fictional patients (although technically that may mean he can help with a real injury as long as it belongs to a character you’re method acting?). Soon enough we were jumping in to Turtle Cove; there were some gorgeous turtles to be seen but sadly the reef seemed like it might have been adversely affected by environmental issues.

We moved onto the adjacent Shipwreck (Mouillage) Cove, home to the wreck of the Cartanza Senora which can be clearly seen despite being 45feet down. The vessel was launched during WWII as a freighter, scuttled in suspicious circumstances (probably related to some disreputable dealings in Colombian agricultural products) during the 1970s, dragged out of the shipping lanes and then washed up to her present position by a Hurricane in 1989. When we arrived a group of SCUBA divers was on the wreck, sending up constellations of sparkling bubbles.

Soon it was time to head to the main island of St Thomas so Robert could get to rehearsal for a play later on; we stood against the rail at the aft of boat (taffrail?) drying off in the bright Caribbean sun whilst rum punch was served. When we arrived back in harbour the wood of the wharf was warm enough that Alex ran to her shoes (which had been laid out on the shore for us to collect).Read more