St Thomas

Our first port was in St Thomas, part of the US Virgin Islands. We landed in Charlotte Amalie and decided to rent a car for the 6 of us since taxis were ridiculously overpriced. We could only find a 5 seater sedan, but we worked it out with four of us in the back. Even though St Thomas is a territory of the United States, they drive on the other side of the road.

The island was owned by Denmark for most of it's modern history but was purchased by the United States in 1917 for $25 million as a defense strategy in World War I. I'm not sure why they drive on the left, but it made for an interesting trip! Especially when Brad tried turning left at a stop light and nearly plowed us into the cars idling at the red light on the right of the road (where you would usually go if you were turning left). We all probably would have done the same thing :) In fact, no one else said anything until we kept trying to go over... over... over... until we were out of lanes and suddenly realized - oh yeah, we need to keep LEFT! It was all good. The other drivers were laughing at us but I imagine they must be somewhat used to it.

We started out by stopping at a local market to do some shopping.

It was fun browsing through all the trinkets, purses, clothing and souvenirs for sale (later we realized these were not really native to St Thomas - we saw the exact same fare at every cruise port). We then continued on to Magen's Bay, a beautiful little beach famous for its white sand. It was gorgeous, no better place to soak up the first of many beach rays.

After the beach we bought a coconut from a machete wielding local on the side of the road.

It was great until most of us realized we don't like coconut milk - we busted it open later though and ate the actual flesh which was delish. The great thing about renting a car is you can go where the road takes you - after the coconut milk we stopped at a local dairy and tried their homemade milkshakes. They were excellent and we were able to support our continued quest to gain 15 cruise pounds. We hopped back into the car, took in the incredible views the island has to offer and searched for our next adventure. When we saw a dirt road with several cars parked nearby we figured we had found it. We jumped out and began walking. Something smelled seriously rank and I had the pleasure of spotting a huge dead dog next to the side of the road. Yuck! We figured there had to be something cool down our path though so we kept going. Well, I wish I could say we discovered a hidden oasis but there was nothing at the end of our dirt road. We hurried back to the car - avoiding the dog - and went on to Sapphire Bay which was an oasis.

We spent more time laying out and we were able to do some snorkeling too. We saw plenty of beautiful fish and even fed them some doggy treats, which they loved! After Sapphire Bay we headed back to the cruise ship (after our near-death experience :) . Truly a perfect day!