Christmas Tropicale

Here, dear readers, is my belated Christmas gift to you: Sunny, sandy photos from the Virgin Islands, intended to pluck you straight out of whatever dreary, post-Christmas winter funk you might presently find yourself in.  I spent five days there last week; the first time I’ve spent Christmas in the tropics.  I have to admit it was a little odd to see palm trees glittering in Christmas lights, but all in all it wasn’t so bad.

We stayed at the Ritz Carlton (oo-la-la!), which is situated on the eastern shore of St. Thomas.  Now, I hesitate to complain about a Ritz Carlton, lest I sound like a completely ungrateful travel snob, but this resort was way too big and crowded for my taste.  If I went again, I’d stay at a smaller, more modest property with more beach and fewer people.  Nonetheless, we managed to have a great time, mostly by getting off the island, away from the crowds, and into the water.  The scuba diving on St. Thomas and the surrounding islands is fantastic… fish in every color, sea turtles, and fantastic coral.  We chartered a boat for a day and visited the islands of Jost Van Dyke, St. John, and Tortola, stopping to snorkel and scuba wherever we could.  My favorite stop on land was a joint called Ivan’s Stress Free Bar on Jost.  On Christmas Day, we scuba dived at a spot appropriately named Christmas Cove off the northern shore of Great St. James.  I didn’t have an underwater camera, but here’s a pretty good video from Lonely Planet.  It was a breathtaking dive.  (No pun intended.)

The food on the islands is great.  Not surprisingly, there’s a lot of seafood.   The specialty is “local lobster,” which is served in everything from omelettes to pasta to quesadillas.  It’s flavorful and tender, though not quite as rich and buttery as the cold water lobster we eat here on the mainland.  Comparatively speaking, it makes for a lighter meal, which is not such a bad idea when you’re spending a lot of time in your bathing suit.  Our most unforgettable dinner was at a fabulous little restaurant called Herve in Charlotte Amalie, the capital of St. Thomas.  One of the specials that night was a wilted spinach salad with a shallot vinaigrette, which we paired with conch fritters to start.  For our entrees, I ordered the local lobster (but of course) and my companions ordered seafood linguine, broiled shrimp, and Norweigan salmon.  The food was fabulous and the ambiance was lovely… the owner, Herve Chassin, personally greets his guests at the door and leads them to an open-air dining room with panoramic views of the harbor.

I’m back in foggy San Francisco now, with an interesting task ahead:  I found a conch shell during that dive at Christmas Cove and carried it all the way home in my suitcase.  Now I’m trying to figure out how to get the dead animal out of the shell so I can polish it and keep it as a souvenir.  The thing stinks to high heaven and I’m too squeamish to touch it.  I’ve done some preliminary research online and have learned that the best thing to do is to leave it near an anthill and let the ants clean out the flesh before soaking the shell in a diluted bleach solution to loosen the debris.  The other option is to boil the creature so it “cooks” and then pull it out of the shell with my fingers.  I think not!  So I’m off to find an anthill, I guess.

I think I’d rather be scuba diving off the shores of St. Thomas.