St. Thomas Virgin Islands

We get off the boat pretty easily and just leave the port area to see if we see a taxi to take somewhere.  I did some reading up and

 noticed that there are cable cars that you can walk to from the port that take you up a mountain and Julie is intrigued by the beach here that is named one of the world’s best, so we wander around getting different offers for taking our whole gang different places.  It seems 

 like all of the offers are high and would take too much time, one driver tells us that you can’t see anything from the top of the cable cars because of the ships that are in the way and the only thing that I can decide on is that I want to buy lottery tickets here because it seems like

something that would be bandied about a winner.  Well, she bought the ticket when she was on vacation in the Virgin Islands, but she’s really from Michigan…..and man, do they take their lottery seriously here.  There is a line and people are going through several

 transactions each person with scratch offs and other things.  Thankfully, the Virgin Islands dedicate one whole storefront to the lottery because if this was a gas station, I would have had to wait for hours.  We finally head to the cable cars to see how much they cost and

then hit the pirate museum where Oscar finds his souvenir for this trip.  We are still trying to figure out what to do with taking a taxi or something when we finally decide to just take the cable cars.  The kids want to do it and Dave and John have 

 made it clear that they only thing they want to get down, is have a drink in port, probably at the bar we passed with swings…..so, we turn back to the cable cars and there is now a Johnny Depp look alike at the pirate museum and Oscar is so

 excited because he wanted to take a picture with a pirate on the boat earlier, but missed him.  This guy is authentic, hell it could be Depp in there and he gives Oscar an eye patch from his treasure chest before we go buy our tickets and find out at 

   that Oscar and Lena will be free as soon as we say that Lena is only 5 (a slight fib) and everyone is excited about this.  The cars never stop, you just hop on as they come around and we go very high up the mountain.  The boats are

 nowhere in the way and we get some fabulous views of the island, the harbor and there are shops and things up there.  We have a great time and realize that the taxi driver lied to us that this wouldn’t be worth it and our view would be

blocked.  We mail ourselves post cards from here, because, hey, it’s the US and I find little gifts for Oscar’s pre k teachers.  They said that they wanted rum if he was going to Puerto Rico and I think the little mini bottles held by a palm tree and a frog will be cute, but not get

 them in trouble.  After convincing Oscar that he doesn’t need the purple octopus or the snow globe with a cruise ship in it for our travel cabinet, we make our way back down and back on the boat.  We have a great lunch on the boat with the burgers and fries, the kids

     go in to kids’ club and John and Dave return to the island to have their drink.  Julie and I act like we’re going to do some reading on the deck, but mainly we sip cocktails and talk.  The guys come back victorious because they found super cheap drinks on the island and had many of them.  Well, Dave was mad that he got a beer for $6 and John got 6 fingers of whiskey for

$3, but they seemed to have had a good time.  We get the kids and put them in their swimsuits to play in the water park while we sit and talk on the lido deck.  It’s another warm, perfect evening and we barely get up to go in and change for dinner, but eventually do.  It’s 

great that the kids are getting old enough to where you just have to be there if they need you in the water park, but you don’t have to hovering over them.  We’re lucky that the older ones look out for Oscar now and there’s a surreal 360 change in things when it is Julie and Dave who can’t get rid of their 12 year old because his kids’ club is rarely open, lame, and he would rather play his own games on his table in the room.  That’s great, but when you’re sharing a room with the kids, it’s like when Oscar wouldn’t go to kids’ club at all.  Irony and where we’ll be in a couple more years I guess.  Knowing Oscar, he’ll probably refuse to go when he’s 8 so we don’t have long at all in the glory days of him wanting to be around other kids his age.