Travel day.

Moses took us to the Cruz Bay ferry dock, our last ride with him. I think we’ll miss him. He enjoyed surprising us with bizarre proclamations about humanity or fate or where our hearts really lie. He would pound on the steering wheel until we reacted, arguing when we didn’t say what he wanted.

The first ferry ride was about 45 minutes and uneventful. We went to the inside area for the air conditioning. When we disembarked we ran into a geology professor from Fort Collins and discovered that we had many acquaintances in common; it is indeed a small world! We left our luggage with the ferry people and went for lunch at the French Quarter Bistro during our 2 hour stay before the next ferry ride.

The next ferry was two hours of bouncing in rough seas. See how narrow the boat is? We were amazed that no one seemed to get sick. Don’t watch the video if you tend toward seasickness!

Finally we made it to St Croix, our final island on this journey. Gallows Bay was the site of public executions in Danish Colonial (1733-1848) times.

We got off the ferry and onto a taxi for a half hour ride to our hotel.

After a taxi ride from Gallows Bay, we arrived at the Carambola Beach Resort around sunset. We ordered a pizza and drinks for dinner. It was a bit surprising that the bar was sold out of local VI beer!

Our first morning on St John, we woke to what sounded like a deluge. We looked out the window to see rain pouring down. It lasted about ten minutes. When Moses, our taxi driver, picked us up we mentioned the storm, but he said, “That was no storm, it was just a sprinkle.” I guess perspectives are different if you’ve lived through hurricanes. We experienced another sprinkle the next day and joked about what to call it.

This day, Moses drove us to a trailhead in the national park.

The trail was super steep at first, but Jenn had told us it leveled out, so we weren’t worried. The views were nice.

At the top, Clare took a break in part because she got blisters snorkeling yesterday. Her feet were hurting, and she wore tennis shoes rather than the water hikers we bought for this trip.

Nice hike, and it did level out somewhat. Very interesting plants!

Then, it started sprinkling. Pouring. We were drenched in minutes, but it kept coming down. We kept walking—what else are you going to do? We yearned for our umbrellas which were left in the room.

The plants looked different with a coating of fresh water.

On the way down, the trail got steep again and very slippery because of the rainwater on the fallen leaves. It took a lot longer getting down than going up!

We enjoyed fresh Grouper for dinner, with rice and squash. We then made preparations to leave in the morning.

Day trip to Great Britain! Who would have thought?

We were to meet our boat at the Westin Resort, which we saw yesterday on our trip with Jenn. A taxi driver named Moses gave us a ride. We had to go through a locked gate where a guard questioned Moses. It felt a bit like a prison for rich tourists, few pathways out of the complex.

We were entertained by a couple of pelicans diving in the water and posing on the gate as we waited for our group. Tour personnel collected our passports, and we were off.

The ride out was smooth and pleasant. We went along the border between the U.S. and Britain for quite a way in the water.

When we got to Virgin Gorda, the captain handled immigration while we put our shoes back on for our visit to the Greater Baths National Park. A taxi drove us to the start of the famous trail through an astonishing jumble of gigantic granite boulders and curved slabs that make up this path through the park.

The trail started along a sandy walkway headed toward the beach. Lots of people were walking. A couple of places we got stuck behind a crowd, when someone ahead got stuck or scared and tried to turn back, but this is a narrow, one-way trail.

The crowds gave us a chance to study the boulders and evolve a hypothesis of how they developed into this unusual presentation. Deep seated magma (from the garnets) and fairly quick uplift caused widely spaced joints to form. The joints allowed water to erode the edges causing large scale exfoliation similar to the domes in Yosemite. The thick slabs of exfoliated granite fell away from their well rounded surfaces, landing at random angles. Quite unique! We felt lucky to experience these rocks at this precise stage of development.

The trail was tight in some places, but open to the beach in others. I feel like we would have spent much more time exploring if fewer people were around.

After the excitement of the trail through the Baths, we had a quick lunch at a restaurant at The Top of the Baths. We had put in our orders before we arrived.

The boat ride to Norman Island was smooth and easy again. Other boats were anchored where we were headed for the best view of sea life. This island was the inspiration for Robert Louis Stevenson’s novel “Treasure Island.”

We asked the captain to drop us off at U.S. Immigration in Cruz Bay rather than at the Westin Resort. This enabled us to find drinks at a bar before going to dinner at a nice restaurant where Clare tried to eat a 2-pound Caribbean lobster!

From Doubting to Baptism? With St. Croix next? What does it mean?

After packing up for the next island, we took a taxi then a ferry to our destination. The ferry ride was quick — about 15 minutes.

When we got off, we hauled our luggage to the National Park Headquarters, but it was closed on Sundays. So we found a grocery store. Our new accommodation was about a mile from there.

St. John Island is very steep, so the planned mile walk up the hill was arduous, at eighty degrees and eighty percent humidity. Luckily, two young gentlemen offered us a ride! Brian didn’t want to accept, but they convinced us, so we hopped in their car. Smart move! And such kindness. They didn’t even want any money for helping us out.

Next, we hired a guide to take us around the island. Jenn was great! She stopped wherever we asked.

We spent three wonderful hours listening to Jenn, learning about her favorite place. She moved here about 15 years before, thinking to stay about a year, but she never left. Now she has a family.

So many beautiful coves on this island! The steep terrain enhances the sights.

We got out of Jenn’s car often to see her favorite views. Jenn referred to Caneel Bay Resort as a Jurassic Park scene, with the abandoned buildings on a remote island. In 1956, Laurance Rockefeller opened this eco-friendly resort and purchased thousands of acres of the surrounding land which later became Virgin Islands National Park. The resort operated under a lease from the park until 2017.

We even walked down to a few beaches.

Jenn let us out at a sugar mill ruin which had informational signs and maps. She couldn’t come with us because she was parked in a taxi-only zone and had to stay with the car.