Friday, December 5, 2008

Our Babymoon

This summer Sara and I spent our babymoon (the last trip before baby comes!!)

in one of the most beautiful places in the world...

St. John, US Virgin Islands.

We flew into St. Thomas and then took a ferry over to the Westin in St. John.


Our first taste of the Virgin Islands after about 20 hours of traveling...
we were starved!
Water trampolines at the Westin beach.

Sara enjoying a coconut smoothie at the Westin

Sunset on Cruz Bay, St. John
We took a boat excursion to snorkel around and see the other islands.
Here we're anchored at White Bay on Jost Van Dyke, British VI.

We snorkeled at The Caves where we saw a wide variety of jellyfish.

We ate lunch at Foxy's Taboo during our snorkeling excursion

Sandy Spit - a tiny island that you can run around in 42 seconds.

This was the talking Scarlet Macaw at the Westin

Sweet-smelling Frangi Pangi (aka plumerias) were easily found on the island...

Looking up through the ruins of the Susannaberg Estate windmill

Some really cool stones were used around the ruins.
This one reminded me of the Haversian system in bone!

This was our "hike." A few hundred feet down the Salt Pond Trail

Tons of geckos and lizards live here.

Playing darts at Skinny Legs restaurant.

We snorkeled with turtles at Watermelon Bay.

Great example of some of the tortuous roadage on this island.

Haulover Bay - a small neck of land connecting two parts of St. John
They used to drag boats over it to save time going around.

I love Sara's expression here. I think she's feeding it her keys.

The old windmill that used to power the Annaberg Sugar Plantation
When there was no wind, horses turned the mill.. ca. 1810

The cane juice flowed by gravity from the mill into this building where sequential copper kettles
boiled out the water to concentrate the sugar... the hill beyond used to be covered with
sugar cane, harvested and milled by slaves.

Pathway through the jungle... its so green!

Cocoa tree leaf. The crop never took off on the islands.

Huge flamboyant tree with super vibrant flowers at Caneel Bay Resort.


Sunset at Gibney Beach

Trunk Bay - one of the most picturesque beaches in the world

Maho Bay sea grape tree (grapes not shown)

Maho Bay

Maho Bay, St. John

Maho Bay (and pretty much the whole island) was strewn with coconuts!

It was raining, but this iguana apparently wasn't satisfied.

Cruise Ship in the port of St. Thomas


A typical taxicab on the Virgin Islands

Here comes Baby!