Some of the free range chickens.
The first night we were here, Gayle told us that it might be nice to walk over to the Westin (the 5 star resort a short walk down the mountain) for a refreshing dip in their pool. Unfortunately, shortly thereafter I realized that I had made the suitcase theft and had no bathing suit. Anyway, every day since then we had been promising ourselves that we would check it out and never succeeded. So this morning we put on our bathing suits and grabbed towels and walked down the hill.
The Westin is a beautiful, self sufficient resort geared mainly towards families. We passed a kid's activity house on the way to the pool, plus a group of women doing step aerobics under the trees. Our wanderings eventually led us to the pool. And what a magnificent pool it was! It was very large and geometric with central raised platforms with plants in them and one with a waterfall. The water never got deeper than 4.5 feet. We walked around, but could not find any free chairs so we dropped our stuff by a table and went in. It was refreshing to be in chlorinated water instead of salt water for a change. There were tons of families and older couples there. They even had their own beach beyond the pool. The place was amazing though I imagine that if I had asked any of the kids what their favorite part of St. John was, I'm sure they'd say the pool. That seems kind of a waste of an island.
At the Westin Resort.
Dave and I did enjoy the pool as well as the two jacuzzis. We only stayed about an hour and then walked back to Serendip. We stopped by Tropicale (a convenience store) first and got some chips and a mango to eat with our lunch, which we ate out on the patio.
After eating and showering, we walked down to Cruz Bay to the Low Key Water Sports shop and rented a two person kayak. It was already 2 and we could only have it until 5 so the helpful man suggested that we go out to this small, uninhabited island that was somewhere around Caneel Bay. He said there was good snorkeling. I sat in the front and it took us about 45 minutes to kayak out there. We landed on a short strip of beach. There was a family there who had arrived by boat. They directed us to where the good snorkeling was. The snorkeling was pretty amazing. We soon discovered the reason for the fat, contented looking pelican sitting near the shore: schools and schools of yummy fish (minnows?) covered the shallow shore line. The line of them seemed to stretch on forever. We saw lots of other interesting fish as well.
left: The yummy fish the pelican liked to eat. right: A stingray.
Around 3:30 we decided to head back. Dave took the front this time. We could see a kayak tour heading our way and had no wish to get involved with them. Again it took us about 45 minutes to get back. A couple of times a fast moving boat would send turbulent waters our way. Luckily, Dave knew what to do and we frantically turned the kayak towards them and hit the waves straight on. I'm proud to say that we never capsized.
After getting back, we showered and talked to Gayle. She told us that the power outage was the result of their running out of water in the generator. She said that the power outages were a frequent occurrance on the islands. We also asked for advice for going to the British Virgin Islands. She recommended going to Virgin Gorda, which had a ferry going over from Cruz Bay every Thursday and Sunday at 8:30 am and returning at 3. Then we went to Tropicale and got some garlic and fresh (but frozen) bread for dinner. We also got lots of juice to mix with our rum bottles. Back at Serendip we made pasta and garlic bread and Dave had fun crushing ice in the blender. The coconut rum is our favorite.