My office view

A panorama view from where I sit.

Lawn mowers

This is the very most common kind of lawn mower.

Old walls and new posters

This is a juxtaposition of a couple of common sights in the city: very old, crumbling walls, and bills announcing upcoming dances and hip-hop music events.

Door locks

This is the typical way to lock doors around the city: the doorknobs end up being useless after a while, either from rust or just parts that wear out, so the more robust solution is a big bar across the door or window with a removable lock on it.  This is also a more secure way to lock down shutters and doors for hurricanes.

Our natural climber

While moving boxes upstairs, Tolman had his own way of getting around.  This won't be a surprise to anyone who knows him.

Working with coconuts

This is how Conroy Hosier pulls down the coconuts from his tree.

And here's him cutting the top parts off a yellow, ripe one.

I didn't get a shot of him stabbing it with his machete... but that's how they pry it open and drink the milk.  Good stuff!

Elusive crabs

I only saw these kinds of crabs a few times... and these are the only videos I ever got.

Tranquility

A very, very calm morning, where our pool is as smooth as glass.

Awesome vegetation

I had to show some of the cool-looking plants around our home.

The bush is interesting, but so is that tree trunk to the left: it's a palm tree around which they build our front deck.

And some regular palm trees... with the palms that have to be collected... the St Croix version of leaves.

A simple, one-tree bonfire.

(May 24)

One of our great scout masters saves Christmas trees for bonfires.  It's not often you get to do this kind of thing at a scout campout.  (Never in Utah!)

Jump Up!

(May 3)

Jump Up: the quarterly event in Christiansted where people gather to meet, drink, and generally just party.

Mark Eckard is a friend from work, and a musician:

Outside, Kiki and the Flaming Gypsies gave a warm-up:

They had a little break where some kids used some hoops:

And then it got pretty intense!

It's an impressive performance if you ever get to see them.

Anyway, it's an all-around good time for everyone.

View from a house on a hilltop

(Apr 27)

At the end of the soccer season, the team was invited to this home... which happens to it on the very top of one of the hills.  It was a magnificent view.

I started with a panorama shot, capturing about 270 degrees of the view from the back of the house.

Unfortunately, that mostly shows an impressive patio.  Here's the view from the far left.

 And here's the view from the far right.

Here's the back of the house, behind me when I took the panorama shot.

And when we went out the house through the front door, here's the completion our full 360-degree view... which is also fantastic.

This is wealth... displayed in a way that I would never do, but still something that I can appreciate.

View at the Howard Scout Camp

(Apr 26)

Here's the view at the boy scout campground where Tolman is pitching his tent.

A bird

There's so much vegetation here, but it's weird because you don't hear many birds.  (This is in stark contrast to what I heard in Belize city.)  This video is when I heard a rather odd sounding bird.

Looking for a waterfall

This day Tolman and I went for a hike with the scouts up a creek bed where we were hoping to see a waterfall at the end.

This is where the waterfall should have been... and probably is now as I write this post, but we just went a little too early so there wasn't enough water pouring down the hills.  Bummer.

BTW, can you spot Tolman here?

How about here?

Yes, that's much easier... he's definitely in his element.



The following 5 pics are from a ruin we found along the way.  There are no longer any houses or people living right here by the river.

These are small holes where for beams for the flooring, now totally gone.

This was a wall on the other side of the building, so I'm standing where they redirected the river and they probably had a water wheel here.

This is a short wall and on the other side is a very small room... probably a latrine area.   (So we used it.  :-)

It rained before we finished, so this is Tolman and me, soaked (taken from a camera inside a plastic bag).

 While Tolman and I were hiking, Thomas had his World Cup soccer day... the last day of their soccer season, where his team represented Japan.  His team won all three games.  Awesome.

Downtown, from the far side of Church Street

This is a picture of all the business buildings on Church Street, taken from the far end.

And here's the view down the sidewalks of those buildings (on the left of the picture above).

An interesting entryway

This first view is from the outside sidewalk, right by the street.

Now when I take two steps in, you see the stairs on the left.

Going ahead down the stairs, and now you see some plants... parts of this corridor which are still directly outside.

And just past those plants to the left side is the following view, finally with some technology... which almost seems out of place.

Walkways around Christiansted

Here are some of the walkways in the buildings on my way to work.  There's obviously a lot of history in these stones.