A Little Fun in the Sun

 To gather a little vitamin D and to escape the bitter cold of the Midwest, we headed to the Caribbean.  Specifically, St. Maarten which we picked primarily because there is a direct flight there from Chicago.  We went with our good friends, John and Linda, and had a wonderful time.  Of course, who wouldn't with temperatures in the 80's everyday, sun out every day, and no work for Jo for a week.  This was our first week long trip with John and Linda since we were all in our 20's and we are looking forward to many more - especially somewhere warm in the midst of winter.

While there we did a boat trip around the island with several stops for snorkeling.  We saw some turtles who can hold their breath underwater a lot longer than we can.  We also sailed in a 12-meter yacht that participated in the America's cup.  We raced against two other boats and won.  It was great fun, but a lot of work - can't imagine doing it in a real race.  It was amazing to see how far over the boats lean when catching the wind.  We also found some time to relax on the beach and enjoyed many, many guava berry coladas - so much that guava berry liquor found itself in our luggage for the trip home.  

We also took the ferry over to St. Barts, rented a car, and toured around the that island for a day.  The ferry ride over was a wild ride with the ferry cresting 6-10 foot waves, which we all weathered fine, but the woman behind us became seasick within 10 minutes of leaving port.  Thank goodness, it was only a 45 minute ride and we were all happy to get into port.  St. Barts was a beautiful island and seems to have a lot of great bays and coves worthy of a week long visit somewhere in the future.  Although, the airport is a terrifying plummet to land so we decided it would be best to take our chances with the bumpy ferry.

Another highlight was touring the butterfly farm.  We have seen several of these across the world and they always are fun and interesting.  Plus, having a butterfly land on you seems so peaceful and serene.  But all too soon, we were sipping our last coladas on the way to the airport and landing back in sub zero temperatures.

Fortunately, this week the temperatures have been really low so we can re-acclimate to winter rapidly.