Things looked SO much better in the morning, both literally and figuratively. I woke up to a view from our balcony straight over the bay, the sun casting colors off the sky that the water echoed, almost seeming to combine the colors halfway between off on the horizon. I lounged on the balcony for a little while , sipping coffee and dozing on a beach chair.
Mike roused a bit later and we took off to the airport to pick up the rental car. In our battle with the map and poorly-marked roads, we slowly realized it may have been a blessing in disguise that we couldn't pick up the rental car the night before. Navigation is so confusing that I'm not sure we would have ever found our resort until we had the benefit of daylight. Winding our way back to the resort, it was about noon and we decided to hit the beach for some activities.
We had been informed that the majority of tourist activities and attractions on the island are totally dependent on the cruise ship business, and that many of those things would not be open unless there was a ship in port. We'd had our eye on the jet ski rentals across the bay from us, and knew we could tell if he was open for business (and therefore whether there was a ship in port or not) by whether or not he had his sun-faded red canopy up.
We walked around the beach to there (the canopy was up) and the owner was busy haggling with some half-drunk college students who were being wrangled by one of their fathers and trying to decide if they were going to go out. The vendor finally acknowledged our presence and told us it would be at least an hour before we could rent. By then, we were fine with that- highly hesitant about sharing the bay with these yahoos on jet skis. I couldn't help but chuckle later when I saw those knuckleheads on the beach just a short time later. They hadn't gone jetskiing, and I sympathized with the vendor- I guess there's really no way for you to be sure who's ready to pony up and get going (us), and who's gonna dinker around, waste your time, and make you lose your other customers in the process (them).
We had brought our snorkel gear with us, so we walked across the road to Coki beach and staked our claim in the sand. We spent the next hour and a half snorkeling at Coki beach. A young islander offered to sell me some tuna to feed to the fish, but I passed. At first we saw just a few schools of very small fish, similar to minnows. We started swimming along the west curve of the bay where it was rocky, and realized thre were coral formations on the rocks in the shallows. Wind and wave were virtually nonexistent in the bay, so the rocks didn't pose a safety hazard. We swam that for a while, watching all the fish zip and dart away when they realized we weren't going to feed them. We finished snorkleing and lounged on the beach for a little while, just soaking up sunshine.
Heading back to the hotel, we decided to find a grocery store- $17.25 for a pound of bacon, a quart of milk, and a small box of cereal from the hotel "pantry" just wasn't going to cut it, and we wanted some better breakfast food. We found KMart, which seems to be the center of commerce, not to mention cheap booze. By the time we got back we were ready for an evening dinner at Fungis, and a straight shot upstairs to collapse into bed for the night.
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Honeymoon 6.3
Well the trip down was an adventure, albeit a long and boring one. We both slept for a good portion of the flight from Denver to Miami and the skies were smooth. Miami, however, was trouble from the start. We got off the plane and had a couple of hours before our fligth to Charlotte Amalie and all we wanted to do was sit down and have a relaxing meal. This task proved more difficult than it sounds. We spent about 30 minutes wandering around, unable to find anything more than a kiosk-snack stand. We perused 3 different concourses and found many areas under construction. After quite a while we finally found a sit-down restaurant. We were soon to find out that cheap cafeteria-quality burgers and terrible service were included in their ridiculously high prices.
We finished eating and started back to our gate with about an hour to spare. During our first flight, my travel pillow proved to be a popular item between the two of us, so on the way back to the gate we stopped at a shop and bought another, along with a couple of novels as reading material (this proved to be a wise choice). We sat in the gate area for some time, with the flight having been delayed for an hour. We boarded our flight for Charlotte Amalie and proceeded to sit on the plane for 2 hours. It turns out that two of the three toilets on board weren't working properly. Early on, the pilot came on and made an announcement, badmouthing the ground crew saying they didn't want to fix something that needed to be fixed because they didn't want to do the paperwork. He said he was making them fix it and would kep us updated. 2 hours later, we learned that the problem was fixed, but we had lost our cabin crew. It seems they had already been on flights for 16 hours that day, and by the time our plane was fixed, it would have put them over the threshold of being able to go on our flight due to the length.
We sat on the plane for another hour and a half or so after that awaiting a new cabin crew. Mike and I just happened to have gotten lucky- we had an empty seat in our row, which gave us a little extra room to stretch out and be more comfortable. That wasn't MUCH of a consolation, because by that time we both had an upset stomach from our overpriced burgers.
