Continuing on with the odyssey, we have now completed Alexa's graduation, The North Carolina diversion, and now we go for the 10-day sailing trip to the BVI's (Sans, Karen Johnson). We parted ways with Karen at the Atlanta airport in the Delta gates. Our trip downward was only a 3-hour flight to St. Thomas. This is in the U.S, but a territory. I've never been in a territory before. I suppose growing in SE Alaska in 69 (ten years after becoming a real state), could classify. However, you can always tell when you've entered a 3rd world country or (territory), by the fact you don't exit an aircraft through an air-conditioned gangway. No. They pull up the vehicle stairs and make you walk straight into the humidly without any phycological or physiology preparation. Once it touched my skin, my entire body lit up as a sweat factory.
We walked 45 yards into the airport, and ahh, air-conditioning. Also, free Rum samples. "Don't mind if I do". I tried the Coconut Rum and deemed it satisfactory. Then came what felt like when we go to Mexico. Haggling for a taxi ride. Alexa and I just sat back and let Sandra work on her Juju. Ultimately, we found our way into a collective van for $12/Person. It must've been a good deal, as the driver was no longer smiling.
He dropped us off at the ferry terminal in which we would transit from the U.S. Virgin Islands to the British ones. One thing we did notice was in the USVI, folks were driving on the Left side of the road. Like they think this is England or something. Have they not gotten the memo yet we kind of won that work a couple hundred years ago? Also, interesting. The cars they were driving had the steering wheel on the Left side of the car (just like us). I mean, they are us, but what the hey!? This was a hybrid experience I never expected.
We looked for some food, as at this point, we had gone 7 hours without food. We walked around carrying our geared-up backpacks in 92% humidity. Restaurants were closed. It was 2pm in the afternoon. Even in America, we allow for hobbit 2nd lunches all the way up to 4pm. No Go here in the USVI. We found a McDonalds and had our 10-piece Chicken McNuggets and convinced ourselves this was a proper way to exit the U.S.A.
Our ferry ride from the U.S. to the BVI's was about an hour. We sat on the upper deck of the boat and talked to other sailors heading off on their ventures. It was a pleasant ride. But once we docked it took quite a while to get off the boat and through customs. We were the last party off the boat and thus, I believe, flagged us for the interrogation.
customs: "Where are you from"? me: "Oh, We're from Boise". Sandra: "We’re just coming here from Atlanta after our daughter graduation". customs: "Seems like our stories aren't straight here." me: thinking: are you kidding me? customs: "why are you here". me: "We’re going sailing. We chartered a boat". customs: "do you know how to sail?" me: "kinda do".
Then the obligatory search of our bags.
Finally, the $10.00/per person environmental fee to continue to what was our boat. Which was a 10-minute walk from this Spanish Inquisition. Once we paid the ferry man, we walked about 200 yards along a road where people drive on the wrong side of the highway, which was no wider that to bike lanes. We found our charter company at the marina, but they were closed. They left a note indicating we could head to our craft and proceed with a night's sleepover on the boat. No problems here. It was not 10 hours into our day, so a good sit on the deck with a beer sounded quite chipper (that's English). Our provisioning supplies have been delivered. 22 Gallons water, some condiments, spinach, 10 bottles of wine, and hmmm. No Beer! No Beer?!? It's 82-degrees and 92% humid, how is this acceptable? In this marina, it seems, the store is not fully stocked. So, we headed up along the double bike lane road, and were going to provision a few things to last three days until we could get to a bigger store. I found some Stout beers, which were acceptable. We headed back to the boat, and settled in for the next morning which would begin our checkout of the sailboat for our next 9 days.
We were happy with our Jenneau 389 (39 feet sloop). A berth up front, another in the back, and it was air conditioned. Its name was "Reaching Heaven". The air-conditioning I'm sure made it so. We didn't last too long. We were asleep by 9pm and were looking forward to tomorrow to get through the check-out.