2012-11-13  St. Thomas:

Today we were in port at St. Thomas.  Having been here before, we knew the snorkeling was great and had an idea where we wanted to go.  We also had rented a car here before and did so again.  Pick up was easy----just made our way to the windmill on the port and called Budget for our courtesy pick up.  Rental for the day was $45, plus we paid $10 for supplemental insurance.   They do drive on the wrong side of the street there, but my driver didn't do too badly! 

We had planned to go to Coki beach first before the ship tours got there, but with the poor road signage, we ended up at Sapphire first.  I had read Sapphire was the place to go for snorkeling, but because of weather had never made it anywhere but to a beach in Cowpet Bay before.  Although Sapphire was beautiful, we found the snorkeling to be only so-so near the shore.

 

 Typical snorkel area at Saphire.

 Yellow tailed snapper at Sapphire---

 Blue tang at Sapphire----

 blue head wrasse----

After less than an hour at Sapphire, we headed to the place our daughter told us about last year---- Cowpet Bay at the Elysian Resort---

last look at Sapphire from the top of the hill

Cowpet Bay by the Elysian Resort



 Snorkeling here was excellent again.  Even saw some creatures I hadn't seen before like this guy---(smooth trunkfish?)

four eyed butterfly fish---

 Never saw one of these before,either, but there were several of them here this time.

 Not sure what happened to this guy.  I was thinking it was a shark, but seeing it's missing some basal fins, I now think it was a dolphin.

 Another interestingly marked blue tang.

  flounder

trunkfish and parrotfish

 tiger fish

a wrasse, I think

Lots of these squirrel fish, too

 A curious school of squirrel fish---

 The largest porcupine puffer fish I've ever seen---

 The last beach we had time to go to was Coki Beach.  It was gorgeous, but got quite crowded with the cruise ship excursions going here.  Also had lots of "waitresses" and venders trying to drum up business.  We bought a sandwich and drink from Subway on our way there and didn't have an problem pic nicing on the beach before we entered the water.  We enjoyed snorkeling there for about another hour.

 The snorkel area really isn't very big, basically the rocky area shown above.  But it was better then where we snorkeled at Sapphire. (On a later trip, we found really good snorkeling at Sapphire, but it was way out at the point to the right of the bay)

 a spotlight parrotfish

 jelly fish

 sea bird

 A portion of the crowded Coki beach area.

We didn't go to the domed viewing area where lots of ship tours go.  There is a roped off area by it which we didn't go past. 

I had hoped to get to Megan's beach, too, or at least to the overlook, but time ran out.  We stopped at K-mart for some post cards and to the post office to mail them.  Then sat in traffic for a good 30-45 minutes getting back to the Budget rental place.  Caught our shuttle back to Crown Bay port.
pretty flowers by the port

 our ship, the Noordam in port.

 the port shops as seen from the ship.

 Crown Bay as seen from the ship.

 After really bad weather here the last 2 years, it was so nice seeing the sunshine and beautiful waters of St. Thomas!  Next year, we're even planning a land based vacation there instead of cruising.  (here's a link to that trip)