After wrap, wrap party, and Debajo de las Estrellas party (a seemingly seamless blur of celebrating), Adam, Lisa and I took the seaplane to St. Croix. The aptly named Waves was where we stayed and it is perfect. Perched on top of rocks, never ending barrage of waves pounding into the wall right below the hotel itself. We dropped out stuff, took in another gorgeous sunset and headed down the Salt River Bay, where Lisa had set up a kayak tour in a glass bottom kayak….IN A BIOLUMINESCENT BAY! That shit CRAY! I still don’t fully understand why these glowing suckers are in this specific spot, but I guess there’s a handful of such bays in the Caribbean. Under darkness we glided around the bay and through the clear bottomed kayaks it looked like a universe was streaking by at Warp Speed. When you drag your hand through the water twinkling streaks of living light sparkle in trails behind. The guide let me jump in (but he was pretty hesitant which made me keep my dip quick), and I kicked a glowing jelly fish by accident. Pissed off, it flashed into a ball of blue light for a second and drifted away. A GLOWING JELLYFISH! It didn’t seem like it could be real. The Caribbean never fails to amaze me.
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The next morning we got up early and met Jackson and Blue back in Christiansted to go dive “the Wall”. Can’t lie, diving isn’t my favorite thing in the world. I like it, but it’s not very comfortable for me and all the “remembering things” and head crushing pressure distracts me from the beauty around me. It was pretty sick though. To float along the sea floor and and see it abruptly drop 3,000 feet into oblivion is pretty goddamn cool. It gave a me a weird vertigo moment. I expecting at any moment, the “floor” would drop out from under me and I’ll plummet down the cliff. In possibly my coolest diving experience ever, I literally found Buddha at the bottom of the ocean. I was swimming along, when I saw something white and out of place about 80 feet down. I floated down to it and when I saw it was a Buddha statue my heart skipped a beat. I know your supposed to “take only photos”, but I’m sorry conservationists, when you find religion in the middle of the sea, you can’t not take it with you! I grabbed it and brought it home with me, and will be joining a monastery next time I see one…maybe.
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After a couple head-eclearing/nerve chilling shots on the boardwalk, we said bye to Blue and Jackson and drove across the island to kept the action going. Lisa had also set up a sunset horseback riding tour. The owners were an older, crazy married couple Paul and Jill. As they got us set up with our horses (mine was General and he is a boss), Paul chain smoked and Jill barked out orders. Jill lead the tour and her use of a bullhorn to point out random things in the bush was a little…lets say distracting, but it was fun nonetheless. I wish I could ride a horse to work every day.
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The hits just kept on coming as that night we had dinner at the restaurant in The Waves. Hard to describe how refreshing, inventive and delicious their menu is. If this little, open air place resting about the ocean was in Newark I would make pilgrimages there, and the combination of location and world class food is absolutely amazing. As soon as I saw the live lobsters in a trap just outside I made sure I “reserved” one and started licking my chops. All the food we ordered was amazing, but when my lobster came out I almost shed tears of joy. How can you get better than a caribbean lobster, halfed and cooked over fire with the chef’s simple island spices. Fuck butter or a sauce, this bug was edible gold. We ended up moving to the bar and got shit-housed talking with the owner, Laura, and a local captain that was her friend. Over ridiculous amount of shots, we chatted about this and that for more hours than I thought we had in us. By the end we were just inventing shots, the “Lisa 2.0” shots were great…not that I could ever remember what was in them. Laura is funny, and has had a crazy life, traveling the world and eventually “building this place out of the ocean”. Hovensa, the oil refinery on St. Croix, just closed and Laura was concerned with the economic impact on island now that the main source for jobs had disappeared. Between that and the low season coming around, she wasn’t sure if she could keep the place opened. Please go there this weekend, eat, relax and keep Laura in business so one day I can come back.
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Next we got up and just kept going. We flew back to St. Thomas by seaplane, and went straight to Lindquist Beach to hang with some crew who were leaving the next day. Beach cocktails, great conversation, bone white sand all finished up with an amazing sunset at Paradise Point. That night the whole crew got together at Sibs and reveled with our leaving members. It was the first big wave of people leaving, and started to make it real that we were all going to have to go to our actual homes at some point soon. I eventually hit my wall and slept in the car, and the next day I didn’t do much more than recover. Weirdly enough that night was the first time we turned on the TV. Its been almost 4 months and the thought never really accured to watch TV, there’s so much great stuff to look at outside.
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After the day of respite, it was time to party all over again. We celebrated Adam’s birthday with a great dinner at Oceana and popping bottles like a boss at Starz. EARLY the next morning though, the island hopping continued as Lisa, Adam and I dragged our asses to the airport and fly to San Juan. The Shelly’s joined us, and we all stayed at Da House in old San Juan. Love that place. Using my limited experience in San Juan I played “poorman’s tour guide” and led the group to my favorite haunts. Flying kites at El Morro is my favorite thing ever, nothing makes you feel more like a kid. If I didn’t suck so much at it, I’d look into going pro. We had another great dinner at Aquavida, and ended the night playing pool at El Batey.
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The next day a new troop of recruits arrived in San Juan, when Billy, Breanna, Jordan, Tonben, Christina and Alex landed. Again I played tour guide, pretty much going to places I took the other peeps (with some extra beer stops), and had an equally great day. After showers, naps, etc we all reconvened and went the Nuyorican Cafe under Da House. I. Had. A. Blast. So much fucking fun salsa dancing to a life band, in a steamy island club. Any girl (or old woman) within my reach was been grabbed and forced to endure my shitty salsa for a song or two. After a few Presidentes, I felt like I was the next Fred Astair, and although I doubt that’s true, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it…..(photo’s need to be developed)
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Adam, Lisa and the Shelly’s had to leave the next day, and it was a tough goodbye. I know I’ll see them all in NYC in less than a week, but this was the official end of our St. Thomas adventure. I don’t think we could’ve ended it on a better note, but there was a lifetime of “good notes” while we were down here. No sleep, Presidente and determination gave us an amazing taste of the Virgin Islands.
cirque duford 