Cruising the Caribbean, Next Port: St. Thomas 9/9

Welcome to St. Thomas!

It's now Wednesday, we've been cruising for 3 days and have finally arrived in the first of the Virgin Islands, St. Thomas. We enjoyed relaxing on the island of Coco Cay, but it was just that and island with nothing to do but lay around and no one else there besides us. That is why we were even more excited to arrive at St. Thomas, apparently the shopping capital of the world, according to "Shopping Shelby" whose only job on the ship is to teach us how to shop! St. Thomas is also a U.S. Virgin Island which means we can finally call our kids without racking up the phone bill. As you can see it is beautiful, the water is so blue it's unbelievable. As I mentioned this is the down season for cruising the Carribean so we are the only boat at dock all day, we have the island all to ourselves and plenty of natives just waiting to "earn" our money:)

The first stop of the day is our much anticipated Snuba excursion, we had to hustle off the boat, to cram onto the bus, and drive all the way to the other side of the island. The little road trip gave us an opportunity to see what life on the island is really like when your not trying to impress the tourists. I was surprised by how crammed together everyone seemed to be and their homes with all the junk made the island appear as a third world country. They also drive on the opposite side of the road, which is weird to me since it is a U.S. island, I could never get used to it, freaked me out every time we turned the bus. Lots of iguanas, the tour guide said that we have squirrels, they have iguanas!

We finally made it to our destination, our own private, beautiful beach. Kendall and I were slightly disappointed because we assumed we would be going out on a boat to Snuba. Anyway, while we waited for our turn to Snuba, they gave us snorkel gear and turned us loose out in the great ocean. I was glad we got to acclimate ourselves with a little snorkeling before having to breath through the air tank, it takes some getting used to, a mental thing I guess. Snuba is a new sport that combines snorkeling with scuba, but requires much less training then scuba diving. It's just like going down deep with scuba gear except for your air tank floats on the surface of the water in a raft and you are connected with a long hose which enables you to go much deeper than just snorkeling. It was quite an expereince, a three hour one to be exact, not quite as exciting as Kendall and I had anticipated, but a great experience none the less. The instructor said I did a wonderful job and complimented me on my ability to keep my body flat and stay down in the water. Kendall, although almost as skilled as I, got some water in his mouth piece, so every time he inhaled the salt water would just go further down into his lungs. He went to the surface to readjust and the instructor went up and brought him right back down again before he could even get his equipment figured out, Kendall said he felt like he was drowning because he couldn't the water out of his lungs.

I have to say that I'm just glad I survived as Kendall made me falsify information when signing away my life to be able to Snuba. As some of you hopefully know, we are expecting another addition to our family, we discovered this right before the cruise. In order to Snuba you cannot be pregnant, they make sure to ask you this more than once. Although, I was not very far along, they specifically ask you to sign paperwork that you are not pregnant, I just can't tell a lie, my concience is too guilty:) Kendall made me do it, said there was no risk, and if it became an issue to tell them I had a doctor's note allowing me to Snuba! It turned out fine, the entire time we were down under the ocean I kept having to concentrate to keep from getting sick, I actually couldn't wait until we resurfaced.

We didn't have much time on the island in the first place and then Snuba took almost half the day, so we were literally running to see as much of the island as possible. As I mentioned, "Shopping Shelby" had geared us up for our arrival on the island by giving us coupons for free jewelry and a map on how and were to get it. It was actually kind of fun, like a treasure hunt, because Kendall and I had to divide and conquer, literally running to get into every store before they locked up for the day. We succeeded with lots of free jewelry, but the best buy of all was my new Ammolite necklace for our anniversary. It is one of the most recently discovered gems and is only found in Alberta, Canada. I could give you my sales pitch, but I'll save that for when I show you my actual necklace:)

Our final excursion was a sky ride to Paradise Point, well worth the view! Our boat was the only one at port and we truly felt like the only ones on the island. There was no one at the top of the mountain, except for the poor peddlars selling nothing to no one. Although I have been skydiving, I still have my issues with heights, esecially riding in a little car, dangling from a cable, up the mountain. I was a little tense anytime we breathed if the cable car swayed. Here are some of the beautiful sites from the highest of St. Thomas.

As you can tell by this very long post, we had a wonderful visit to St. Thomas, we just wish it could have been longer. We literally used every last second as we had to run to catch our boat before it set sail.