It appears that the same cruise ships are seen in the islands over and over again...the Ruby Princess is one of them. We've seen as many as 7 in St. Thomas at one time. Considering how small the island is, you can probably imagine how congested the roads and gift shops are when this happens. It's also hard to imagine the number of passengers the cruise ships bring down here in a season, especially given the size of some of them, but let's try it. Doing a simpleton's math, 2,000+ people per ship times 50 cruise ships in St. Thomas each year = 100,000 tourists all trying to haggle over t-shirts and sun dresses. I'm not going to even try to include the fly-in types of tourists, or the ones that sneak in illegally.
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| Ken and Sue. Their room is right above Ken's head. Yep, that one! |
We arrived in Crown Bay, St. Thomas to meet brother Ken and sister-in-law Sue (on Karen's side) as they arrived on the Ruby Princess. This was the same ship that Aunt Louise arrived on last year. Karen and I walked over from the marina where we docked our boat and waited for them. Ken and Sue waved from their balcony...they could see us sitting on the park bench. We didn't see them. They tried swinging their white towels around. We finally did notice them. Later, they told us they planned on lowering their cabin steward out on a bed sheet if we didn't see them using the towels.
They had a great trip so far...but we hadn't yet spent any time with them yet. Nor introduced them to driving on the left hand side of the road.
They had a great trip so far...but we hadn't yet spent any time with them yet. Nor introduced them to driving on the left hand side of the road.
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| Coki Beach has sergeant majors everywhere (that's those stripey looking fish) |
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| Hi, Sue! Sure looks like you're having fun! |
A car was rented and we all headed around St.Thomas to see the island. Many of the areas Karen and I hadn't seen yet, so it was a real treat for all of us! We drove along the upper ridge road and the views were spectacular. One of our stops was at Coki Beach, where we went snorkling. As usual, the water was clear and warm with a lot of fish...I think the fish are used to being "chummed." What a great time!
We made an attempt to get lunch at one of the nice places in Havensight, near St. Thomas' other cruise ship dock...but decided to head back to Tickles Restaurant in Crown Bay instead. After a nice lunch we headed to our boat in the marina to try out some beer from Aruba.
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| Sue and Ken, before Aruban beer |
It must've been pretty potent stuff, because Ken was sure he saw miniature dragons on their way back to the cruise ship.
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| Ken was seeing things...there are no dragons in St. Thomas |
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