St. Thomas

Off Duty in St. Thomas

On Saturday we motored (the wind could not have been more on the nose) the 20+ nautical miles to Red Hook, St. Thomas.  Our buddy boats stopped at Charlotte Amalie, but we continued to Red Hook where my old high school friend, Garry Bryan, lives.  We got together with Garry and his friend, Pamela, who manages a charter catamaran, Catatonic.  Since Cataonic is out on charters, she kindly is allowing us to stay on her mooring ball that is conveniently located near the town.  It looks as though most all of the buildings here are less than 20 years old.  You can see that the tourism trade is going strong here.  Still it is a beautiful place. 

Yesterday the four of us motored over to Hawksnest Bay in the National Park on St. John.  We picked up a day mooring and had a leisurely lunch and swim.  As I swam, I saw a turtle quite a ways ahead of me.  I then swam to the left so as to keep Wayward Wind in view.  I couldn't find the turtle.  Darn.  Then I looked straight below me and saw two mottled things...Coral?  No, turtle legs!  The turtle was right below me about fifteen feet.  Did he have a fin on his back?  Wrong again!  A foot-long fish was nibbling bits off the turtle's back while the turtle grazed on the sea grass.  Neither seemed to mind that I was there, so I just floated and watched.  Love it!

Oddly, the wind was coming from the south rather than the usual east.  We put up the jib to see if we could sail with jib only.  We eased along at 3.5 knots.  Not bad for this little jib and this big boat.  The wind was at 15 knots for a pleasant ride back.  Wonderful weather and fun with friends made for a lovely day.

Lunchtime view of swimming area