Mike was good enough to take us to the airport at the ass-crack of dawn on the 6th. I don't know about Carrie, but I was pretty well exhausted, given when we went to bed would have given us about 5 hours of sleep. But the airline called us with an automated message at about 3 a.m. to let us know our connecting flight had been delayed 80 minutes. No biggie, right? Well, that would put us just about too late to catch the last ferry from St. Thomas, where we were landing, to St. Croix, our ultimate destination.
Well while I was enjoying my after-flight piss, Carrie got on the phone to the ferry people, and they said yes, it is leaving in 5 minutes, so you'd better hurry.
We're a ways a way from the marina and I'm sure we're not going to make it, but into the taxi van we go. Whole lot of hurry up and wait, that was. Then taxi man takes off like a whirling dervish and through the streets of St. Thomas we zoom.
And, can you believe it? They actually held the ferry for us. For at least 20 minutes.
It would be a decision they would soon regret.
Everything was fine and dandy on the outer ferry platform until the choppy water starts spitting on us and we get a bit worried about Carrie's laptop. She's not feeling too hot by this point either -- not having taken any Dramamine or anything. Carrie tries to go inside and long story short, pukey puke on the decky deck.
It's a two-hour ferry ride.
Doug met us at the ferry station. The plan was to listen to some live music and drink moonshine in the rainforest, but that plan was scratched as per Carrie's vomitus disposition. (We'd make it to the rainforest our last full day on the island.)
So we headed back to Doug's pimp condo on the coast and mixed up some drinks (equal parts Cruzan mango rum, pineapple rum, orange rum and orange juice) and shot the shit on Doug's porch (which is seriously as big as my last apartment).
Our plan for the following day would be to take a tour of a National Radio Astronomy Observatory telescope on the eastern end of the island.
Doug had an appointment set up for the tour at 11 a.m., in theory. We arrived early and joined a couple waiting for the same tour. They'd been pressing the talk buttons outside the gate for some time and had received no response. We broke out the beers at about 11:20 and decided to camp out -- it was to be a battle of wills. How long could they stay holed up beyond the barbed wire? We were willing to find out.
If memory serves, and it may not, we hung out there until a little bit after noon. We'd return later to harass the telescope. We then traveled to the eastern-most point in the United States, Point Udall. It was neato -- probably our first glorious view of the coastline.
Apparently, there is techincally another eastern-most point of the U.S. in Alaska, across the international dateline.
After we'd had our fill of Point Udall, it was back to stalk the telescope.
Back at the radio observatory we thought it would be a grand idea to off-road in the back way, with predictable results.
After that we rolled down the mountain to take a gander at the private yacht club.
Our stakeout at the observatory had worked up quite a hunger, so we headed over to Dugggan's for lunch. Back in cell service, Doug called the tour guide and asked "What the hell?" Apparently some errands had taken longer than dude had planned, and he invited us back over for a tour after lunch. Hurrah!
He met us at the gate and took us in the little building. Nearly the first words out of his mouth were used to assure us that neither the FBI or CIA use the telescope to listen to our conversations. Took the question right out of my mouth, since another NRAO scope is located at Green Bank, W.Va., a facility adjacent to the NSA listening station in Sugar Grove. Apparently the facility in St. Croix doesn't have the capabilities for transmission, and its data FedEx'd every few days back to the Very Long Baseline Array headquarters in Socorro, NM.
This telescope is 1 of 10 scattered around the United States that together all function as one giant telescope call the Very Long Baseline Array. It simulates a telescope with a dish 5300 miles across. Holy cow. Check out the PDF brochure and the Web site.
Up we go, all the way to the inside of the dish!
After the tour we headed to the beach. Fortunately, the Open Beach Act of 1994 says resorts can't claim private rights over beaches, so anyone is able to go to any beach on the island. Unfortunately, this is where the food poisoning hit. I won't go into details, but I didn't stop throwing up until about 1 or 2 a.m. (Damn you conch chowder!!)
On the way back to Doug's we stopped at an old sugar plantation overlooking the coast.
UPDATE: Apparently this is not true. I was so addled that I didn't realize this was actually the following day.
The property is for sale and offers a nice view of the coast.
Stay tuned folks, for more craaazy adventures.
You can see Buck Island, a National Park, in the background.
Apparently, there is techincally another eastern-most point of the U.S. in Alaska, across the international dateline.
The Millennium Monument.
After we'd had our fill of Point Udall, it was back to stalk the telescope.
Part of the descent from Point Udall back to the telescope. Sorry it's bumpy.
Back at the radio observatory we thought it would be a grand idea to off-road in the back way, with predictable results.
After that we rolled down the mountain to take a gander at the private yacht club.
Hello birdies!
Our stakeout at the observatory had worked up quite a hunger, so we headed over to Dugggan's for lunch. Back in cell service, Doug called the tour guide and asked "What the hell?" Apparently some errands had taken longer than dude had planned, and he invited us back over for a tour after lunch. Hurrah!
He met us at the gate and took us in the little building. Nearly the first words out of his mouth were used to assure us that neither the FBI or CIA use the telescope to listen to our conversations. Took the question right out of my mouth, since another NRAO scope is located at Green Bank, W.Va., a facility adjacent to the NSA listening station in Sugar Grove. Apparently the facility in St. Croix doesn't have the capabilities for transmission, and its data FedEx'd every few days back to the Very Long Baseline Array headquarters in Socorro, NM.
This telescope is 1 of 10 scattered around the United States that together all function as one giant telescope call the Very Long Baseline Array. It simulates a telescope with a dish 5300 miles across. Holy cow. Check out the PDF brochure and the Web site.
Time for hard hats!
Up we go, all the way to the inside of the dish!
Holy crap this was awesome.
After the tour we headed to the beach. Fortunately, the Open Beach Act of 1994 says resorts can't claim private rights over beaches, so anyone is able to go to any beach on the island. Unfortunately, this is where the food poisoning hit. I won't go into details, but I didn't stop throwing up until about 1 or 2 a.m. (Damn you conch chowder!!)
On the way back to Doug's we stopped at an old sugar plantation overlooking the coast.
UPDATE: Apparently this is not true. I was so addled that I didn't realize this was actually the following day.
The property is for sale and offers a nice view of the coast.
The North Shore, just after sunset.
Stay tuned folks, for more craaazy adventures.
2 comments:
Tan Doug tours rule!
Your adventures are far more interesting than mine!
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