St Thomas Day 5
It's a beach kinda day...new experiences
I was slacking today. I didn't wake up until 7:30am. I guess I needed my sleep.
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It was time for breakfast of eggs, toast and bacon but this time I have proof that I actually made it. We learned a new trick this morning too...once the toast pops out, flip them babies over and do the other side and you have real toast. However, we would also learn this toaster took longer to toast bread than it does to make an entire breakfast. Fail.
Ok, cooler in hand...or in the trunk at least and we were following my MapsMe and winding our way around on a twisting turning ride and then up we went...clunk ka clunk ka clunk as the chain lift pulled our cart up the hill for the big drop and vertical loop ahead of us.
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Wait, snap out of it! We were in a car securely on the ground and not on a roller coaster. We got to the top of the hill and what a beautiful sight it was...overlooking Marina Bay. There was a pullover site and at the last minute the hubby wiped our cart around the turn and....well we parked and got out and looked.
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After a brief stop at Marina Bay overlook, we were off again to Drakes Seat. I was preparing myself for this journey only to find out that it wasn't much at all. Decent roads, not too steep or twisting and we're all alive. I guess our last little "journey" (from my last review) was so scary when we went off roading that it has tarnished my thoughts of these roads. But, I was happily mistaken about getting to Drakes Seat overlooking Magen's Bay. However, Sakari was complaining that the roads were making her dizzy and she felt a little sick.
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What a beautiful sight it was too!
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We headed down a hill to make it to Magen's Bay and got in line at the entrance.
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There is a charge to get into Magens Bay. It is $5 per person for those 13 and over and free 12 and younger. It was $2 to park.
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The parking lot was right beside the beach and I really liked that. We found a spot, backed in, popped the trunk and took our things out and put them at a picnic bench that had some shade. Perfect!
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The beach was gorgeous!
We watched these weird looking birds scoop into the water and grab a fish and take off. They looked like ducks. Were they seagulls? I wasn't quite sure but if it looks like a duck and fly's like a duck it must be a Brown Booby! Yep, that's what it was a booby!
I headed out to the water because it was a warm day and I needed cooled off.
The girls seen me out there and immediately decided they were coming too...and bringing along the water frisbee for some fun and games.
Flying the water frisbee provided to be quite the task. It just wasn't working out the way throwing a water ball does. It was going everywhere but to each of us.
As we played, we had an audience that stayed with us the entire time.
Ok, enough of this...it was time to head out and .....snorkel??? This is a sandy beach. A sandy beach=no snorkeling...or so everyone always tells everyone. I'm one of those that go against the grain, the norm, the followers. I do my own thing and let's be honest...it's the ocean and within the ocean there is sea life. I don't care if it's a sandy bottom with very little to see or if it's a rocky bottom with a lot to see. I'm going to snorkel each and every place I go. I've said it many times before...you never know what you may see and I sure don't want to miss the opportunity.
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The girls and I grabbed our snorkeling gear and off we went. We headed to the right side of the bay and there were rocks along that side. There had to be something interesting over there right? Found a huge feather duster.
And a few more feather dusters (worms). They were everywhere. I tired one of these in my tank once. It didn't last very long...maybe a few months and then it disintegrated. I'm not sure if the fish I had in the tank picked on it or it didn't like the parameters of my tank. I was sad because they are so cool.
Sakari came running over and said "Look what I found, it's one of those one "things" (Chitons). We see these everywhere we go on the rocks. They are hard and suctioned to a rock. They are molluscs and are ancient creatures that date back 500 million years ago.
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These were the rocks along the side.
It was pretty calm in this area so I decided I would give it a shot of my over/under skills. 500 shots later and I did manage to get a few.
Now mind you it is very shallow along the edges. It makes for a great place for beginners to learn to snorkel or those that are just relaxing and exploring. You could sit down at any time and just chill. We did that a few times and just took in the beautiful scenery.
There were definitely plenty of small schools of fish in the area.
Then we spotted a weird looking fish. It was brightly colored. I had never seen anything like this before in all my days of snorkeling. It had a striped body with a red and green head. It was beautiful. See, I would have missed this new find had I not snorkeled here!
We actually ended up seeing two of these fish in this area although I wasn't able to get a picture of the other. After a lot of google searches for every combined wording I could think of I found that it was called a red breasted wrasse. It was so pretty and unique.
We looked over at the grassy area...and whaddayaknow....guess what we found.
Then we went back to snorkeling a little more where I would find plenty of snappers, grunts , damsels and slippery dick wrasse.