Charlotte Amalie –St Thomas

Another restless night for the J man, and as a consequence us. I herded
my family through breakfast and rushed them onto the Pier only to find out that I had mis-read our tickets, and we were 30 minutes early for our tour. Sigh. R had a good time pushing J’s stroller around the pier, they had numbers set up (to organize tours) and they were all empty, so she
slalomed through them all. Near the edge of the pier there was a giant
pile of rocks, and lone behold there were about half a dozen iguanas lying on the rocks sunning themselves. These were fairly large (about a 10 taco iguana as a Mexican guide once told us) about 40cm long without the tail.
Neat.
Soon enough we were on our way to “Coral World Park”. A harrowing drive
through switchback turns up the mountains was first though. It is all very lush here, and there is lots of greenery. There is also crazy driving, and the combination made me keep my eyes inside the taxi.
Coral World is a small aquatic park. It is set right on the ocean, and is very pretty to walk through. Soon after we arrived we were encouraged to go to “Stingray Lagoon” for the feeding. We gathered around a tank of
female southern stingrays. It turns out our talk was not just a talk but
a chance to feed the stingrays ourselves. Daddy and R quickly went to the feeding side of the tank, and J and I retreated to the non feeding side.
The sting rays would swim right up the sides of the tank, push their bodies out of the water a ways. You then had to push their noses away from the wall to expose their mouths where you could drop your fish bits
into. It was quite a sight. There were only about 20 people there, and
the small tank (pool with a stone side) had enough room for everyone to stand and feed if they wished. After that, we went to see some exhibits and wait to meet the sea lion. Again everyone had front row seats, as there weren’t many people around. They have Southern sea lions at Coral World, apparently that is rare. Most places have the plentiful California
Sea lions. They have a few Sea lions that came from the coast of
Uruguay. They are quite large, have ‘hair’ around their necks and heads,
and have a very very deep bark. They showed us how Franco (the Sea lion)
paints. The keeper dips the paintbrush in paint, and another keeper
holds the canvas and the sea lion swipes at the canvas. Then the keeper changes colours, and the process beings again. Apparently Franco favours more dot like art, while the other sea lion likes making sweeping lines.
It was so neat to see. After that we wandered on, saw sea turtles,
picked up starfish and sea cumbers, and went into this large building where the basement was in the ocean, and had lots of windows to look out.
Apparently this is also where you can “Snuba”. You put on this helmet and
walk along the ocean floor looking at wildlife. It looked pretty neat.
Soon R requested a snack. We sat down and had popsicles under the palm
trees. Once again, there was a large iguana near our table. It turns
out they are like our seagulls at picnics. They come close when you drop
food, and if you don’t want them, you need to shoo them away. R was
quite freaked out when one came close, so daddy was on shoo duty. There
were big signs saying don’t feed the iguanas, they eat leaves and flowers.
There was a screaming child close by, and the snack lady decided to calm
him down by showing him how to feed the iguana lettuce. Pretty neat.
A lot slower than our squirrels or seagulls.
We came back to the ship through some serious traffic. An accident happened some ways ahead of us, and about 10 police cars zoomed through to them. Essentially blocking everything up all the more. Our driver was most upset, and yelled at the cops when we finally got to go by.
The afternoon was the usual, J and daddy slept, I swam with R until her friends came, then I sat on a lounge chair and watched. We had a nice supper, and we are now sailing back to the Bahamas “Half Moon Cay” Holland
America’s private island. We have a day at sea first. So don’t expect
an exciting update tomorrow!!