March Trip Report

jmq · Post by **jmq** » Tue May 17, 2016 2:11 pm

Greetings all

After trips to central Europe in 2014 and a 2 week trip to Maui and Kauai last July, in March, our family of 3 finally got back to STJ.

We had never been to Maui before, and since I never posted anything about it here on the OT forum (and, as you may be aware, I do loves me the photography), I will crassly overindulge myself and subject you into viewing some pix from that trip before going on to the recent STJ stuff: (BONUS: this will really confuse the folks who look at the images without reading this disclaimer)

NOW THAT I TRICKED YOU INTO LOOKING AT THOSE, BACK TO THE REAL SUBJECT MATTER AT HAND
We long thought that after my daughter was done with college that we wouldn’t be tied to the school schedule anymore for travel adventures (and the extra costs and crowds associated with that).

Wrong! She has a job as a high school chemistry teacher and is still at home and still enjoys our company (and us paying for) travel

so that’s why Hawaii was last July and STJ was during spring break this year.

I was dreading the holiday travel and the peak island crowds for this 3/20 – 3/26 trip and I was right to be concerned about the peak travel but wrong about the island feeling extremely crowded. But we needed this warm weather get away - and needed St. John again.

Early 7am non-stop out of Newark on United and the TSA lines were massive well before 6am but they went into expedited screening mode and ran thru folks quickly without shoe removals. Makes sense because if you were to profile those in the airport at that time it was 95% families on holiday travel.

Even with checking and retrieving one of the larger carry-ons with the extra toiletries we landed early enough to catch the noon ferry out of Red Hook which is pretty crazy.

We were able to check in early at Gallows, and the rest of this trip report won’t be a day by day recounting because it was just beach, book reading, no-shower-happy-hour as we rolled back into town, dinner, repeat. We all needed simple island time to just relax and unwind (you cannot believe how hard new teachers have to work).

Didn’t bring my own snorkel gear or my ancient underwater camera so we could do carry-on only on the way back, so rented one of those new face mask snorkels and a GoPro camera. There was a bit of a learning curve with the GoPro as well as the lack of an extension stick, combined with the fact that I didn’t really do a lot of snorkeling this trip, so this didn’t yield much in terms of underwater photo ops. The extent of coral bleaching in many areas was also pretty sad to see.

Beaches we spent significant time at included Maho, Francis, and surprisingly stumbled onto parking at the Gibney gate twice. Took a ride out to Coral Bay, stopped for a walk about at Skinny Legs, but didn’t do the traditional lunch at Shipwreck this time. Had intentions of doing the Ram Head hike but never got to it.

Meals included traditional lunch at Sun Dog (always good), sammiches from North Shore Deli and Sam & Jacks (we think S&J might be slightly better), breakfast at Cruz Bay Landing (impressive), and good drinks/dinners/extended happy hour apps etc at Joes Rum Hut, Beach Bar, Longboard, Rhumblines, and Zozos (worth it).

Perfect for a book (or a nap)

What our refrigerator looks like when on island

Love that walk from Gallows

Caught 11am Red Hook ferry for 2:50pm flight back to PHL on American. With pre-printed passes and carry-on, got thru security pretty quickly which made the LONG wait in the zoo known as the STT waiting area on the day before Easter pretty brutal. Flight was basically on time departing and arriving so can’t complain too much.

And on the island itself, yes some beaches (especially Francis in the afternoon), bars, and restaurants got pretty crowded, but Cruz Bay did not feel overrun, at least the times we walked down from Gallows, which was often, and included morning walk-abouts for exercise. Maybe folks stay in their villas more during a holiday week vs trekking into town?

Overall, it was great to go back again and looking forward to another trip to the VIs sooner rather than later.

Pickle · Post by **Pickle** » Tue May 17, 2016 6:51 pm

Great photos of different islands, jmq.

We visited Kauai over 20 years ago and look back on that trip fondly. These are some wonderful shots you took there and Maui. If we hadn't found St. John, we might have visited Hawaii (and other places) again, but... well, you know.

How did you like that full-face snorkeling mask? I can't bring myself to use that mask (yet, maybe...) but I am curious.

Always enjoy your trip reports. Thank you for posting!

jmq · Post by **jmq** » Wed May 18, 2016 8:55 am

Thanks Pickle. Those are shots from Maui only as I had already posted a bunch of shots from prior trip to Kauai some years ago on the OT forum. Plus, I didn't even get near the quality of shots when we went over to Kauai on this trip.

