We spent a few days in Christmas Cove. There wasn’t anything particularly special about the spot, but we were all content to just hang out on the hook. The kids and I would snorkel around the small island in the middle of the bay each day, then tiptoe through the sea urchins to get ashore and play in the rocks. We kept an eye out for one of the free moorings to open up, but despite the supposed ten day max nobody ever left, leaving us to swing in the deep water way out the back. Not the most comfortable place to be, but with the trade winds so steady it doesn’t much matter.
The kids are always betting each other whether or not I can make it to the bottom. If we can see the bottom I can make it, yet someone always takes the bet that I won’t.
The water is clear and clean here, though there isn’t much of interest to see.
Setting up the restaurant.
The famous Pizza Pi boat. The pizza was okay, but I’d stick with the “sticks” they make instead (sort of like a calzone).
St. John is a whopping two miles away. Long passages are no longer a thing.
We grabbed a mooring in Caneel Bay, inside the Virgin Islands National Park. There is no anchoring in this area protecting the sea grass for the turtles. I can’t tell you how good it was to see turtles all over the place again. The Caribbean has been a great disappointment to me as far as sealife is concerned. It was obvious immediately what a huge difference a protected area has.
Island to island and bay to bay, it’s easy cruising here.
The drone’s landing pad.
We watched this little guy munching on the grass. He just sits down there on the bottom and picks delicately at piece after piece. If anchoring were allowed here this would be nothing but sand as the chains flattened and cleared it all.
For days the kids haven’t wanted to go anywhere in the dinghy, they only want to be dragged behind it.
Probably four years ago I wrapped a piece of floss around one of Ouest’s teeth that was just barely hanging on. Knowing she wouldn’t feel it, I just yanked it out without warning her. The tooth flew across the room and she didn’t feel it at all, but I’ve never been allowed back in there. So now this molar had been rolling around in her mouth for weeks and she finally let Ali in there to mess around with it. Next thing I know Ali is being squeamish, Ouest is crying, and blood is pouring out of her mouth. “Papa, Papa, Papa.”
I should have sat back and said, “No, no, you don’t want me to do it, remember?”
I didn’t of course. The tooth fell out just from me looking at it. The fairy house was built, and the tooth fairy found us.
And Ouest is back to chewing normally on both sides of her mouth again.
I like Lowe’s look as this is going on.
Pretty nice sunsets here as well.
9 Comments on “Caneel Bay”
Love seeing your beautiful family adventures. You guys all have so much love for each other.
I see Ouest reading on her tablet. My iPad saved me during the Covid shutdown in Michigan. Our libraries are still closed. Can I suggest a series for her to read? I stumbled on the Theodore Boone series by John Grisham. They are entertaining even for an adult. And I’ve actually learned a few things about the law.
Thanks, Marie H. I put it on her reading list. We got two free months with kindle unlimited on Amazon to see how the books were – and thank goodness it has some good middle school reading for Ouest, as we were plowing through the books/money. Which is all good – and we would never not buy books! She liked the James Patterson kid series, so I’m sure the Grisham ones will be a hit as well. We’ve caught her up at 9:30 reading since we got her kindle. While I’m usually off to bed myself…
HA! HA! That loose tooth photo is hilarious-all the facial expressions-priceless! Thanks for the laughs! Still stuck in CA, we were headed for Oregon but now, just a few days after re-opening, that governor has closed down the state again, due to a spike in cooties cases. Be glad you’re able to move about more freely there! Have fun!
We are staying away from all the debates on the Covid closures/lockdowns etc. I don’t think you would really want to know how we think the U.S. is dealing with the virus.
Like I said in the post comments a few back: we were always free (to head to the U.S. or to the U.S. Virgin Islands) – but we decided to sit back and see where this was going. As this is our life, and not just a trip – we were able to really gauge this unknown time and make good decisions for our family and our home. It wasn’t a horrible 2 months to be together on a 42′ boat – we kind of liked it. Well not the cooking and the hand washing of laundry. ?
Puerto Rico would always let us leave – it was that they weren’t going to let us back in with hurricane season on the horizon.
Are those the ruins of the Caneel Bay Resort in the background?
Yes. Very sad that they were destroyed, of course, and all those jobs lost. But the real sad thing is that they have just left them there – “ruins” not so much just damaged buildings left on the beach of a National Park.
Nice Lowe. Haha!
Haha! They would both just leave them until they fell out naturally – but this one, had the new tooth already in, and the lost tooth even had a hole through it, it had been rotting there so long. We joked the next morning when she got $5 from the tooth fairy, all agreeing the tooth wasn’t worth that.