Round Bay, St Johns, USVI.

Serafina
Rob & Sarah Bell
Sun 9 Mar 2014 01:42

18:20.2N 64:40.5W

 

 

Thurs & Fri – 6th & 7th March

 

We didn’t quite get round to the proposed early start and early morning rain wasn’t any more encouraging, so it was almost 1000 hours when we took the dinghy ashore to the beach.  We had decided that it would be easiest to drop a stern anchor, tie the dinghy off to a handy tree and then pull the dinghy offshore a bit.  There is a fair swell on to the beach so we weren’t exactly 100% convinced by this exercise, but set off – feeling very over-dressed amongst the now arriving trip boat tourists all kitted out for snorkelling, with our walking boots and poles – for the walk to the hilltop.  This was an easy walk through scrub and cacti, and as it said on the box, yes it takes a mere 45 minutes.  Sadly it didn’t give us any views over the bay Serafina was anchored in, but takes you to a viewpoint looking north across the barrier reef.  There was lots of noisy scuttling in the undergrowth but it is actually made by little lizards stomping through the dry leaves.

 

We arrived back at the beach to discover that Dorris had dragged the anchor onshore and was now comfortably sat on the only bit of rock she could find – slightly embarrassing!

 

Once we had got back to Serafina, a quick change of costume and we set off to the lagoon at the eastern end of the island again.  This was an even slower trip as there was more wind and bigger seas running but made even more worthwhile when we found that we had the whole place to ourselves.  Having read further touristy stuff, I have discovered that the coral reef was destroyed by Hurricane Hugo in the 1980s and that the Elk Horn coral caught a disease that all but wiped it out.  It is great to see that it is slowly regenerating, but it really does illustrate just how slowly coral grows.  The seas were coming over the reef so it was a bit more strenuous snorkelling, but again stunning fish.  Rob and I have been trying to grasp  underwater photography technics with my point and shoot camera, and in particular Rob wants the perfect shot of his favourite fish, the Parrot Fish.  In practice it results in hundreds of digital photos to trawl through in hopes of coming across one which doesn’t feature just part of the fish as it flashes through the viewfinder!  We had actually taken a picnic lunch to eat in the dinghy and then have a further swim before we came back to the boat, probably not allowing for this mythical hour after eating that helps you survive drowning….

 

Again in the evening we eventually had the island to ourselves once the trip boats had departed and the St Croix locals who dash out for an evening sundowner had also returned home.  Another slightly rolly night with waves slapping on the stern but well worth it for the snorkelling alone. 

 

On Friday morning we set off for the reach back to St Johns but sadly, with ideal conditions, were not able to fly our cutter rig due to the damaged staysail halyard.  We headed for Round Bay and that holy grail of free and very strong wifi for a little bit of surreptitious downloading.  When we arrived we were surprised to find the bay well populated and worse, that the magic signal had disappeared so Rob’s hopes of watching or listening to the rugby this weekend were scuppered, although we were able to utilise another weaker signal for emails luckily.