Caribbean - Anniversary on St Kitts

Oct 15, 2010 St Kitts - Happy 5th Anniversary to us! We spent our spent our special day on the island of St Kitts. Not the most fascinating island we've been to but we made the most of it. We knew not to expect much from St Kitts so we didn't bother with a shore excursion. We got up, ate a quick Lido breakfast, and got off the boat. We had a couple beaches in mind from the research that I'd done at home but the taxi driver we spoke with recommended Cockleshell Beach instead. I had heard that beach wasn’t a great one. However, every taxi driver we ran into said we should head to Cockleshell. So, we did. And we learned a huge lesson: taxi drivers don't necessarily always know what they are talking about. Taxi drivers tend to be an invaluable source of knowledge (many in the Caribbean and Bahamas are actually trained tour guides). We should have gone with OUR choice, because we found Cockleshell to be disappointing. It was dirty, the water was rough, and the snorkeling was pretty rotten. We had to swim WAY out (as in at least a quarter mile) through rough water to find anything decent. The water close to shore was cloudy and grassy. Even the reefs we found didn't contain any large schools of fish that we'd been searching for. The other two beaches are supposed to be good places to spot eagle rays and nurse sharks, and one has a shipwreck in 10 feet of water. So we really missed out. We spent about an hour in the water, laid in the sun for 30 minutes to dry off, and walked along the beach for a little while before calling it quits. Luckily, since I have somewhat of an artistic eye, I was still able to get some nice pictures (at least I think so). It was a waste of an expensive cab ride ($25 each way). At least one positive: there were tons of little shells and Chris collected a bunch to bring home. We decided to start a shell vase and we’ll add things as we find them. After leaving Cockleshell Beach, we went back to the ship to shower and eat, then got back off so we could walk through the town of Bassetterre (the capitol of St Kitts). Again, I knew from research that there wasn't much but I wanted to see the town square and church. School had let out for the weekend and the square was filled with school children. There was also a manufacturing awareness fair going on so a large crowd was gathered around tents, food vendors, and speakers. We wandered around and took a few pictures. I was disappointed to find that Chris and I were the ONLY people from the ship in the square (well, we were the only white people with a camera so I'm assuming we were the only ship passengers). This is was really bugs me about the typical American traveler. They are afraid to venture away from the bad gift shops and the Margaritavilles. I like to get off the beaten path. Or I like to throw myself into the middle of the crowd and try to blend in.

Anyway... we headed back toward the terminal and picked up a bottle of citrus vodka for dirt cheap (one reason to love the Caribbean!). We found ourselves a park bench and transferred all that vodka into our red and blue Carnival water bottles to smuggle back onto the ship. And now we are celebrating our anniversary in style: floating around somewhere in the southern Caribbean drinking vodka Cokes and lemonades! Ah, this is the life. Happy Anniversary to my sweet Chris, my best friend and my partner in crime. Here's to at least 50 more!

We watched a funny show about marriage (where they have couples on stage answering questions about each other) and then a magician in the Caribbean Lounge. He was okay. Chris and I agreed that his act could have been spectacular had he had a little more showmanship. He seemed annoyed most of the time and his act was full of awkward pauses. I give him a C-minus. The C because he was average, and the minus because he was kind of a douche.

Tomorrow we will stop in our final port, St Maarten. We're debating on a shore excursion. We weren't planning on anything other than wandering but we saw something that caught our eye...