St. John (Day 3)

One of the things we like to do at Andante is see how many iguanas we can spot in the cacti and undergrowth surrounding the villa. These critters like to sun in the morning and evening, and I'd say the one at picture center here is probably about three feet long from nose to the tip of his tail. Click on the picture to expand it and enjoy in the 'Where's Waldo?' fun (there are at least three iguanas in this picture). The record number of iguanas seen in this particular cactus is five iguanas. Only a little zoom was used to take this photo, so they are very close and you can enjoy watching them move their heads around from time to time or occasionally inch from one side to the other. However, they are usually the picture of sun worshipping slackers.

We check on the iguanas everyday, and have found that the same ones seem to come to this cacti each day. There are other cacti around the villa but not as many tenants on those. One day, we saw a brilliant green iguana up there. He was a bit smaller than the others, but still a good sized lizard. In fact, the road that winds up to Andante is Iguana Road and I can see why they named it that. Aside from all the ones we see at the villa, several times over the years we've seen iguanas racing across the road. (They can move really fast when so inclined!) They shun humans but, one afternoon, I snapped this photo of an iguana right at the start of the path that leads from the villa down to the beach.  He was just browsing around, munching on flowers, and didn't seem too concerned about me being there. I can see why people decide to keep them for pets; they are really cool looking!

Today, we revisited Francis Bay for swimming and snorkeling. It's on the north side of the island and usually the current and waves are a bit more active here. This activity reduced visibility so we couldn't see the fish as clearly as usual. Part of the problem was we forgot that we should not arrive at a beach before 10:30 or 11 to get the optimal amount of light for seeing fish. It's actually not the light so much as it's not usually until then that all the morning clouds have blown away. Jim suggested we should keep notes of these little factoids we discover, but I'm not sure it would make much difference. We're both such early risers that by 9:30 we're antsy to get out and about.

This day was very low key, as well. After spending the morning at the beach, we had lunch at Mongoose Junction (yes, there are mongooses on St. John though we've never seen one). After that, we just went back to Andante and enjoyed the pool and worked on our tans. As I mentioned, the plant life was thicker this year than in prior years. I think this is a palm tree (or two) growing right along the west balcony. The giant leaves on these plants make you feel like you've taken a trip back in time to some Jurassic ecosystem. (This picture expands really big so you can enjoy the beautiful landscape behind me).