Day 9: Jumbie Barracudas & Ronnie's Pizza

Day 9

Today was our last full day in St. John. Tomorrow we will be lugging ourselves back to the airport and heading stateside. :( I'll be honest... I'm not ready!!! I could spend weeks longer here on either St. Thomas or St. John... or even make a trip to the BVIs! But alas, reality calls, and I've ridden the fantasy tropical wave for long enough. :)

But back to the day! Dad and I got up and out super duper early this morning to make our way to Jumbie Beach before the tourists took over the sand. When we got there NO ONE was there. It was like our own private beach. Neither of us had been to Jumbie before, so the snorkeling was trial by error. We hugged the rocks and headed out and around the reefs. Of course the first thing we ran into was this...

A BARRACUDA!!!
I was a bit nervous around it, but he didn't seem to care that we were there in the slightest! My demented father wanted to swim up next to it so he started following the damn thing around the reef. I hung back and kept all of my body parts in tact. :)

We continued further out and sadly, much of the reef had died off. There was some brain coral and fan coral started to regenerate closer to shore. We swam through schools of Blue Tang and Fries. There was some MASSIVE Parrot Fish on this swim and they are just so fantastic looking. They are all different colors and very rainbowish. They were very deep in the water so it was hard to get a good shot of them, but seriously, open a new tab and Google Image "Parrot Fish" and check out the different varieties!

Around lunchtime we went back to the villa to pick up Joan, who decided to get off of her knee for the day so it could heal up a bit more. We stopped by Ronnie's Pizza again today and, surprise! They were open! I'm very glad we tried it again because WOW! The pizza there was awesome. Much like yesterday, I have to post some food porn for you all. <3 Delish!

After lunch we all drove down to Mongoose Junction in downtown Coral Bay and went SHOPPING!!!! I'm very glad I waited really until the last day to make my biggest purchases because there was not a lot to spend... and there's not a lot left! I picked up some funky island jewelry and some trinkets to take home. I still need to find a few postcards before hitting up the airport tomorrow (and a few cigars).

By late afternoon we came back to the house and changed into our swimsuits for one final dip in the Wally pool. You would think it was a group of 10 year olds taking a dip because we got into a noodle floaty fight using the water jets at the sides of the pool. I'm pretty sure I got a lung full of chlorine from laughing so hard! :)

Now we are about to sit down for dinner. Dad is cooking up a London Broil and we're gonna finish up the fresh fruit we bought down here. Then we'll pack up and turn it in early for the night. Long travel day ahead. I'll try to make one last blog either on the plane or after I'm home.

Though I will continue to post on this blog and I'll have another day of talking about the trip, I do want to thank everyone who did read through this and those who had some fun with these posts. It was nice to write to an audience again. :)

I have a TON of photos from the trip (422 to be exact), so I'll make some more posts on here or Facebook with photos from the trip on here.

Cheers and my last St. John Brewery Root Beer!

Meg