It's 5 O'Clock Somewhere

When you begin blogging, you have all sorts of ambitious goals. I'm going to go birding and make a blog post every week, then every month. I'll post when there's something interesting going on. I'll post when we go on vacations, since I'm too busy to bird regularly any more. I had eye surgery and don't really feel I can see well enough to take good pictures. I'm really busy babysitting with my grandchildren. Sigh. So many of my birding blogging buddies from the early days have also dropped out, for some of the same reasons, I'm sure.

However, we are in St. Thomas, Virgin Islands this week, which has presented a whole new list of factors. It's warm and beautiful - a big plus. But people drive on the left side of the road. At first, I refused to rent a car and drive, then we started looking at taxi rates and decided to just cross our fingers and go with the rental. So far, so good. I've only turned onto the right side once, so far. I didn't realize how mountainous this island would be. There is little flat territory, and the roads are all narrow and windy, with blind curves.

So far, we haven't had much luck birding. We've seen three new species, and quite a few Frigate Birds and Brown Boobys. The locals say there aren't many birds at all, since someone brought in mongoose to control the snake population. Of course, there aren't any snakes either, but this little anole lizard quietly eyed me from his perch. Took all the photos so far with my iPhone, which is small and easy to carry in a pocket.

I took my bigger Lumix on the sailboat yesterday, and it decided to go snorkeling too. Not good. So today we took the water ferry across the harbor to Charlotte Amalie to go shopping for a new camera. The jewelry stores are all over, so we bought some sparklies too.

Lunched at an outdoor café down a palm lined passage. Great paella and more sangria than we could really handle after a strong rum punch at the jewelers to celebrate my new ring. I don't think the waitress had ever been asked for a to go box for sangria before, since she put it in a soup container!

Of course, we do most of our vacations through our Wyndham time share. They are always after you to buy more points, arguing that it will cost you less over all. Today we went to look at the new Margaritaville resort. It's a separate corporation from Wyndham, and our points here won't get us in there. It was a beautiful resort, but we really don't need any more.

Back home at sunset again, and now I can start taking pictures with the new Canon. But will I take it when we go kayaking tomorrow? I think not. Maybe we'll use Dick's smaller camera.