We finally took off over 3 hours late, losing our chance to pick up the rental car in the process. The flight was turbulent, and we had more to come. We landed and picked up our luggage without any problems. We proceeded to the taxi line and were squeezed into a 12-seat van with 15 other people, luggage piled to the ceiling behind us. As we pulled aay rom the airport, the guy in front of us remarked, "Ready for the roller-coaster ride??". Apparently he'd been there before, because that was an accurate description of the next 35 minutes. We darted and weaved through side streets, and flew around the hilly, winding switchbacks of the main highways at about 45 mph (speed limit 10-20).
The drive certainly was interesting. there's so much old construction. Most of the buildings are so run-down that they look ancient, and make me think of what I've imagined New Orleans looks like. There are churches everywherer, complete with graveyards full of above-ground crypts & elaborate monuments- surrounded by anything from dilapidated white picket fences to ornate wrought-iron handiwork. The drivers here seem very reckless, and at one point we stopped abruptly in what appeared to be the middle of the highway because the driver of the car in front of us had to back up his driveway which was hidden from our view at breakneck speed, almost paralell to the road and at a 40+ degree incline.
We arrived at the resort where security checked us in. We got up to our villa and came inside. We were immediately disappointed- opening up the door to be greeted by a wall of hot air. It was mostly like the pictures, except everything was now painted a dingy white instead of the beautiful exposed-wood vaulted villa ceilings. Aside from one small wicker dresser, the storage in the room consisted of Wal-mart style particle board and white laminate cabinets. There were several things that didn't seem to be working right, not the least of which was the air conditioner. I very much meant what I said while trying to cheer Mike up- that I was still very excited to be there with him. Seeing how disappointed he was, and the condition of the villa, at that point I worried that this could be a very long week...
We finished eating and started back to our gate with about an hour to spare. During our first flight, my travel pillow proved to be a popular item between the two of us, so on the way back to the gate we stopped at a shop and bought another, along with a couple of novels as reading material (this proved to be a wise choice). We sat in the gate area for some time, with the flight having been delayed for an hour. We boarded our flight for Charlotte Amalie and proceeded to sit on the plane for 2 hours. It turns out that two of the three toilets on board weren't working properly. Early on, the pilot came on and made an announcement, badmouthing the ground crew saying they didn't want to fix something that needed to be fixed because they didn't want to do the paperwork. He said he was making them fix it and would kep us updated. 2 hours later, we learned that the problem was fixed, but we had lost our cabin crew. It seems they had already been on flights for 16 hours that day, and by the time our plane was fixed, it would have put them over the threshold of being able to go on our flight due to the length.
We sat on the plane for another hour and a half or so after that awaiting a new cabin crew. Mike and I just happened to have gotten lucky- we had an empty seat in our row, which gave us a little extra room to stretch out and be more comfortable. That wasn't MUCH of a consolation, because by that time we both had an upset stomach from our overpriced burgers.
We finally took off over 3 hours late, losing our chance to pick up the rental car in the process. The flight was turbulent, and we had more to come. We landed and picked up our luggage without any problems. We proceeded to the taxi line and were squeezed into a 12-seat van with 15 other people, luggage piled to the ceiling behind us. As we pulled aay rom the airport, the guy in front of us remarked, "Ready for the roller-coaster ride??". Apparently he'd been there before, because that was an accurate description of the next 35 minutes. We darted and weaved through side streets, and flew around the hilly, winding switchbacks of the main highways at about 45 mph (speed limit 10-20).
The drive certainly was interesting. there's so much old construction. Most of the buildings are so run-down that they look ancient, and make me think of what I've imagined New Orleans looks like. There are churches everywherer, complete with graveyards full of above-ground crypts & elaborate monuments- surrounded by anything from dilapidated white picket fences to ornate wrought-iron handiwork. The drivers here seem very reckless, and at one point we stopped abruptly in what appeared to be the middle of the highway because the driver of the car in front of us had to back up his driveway which was hidden from our view at breakneck speed, almost paralell to the road and at a 40+ degree incline.
We arrived at the resort where security checked us in. We got up to our villa and came inside. We were immediately disappointed- opening up the door to be greeted by a wall of hot air. It was mostly like the pictures, except everything was now painted a dingy white instead of the beautiful exposed-wood vaulted villa ceilings. Aside from one small wicker dresser, the storage in the room consisted of Wal-mart style particle board and white laminate cabinets. There were several things that didn't seem to be working right, not the least of which was the air conditioner. I very much meant what I said while trying to cheer Mike up- that I was still very excited to be there with him. Seeing how disappointed he was, and the condition of the villa, at that point I worried that this could be a very long week...
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
It's Official!
I am now MRS. Michael Weimer, and I couldn't be more thrilled about it! I journaled a bunch this past week, and will be typing up and posting those hopefully in the next several days- check back!
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