St. Thomas, USVI - Marinaville

At 11:30am on May 15th, we tied Vagus to a dock at Crown Bay Marina - our first docking in over 5 months. We had just spent 4 days anchored in a nice little bay called Christmas Cove on Great St. James Island. There we found some good snorkeling and, again, some new-to-us fish. The fish were friendly as I think they were probably fed by all the tour groups that came to snorkel the area. We were continuously surrounded by schools of fish as we swam along - something we have not seen since years ago at the Bat Caves in BVI. Some fish would come within a foot of us, stare at us as if begging for food, and then swim away.

When the time finally came to move to the marina, we had to find our dock lines and figure out where to put the fenders. Docking is a lot more work than anchoring! We were both on edge coming into a new marina and manouvering Vagus around all those hard dock bits. Crown Bay was very helpful and sent someone to help with the lines. Fortunately everything went without any events.

Now we finally have lots of fresh water. Our first priority was to get rid of some of the salt accumulated on Vagus - her first real bath since Trinidad. And it was our first real shower with lots of water as well. Karen quickly disappeared to the laundramat, loaded with bags of clothes for cleaning. There are excellent facilities at the marina - laundry, chandler, restuarant and WiFi - so we are set. We checked in with Dockwise and found that we had a bunch more paperwork to fill out - some to get notarized even. We have had a lot of paperwork to complete for this trip so we are thankful for the computer and WiFi.

We do miss being at anchor though. This is a very busy place with boats of every shape and description constantly going in and out by our boat - everything from dinghies, to ferries, to everything in between, including a submarine that takes tourists out to see the fish. The noise from the boats going by are not even drowned out by the planes taking off from the airport, which is nearby. Shortly after our arrival, a huge (82 feet) trawler parked beside us and blocked our breeze. It was 94F in the cabin yesterday afternoon, even with all the fans on. We try to do our work in the morning and hide out in the afternoon. Yesterday a Princess Cruise ship also came in to the cruise ship dock beside the marina. The ship was huge and became the only view we could look at from the cockpit. It was so close to us we could listen to the announcements over the PA during the day. Life is different here.

We just got word that we are shipping out on the s/v Explorer on the 22nd. The ship should arrive in Newport around the 31st. Now we have to sramble to change our flights. We will fly back to Burlington and then drive to Newport to meet the ship.

So it is time to get back to cleaning. Have a good week.