Part 3: Day Trip to St. Thomas
Monday was designated the day to go to St. Thomas, where we had a few goals: to have lunch at the new Hard Rock Cafe and to shop for a watch for Rick and an emerald ring for me. One of the local van/taxis drove us to the ferry dock at West End, which, after Roadtown, is the principal harbour on Tortola. In comparison to our careful, grinding progress along the roadways, our cab driver was a maniac, taking the turns and bumps with reckless aplomb. The fact that our driver had probably been driving those roads for many years did not give us much comfort as he careened along the coast and barely missed oncoming cars.Despite our taxi driver's adventurous driving, we made it to West End's ferry dock safely. Our wait for the ferry was neither long nor boring, since we had all the activity of the harbour and the vibrant colors of Soper's Hole (across the harbour) to entertain us. At one point, one of the deckhands, a large, sweaty black man, offered to pose with me for a photo. As we posed, Rick walked up and feigned jealousy and then proceeded to threaten to kiss my new friend. This resulted in laughter and ribbing from the deckhand's friends, who were quite amused at the prospect of their buddy being kissed by another man.Soon thereafter, we boarded the ferry, Rick and I staying inside while Doug and Jodi rode on the bow outside. (Since the only "benefits" of riding inside were cabin service consisting of fruit punch, and heat and humidity, I decided I would ride outside on the return trip.) The trip took only 45 minutes, during which time we were able to enjoy the scenic wonders of St. John and its many empty beaches. St. Thomas, with its congestion of people and buildings, was not nearly as appealing.A passing rainstorm was over by the time we reached Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, and made it through the line at U.S. customs, and soon we were greeted by the traffic lights, trucks, and six-lane main drag paralleling the harbour, the very civilization we sought to escape. But, since we were doing the tourist thing, our first stop was the Hard Rock Cafe, which had opened only weeks before. Like most other Hard Rocks, it was cavernous, overly-air-conditioned, and crammed with rock-and-roll memorabilia. Most important to us, there was Jimmy Buffett memorabilia just inside the door. While not a proper Buffett sighting, it was nevertheless a proper homage to our hero.We were soon seated and furnished with a round of Coronas. We began conversing with our waitress, the gregarious Kristin, who had had a Buffett sighting of her own (and she confirmed my suspicion that he is short, probably shorter than I am). This was as close as we would get to him, as the cheeseburgers at Hard Rock were hardly worthy of paradise (a condition which is, in fact, endemic to the islands, since most beef is shipped in from the U.S. and does not survive the trip very well). Undaunted by our mediocre meals, we purchased some Hard Rock gear and headed for the streets of the shopping mecca of the Caribbean.Downtown Charlotte Amalie crams some of the glitziest boutiques and jewelry stores in the world into about three square blocks of narrow, twisted alleys and arcades, with some of the more ambitious companies having three or more stores within that small area. Gems, perfumes, designer fashions and artwork vie for the tourist's dollar with postcards, shell necklaces, shot glasses, t-shirts and other assorted kitsch. Having found and purchased my emeralds (but not Rick's watch), we had time to ogle the more costly wares. Oh, what damage we could do! Of course, I imagine that most of the real shopping is what happens in the souvenir shops, where one can buy all the postcards and refrigerator magnets they can carry without testing the credit card limit. After a while, the overabundance of riches lost their attraction and we headed to The Greenhouse, a open-walled bar across the highway from the harbor, for drinks. Jodi and I hopped up on barstools with margaritas, while the men played darts. Having had our fill of Charlotte Amalie, all we really wanted to do was get back on the ferry and head back to Tortola so we could jump in the pool at Treasure Isle.Once aboard the ferry, with the U.S. Virgin Islands were behind us, we made our way to the bow of the ferry and were joined by a number of other travelers, many of whom were carrying rum punch. The sun was, after all, over the yardarm. The return trip was brief, and soon we were docked in Roadtown (after a stop in Soper's Hole) and headed back to Treasure Isle. Although we had made a point of traveling light, that evening we culled our luggage down even further, so that each of us was down to a single carry-on bag in preparation of our sailing trip. The rest we would leave locked up at Treasure Isle until we returned. On Tuesday morning, we were told that our crew would be substituted. South Africans Russell and Elizabeth Pentz had come down with ciguatera, and our replacement captain and cook would be John and Monique Peacock from England.