St. Thomas. Rain.

This past weekend I was on St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands. A friend was getting married and it was my privelege to be there with them.

After a long day's travel and knitting on airplanes, I arrived at the airport in Charlotte-Amalie tired, but happy. I was instantly relaxed. How can you not be relaxed when half the airport is open to the air? That and because the taxi stand guys were so friendly.

The hotel, Secret Harbor, is located on the southeastern side of the island, a curvy 30 minute drive from the airport. It is an older, laid-back kind of place with a pale yellow lobby with screen prints of fish frolicking in the local reef. My room was on the beach. Most of the hotel's rooms are up on a hill with an excellent view, but no beachy sounds and I wanted to leave my door open at nigh and hear more than the chirp and buzz of a zillion bugs. All of which, it would seem, found me the next day on the beach for my legs are polka dotted.

The view from my hotel room:














I met D. and her (now husband) fiance, E. for a late dinner at the hotel restaurant. The next morning we were up at 5:30 to chase the sunrise. We walked for about a mile and a half until we found a good view. Unreal. We returned to the hotel and took naps.

Yes, I really was up at 5:30 to go sunrise chasing:














I went to breakfast was at 9:30. D. and E. were going to meet me, but the call of sleep was too strong. I didn't mind sitting there in solitude (with attentive waitstaff refilling my coffee and water) watching the sun sparkled water. The rest of the day I spent sitting on the beach watching people and water. And reading (I breezed through a romance; when on the beach, one cannot read too much substantive literature - my other beach book was Flaubert's Sentimental Education).

Hotel chairs where I spent most of Friday:
























Friday evening, after catching the sunset, we all (the rest of the wedding guests arrived Friday late afternoon) walked to the little town of Red Hook for dinner. A frightening walk, to say the least. The roads are narrow, curvy and folks drive fast. Dinner was wonderful. We took a taxi back.

Sunset from the top of a hill on the hotel grounds:














The wedding was Saturday morning on the beach. It was neat to see D. so smiley. They are a cool couple and I am happy they found each other.

Okay. It's raining, I'm cold and need to go dig out a sweatshirt. Then it's off to yoga.