day two: st. thomas, usvi

on monday we arrived in beautiful st. thomas, virgin islands. it was our first official day of the cruise and we were so excited. i had always heard how beautiful st. thomas was and i have always wanted to go there so i was so happy that it was one of our stops. after we got off the ship and made our way to another part of the island. we first went to a place called coral world because we knew it would have stuff we would want to do. it's kinda like a little park with different things to look at and do.

our first adventure that we did was the sea trek. basically you put these 75 pound astronaut helmets over your head that have a constant flow of oxygen and it allows you to walk along the ocean floor. it was seriously the coolest thing we have ever done. it was like scuba diving but was funner. all you had to do was just walk and look at all the amazing sea life under the water. it was pretty neat. we had a guy that look video's and pictures with an underwater camera so we got some amazing pics! we were under the water for about a half an hour as we walked around and got to hold some crazy sea creatures and look at the amazing fish. it was so much better than snorkeling.

 

after that awesome adventure we walked around the park and got to see some sea lions so tricks and such. they are pretty cute animals. i wanted to bring one home but quin wouldn't let me. their whiskers are what get ya! they were so dang cute. we also got to pet some sting rays, sea turtles, star fish, sea cucumbers, and saw so many dang iguana's it was unreal! we also got to see some sharks. they were smaller ones but it was still way cool. the sea turtles were pretty amazing as well. they weighed 160 pounds! they were huge. i didn't think that they were that big but they were stinking ginormous. the star fish were awesome because we got to hold them and they would suck on to your hand and kinda droop around it. it was kinda weird too because i almost felt like my hand was stuck forever. there were pretty cool though. the sea cucumbers just felt like i was holding a good sized poo. they are weird animals. their poo is sand though, did you know that? so when you are playing on the beach you are playing in sea cucumber poo!!

 

after coral world, we made our way to the beach. the water is so blue and clear in the caribbean. it's so amazing and pretty warm too. we had a good time laying on the beach, soaking up our first rays of caribbean sunshine. it's nothing like utah sun. first of all, no matter how much sun screen you put on, you burn twice as fast there. in utah i can go hours without sunscreen and barely get red. down there, in fifteen minutes we were already red! it was crazy. we went through so much sun screen this trip and we still all got plenty of redness to go around. thank you equator for being so close to the sun and frying our skin off. we'll appreciate the skin cancer later.

all in all we had an amazing time in st. thomas. the port was beautiful with all the boats and yachts docked it. it really was a gorgeous island and i would definitely go back! there was way more we wish we could have done but with one day, you just can't get er all done. another trip to the caribbean may be in order because that is how every island was!