16 April 2009

Cinnamon Bay, Virgin Islands National Park

On Mooring Ball

Cinnamon Bay
Virgin Islands National Park
St. John
U.S. Virgin Islands
USA!
18'21.2N/64'45.4W

1185 nm to Charleston, SC

The Piper is sitting in Cinnamon Bay on a National Park mooring ball while turtles are swimming around the crystal clear waters. Cinnamon Bay is part of the Virgin Islands National Park that takes up a large part of St. John Island. We picked up Amy's sister Shannon at the St Thomas Airport on Monday after hopping on the ferry to Charlotte Amalie.

The night before we had met with Capt'n Ben from the charter boat Sadie Sea at one of St Johns watering holes. He hooked us up with a mooring buoy next to his boat that he owned. This was a big relief as we had tried to anchor in Cruz Bay. The harbor is very tiny, with ferry boats running in and out all day long, and the waters just inside the channel markers being less then 5 feet deep. We had anchored our first night, but did not feel comfortable leaving the boat as we were so close the edge of the channel. We now have our own mooring ball any time we go back to Cruz Bay. Too cool!

St Thomas is just 2 miles from Cruz Bay and is little America with all of Americas large corporate stores all over the place. Our first stop after grabbing sister Shannon from the airport was Big K-Mart. The other newly arrived tourists in our taxi van that were all heading to their resorts looked at us a bit strange as we got out of the van, but I assured them that we were not staying in K-Mart.

After loading up with as much American stuff that we could carry we hopped back on the ferry and made our way back to the Piper in Cruz Bay. After a night with Cap'n Ben in St. Johns watering holes we left Cruz Bay for a short 4 mile motor around St. John's coast to Cinnamon Bay where the National Parks have mooring balls set along its beach. There are 3 different bays next to each other here to choose from and Cinnamon Bay has park facilities ashore. There are camping areas along the beach and small cottages that the park rents, along with a restaurant/bar, sailboat rentals, and beach chairs.

We spent the day yesterday on the beach and met up with friends Lindsey from S/V Buxom that we sailed on in the Classic Yacht Regatta back in Grenada. Also there was Lindsey's good friend Gracie, and new friends Mike, Will, and Kiley.

Today is another perfect Caribbean day... sunny, warm, 10 knots of wind, and boats all over the place. We are setting off today for a 5 mile trip over to the BVI's for a bit more fun.

More Soon
Tom, Amy, & Shannon

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