BTW, I have noticed that images I embedded from Picasaweb back when no longer show up in older posts here - - I suspect that's because Google no longer supports it and not because of some issue here, so that's unfortunate. And Flickr only works after you clean up the their embed code before you click "Img" above to insert those brackets. It's a bit tedious.

Re the full face snorkel, it works pretty good, especially for those who struggle with fogging in regular masks, which is mostly caused by nose breathing. One way to help to reduce that in a regular mask is to really concentrate on breathing out of your mouth only, as any nose breathing in the mask can contribute to fog up.

So another option now, especially for those who struggle with mask fogging, is the full face Tribord mask - - what's nice about them is that they don't fog up because you can breathe out your nose. In fact, they seem to work better with nose only breathing as too much opening and closing of your mouth can disrupt the lower part of the face seal.

Having said that, the full face mask yields excellent visibility, but the air you are breathing inside the Tribord mask tends to get a little warm. Anybody else with similar observations? I would also imagine that those with a more thin/angular face might be more susceptible to leakage with the Tribord.

Also think it was here that someone commented to avoid the cheaper off-brand full face masks other than the Tribord as the snorkel apparatus is inferior and can cause breathing issues, so keep that in mind, as that’s kinda important LOL

liamsaunt · Post by **liamsaunt** » Wed May 18, 2016 9:26 am

Great report as always. Your Hawaii pictures are beautiful. Seeing those first kind of made me feel like I was watching an episode of House Hunters International when they just randomly intersperse photos of other islands in the episodes that are supposed to be about St. John

I have a tribord mask, and like it very much. The expanded field of vision is really great. That said, you can't dive down with it, so it's not great for photography. I bring both the tribord and my regular mask. On days when I am feeling lazy I wear the tribord and point out things to John that I want him to take pictures of for me.

I did not notice the air getting too warm in my tribord. I will pay closer attention next time I wear it.

shoemak38 · Post by **shoemak38** » Wed May 18, 2016 12:29 pm

Great photos and enjoyed the Maui pictures I could never get my wife to get up early to go up to see the volcano sunrise

kklay · Post by **kklay** » Wed May 18, 2016 12:38 pm

Thank you for sharing your pictures and trip report. Looks like you had great weather while on island.

jmq · Post by **jmq** » Wed May 18, 2016 5:07 pm

liamsaunt wrote:Great report as always. Your Hawaii pictures are beautiful. Seeing those first kind of made me feel like I was watching an episode of House Hunters International when they just randomly intersperse photos of other islands in the episodes that are supposed to be about St. John

Thanks. I think maybe from now on that anybody who posts a TR with photos should slip a random "other" island image in and then see how long it takes for folks spot it.

But seriously, you make a good point - what is up with that kind of editing?

toni · Post by **toni** » Wed May 18, 2016 7:06 pm

Thank you for posting; feel free to crassly overindulge yourself anytime with photos!

ColoradoMom · Post by **ColoradoMom** » Thu May 19, 2016 8:27 am

Beautiful TR!!
How was the water? Many stinging critters? Was there a lot of seaweed on the beaches?
Thanks for any info,
Headed down soon but not soon enough!!

jmq · Post by **jmq** » Thu May 19, 2016 10:58 am

CM - water was fine. The girls might have preferred it a touch warmer. No significant seaweed.

One day (forget which beach) there were a lot of floaties in the water i.e. what I call small translucent organisms (not just plant matter/runoff) in the water that were just slightly irritating - and not sure if that was just my imagination because it had no lasting effect

I imagine the semi-random prevalence of that stuff in the water probably depends on what might be spawning where and when, currents, lunar cycles, etc.
Side note: floaties makes UW photography more challenging, especially if you use flash.

awardb · Post by **awardb** » Sun May 22, 2016 9:44 pm

As someone who loves Hawaii, but has been under the STJ spell for the last decade, are your beach/ocean shots taken from the Wailea area? Sure looks like it to me. Please illuminate...

RickG · Post by **RickG** » Mon May 23, 2016 6:53 am

Thanks, I enjoyed the read. Looks relaxing!

Cheers, RickG

JohnThomas · Post by **JohnThomas** » Tue May 24, 2016 4:11 am

Great trip report & beautiful pictures!!!!!

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