The infamous ferry dock
St. John Vacation
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Saturday, March 24, 2001
by Jennifer
We arrived in St. Thomas at approximately 3:30 pm AST. It was an amazing view from the
plane: turquoise water and palm trees! Dave and I were happily reunited after having to sit
separately in the plane.We took a taxi to Red Hook, getting a tour of the island along the
way. We passed through Charlotte Amalie, the shopping district and saw this neat old red
building that the driver told us was once a police station and prison but was now a museum.
From Red Hook we took a ferry to Cruz Bay, St. John (about a 20 minute ride).
St. John immediately appealed to the eye more that St. Thomas, which had looked run down
in many places.
On the ferry dock in Cruz Bay, the ferry staff immediately began unloading the luggage
in a big pile. I quickly grabbed what I thought was my own suitcase, but it turned out
to be a nearly identical Samsonite suitcase to mine. I didn't realize my mistake until after
we got to our condo at Serendip. I first noticed
that something was wrong when the suitcase
was locked and I hadn't locked mine. Then I saw
the tag that said it belonged to Vernon and
Rose Lucas of NJ. Oops.
The infamous ferry dock
Our room at Serendip is quite nice. It is fully equipped with everything we might need
including a blender for mixing drinks, beach chairs, and a cooler. From our porch we have a
beautiful view of the east side of St. Thomas. We can see the lights at night. Every evening
there is a beautiful sunset around 6:30 pm. There are lovely Bougainvillea bushes around the
porch with their pink petals scattered everywhere. There are lots of lizards crawling about.
various views in and outside of our condo:
Juliette
Our first trip into town was around 7:00 to return to the dock with the stolen suitcase.
There was a very steep hill we had to go down, which we "fondly" call the
EXTREME VERTICAL
CHALLENGE. No passengers were around. The ferry staff had no
information for us. We next went
to the police station, but no one had reported a missing suitcase. The police office told
us to go to Varlock Ventures, the ferry office, but it was closed. Frustrated, we next went
to a boutique where I purchased a sundress (I needed something to wear besides jeans afterall).
We ate dinner at a Tex Mex place called JJ's out by the dock. The waitress noticed that the
suitcase had a Boston tag on it and it turned out that she was from Massachusetts originally.
The first night. Me with my new and much
needed
sundress.
We stopped at a convenience store on the way back to get some food. It was quite a work
out getting up the EXTREME VERTICAL
CHALLENGE.
