And on the seventh day, God created the Caribbean.
I am contemplating this divine creation of His from the back of Big Beard’s Renegade, a 42-foot, glass-bottom catamaran. Capt. Morris Simpson has dropped anchor off Buck Island at Turtle Beach, one of the main nesting areas for turtles, to allow us practice time for snorkeling before heading out to serious waters.
They are practicing with First Mate Don Baggs. I am sitting barefoot with shorts and T-shirt over bathing suit, my face stretched upward to soak up sun.
I have never snorkeled and don’t intend to. I am happy just catching some rays, pondering how this sea can be so aqua, so emerald, so turquoise-all at the same time-and so absolutely spectacular.
Everyone is in the water except Simpson and me. He grabs a snorkeling mask and asks if I want him to show me how to use it. Nah, I tell him. I’m fine just like this, but he insists and proceeds to demonstrate.
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I can’t stand it any longer. I have to at least dip my toes into that blue-velvet brine. I slip off my shorts and shirt and slide into the water. It is cool for a few seconds, then quickly turns temperate. This is heavenly. I ask Simpson to hand me the mask and flippers. Before I know it, I am snorkeling, or at least warming up.
It is not until we sail over to Buck Island Reef National Monument that I am really snorkeling. This is infinitely better than being in a glass-bottom boat. A stone slab on the ocean floor welcomes snorkelers to the national monument and another reassures me that “everything looks 25 percent larger and closer under water.”
The 850-acre Buck Island, 2 miles off St. Croix’s north shore, boasts a self-directing trail 12 feet under water that follows a 2,000-yard-long reef, on which 250 species of fish have been recorded. Beginners and experts alike and more daring Cousteau-type divers can delve into dropoffs that dip 2,000 feet.
Buck Island is one of the main-but not the only-treasures of St. Croix, which has somehow been overshadowed by St. Thomas and St. John in the tourism rush to the U.S. Virgin Islands. Those other two islands have recovered from several devastating seasons brought on first by Hurricane Hugo in 1989, followed by traveling fears spawned by Operation Desert Storm, then the national recession.
St. Croix business people say the Virgin Islands government has spent no money marketing the island. Consequently, last year the high tourist season came and it virtually was non-existent, with hotel occupancy below 50 percent.
“A lot of us feel St. Croix funding gets left out,” complains Lisa Newkirk, a resident since 1959 who has a dress shop in downtown Christiansted, St. Croix’s major city. “The government is very pro-St. Thomas. We don’t want to get like St. Thomas. We just want a happy medium.”
St. Croix is more laid-back than St. Thomas and doesn’t have the glitz. It appeals to sports enthusiasts, especially divers, sportfishermen, yachtsmen and golfers-there are two 18-hole championship golf course and a nine-hole course-and to environmentalists because of an increasing number of ecological attractions.
There have been efforts to allow gambling on St. Croix to help revive the economy. But a territorial referendum last year that would have permitted any new hotel with 300 rooms or more to have a casino was defeated. The proposal passed in St. Croix but was defeated in St. Thomas. Locals say the hotels in St. Thomas are against casinos, as are churches, some for competitive reasons because they run bingo games.
Amy and Sid Kalmans moved 12 years ago from Houston to St. Croix, where they own and operate Hotel Caravelle, a 44-room waterfront hotel in downtown Christiansted, which like most of the hotels was totally rebuilt after Hugo.
The Kalmans have been leaders in a drive to get local business people to contribute money for marketing.
“We realize we’re going to have to do it ourselves,” says Sid Kalmans, a former stockbroker. “We are a separate destination from the other U.S. Virgin Islands. We can’t market the same.”
He did get the government to match private funds for a new St. Croix marketing brochure with the theme, “The Caribbean the way it used to be.” Some 1.5 million brochures were distributed, 10 times more than ever before.
Merchants also are getting together to clean up the downtown area and to hire a steel band to play periodically as an added Christiansted tourist attraction.
“We probably should have woken up years ago,” says Dan Hogue, owner of American West Indian Co., a gift shop downtown with products of the Caribbean.
Most of the shops, restaurants and hotels are locally owned and operated, and the congeniality is noticeable and appreciated. People are friendly, greeting everyone on the street and some even shouting “good morning” at passing visitors from their balconies.
Outside of the aquatic attractions, most of the action on St. Croix takes place in Christiansted, in the center on the north shore of the 28-mile-long island. The picturesque town with 18th-Century European island architecture has been the center of activity from the mid-1700s when Denmark purchased the islands and built them up as sugar plantations. (The United States bought the Danish West Indies-St. Croix, St. Thomas and St. John-for $25 million in 1917 to prevent occupation by Germany.)
Stroll along and near the waterfront, where several blocks have been designated a National Historic District. The bright yellow Ft. Christiansvaern, the Steeple Building Museum (formerly a Lutheran Church), the Old Scale House, Old Customs House (headquarters for the National Park Service) and the Danish West India and Guinea Company Warehouse all house displays on history of the island.
St. Croix’s second city, Frederiksted, lies 17 miles away at the less-developed west end of the island. It too has a fort, Frederik, which dates to 1760 and contains an excellent exhibit on the slave rebellion of 1878, when much of the city was burned. About 125,000 Africans had been imported as slaves to work the sugar cane fields. On July 3, 1848, Danish Gov. Gen. Peter VonScholten announced an emancipation and freed all Danish West Indies slaves.
Frederiksted also is the port for cruise ships visiting St. Croix.
Hurricane Hugo destroyed the ship dock in 1989 and, although there had been a temporary dock, it wasn’t until last summer that a new 1,500-foot pier opened. Officials view the new facility as a way to help revitalize the island’s economy. More and more cruise ships will be calling at St. Croix, which, of course, means more tourists will be discovering or rediscovering the island.
“We’ve been languishing so long,” notes Amy Kalmans, “we’ve become exotic again.”
DETAILS ON ST. CROIX
Getting there: St. Croix, the largest of the U.S. Virgin Islands, is about 1,100 miles southeast of Miami and 40 miles south of St. Thomas. American Airlines flies direct from Miami to St. Croix and Delta flies via St. Thomas. American Eagle flies non-stop between San Juan, Puerto Rico, and St. Croix. Several commuter airlines fly from St. Thomas.
Where to stay:
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Hotel Caravelle (where I stayed) is a business person’s hotel on the waterfront in a great downtown location. Rates (1994-95) for a double range from $84-$104 in the summer, April 15-Dec. 14, and $105-$135 in the winter, Dec. 15-April 14.
More expensive places include the Carambola Beach Resort, $235-$330; The Buccaneer, $195-$500; Cormorant Beach Club, $185-$350; and Island Villas, $950-$5,500 a week.
Where to eat: St. Croix has numerous excellent restaurants. One of the best is Indies Island Inspired Dishes.
Other restaurants of note include Kendrick’s, Tuttu Bene’s, Club Commanche, Tom Hat and Dugan’s Reef.
U.S. Customs: The U.S. Virgin Islands are a territory of the United States and U.S. citizens can travel freely there. Travelers must clear U.S. Customs but may bring back $1,200 worth of merchandise-double the amount permitted from any other Caribbean destination. Stateside residents may ship home up to $100 worth of duty-free goods each day, over and above the $1,200 individual exemption. A rate of 5 percent duty is charged on purchases over the $1,200 allowance.
Information: For information on hotel packages, call the St. Croix Hotel Association at 800-524-2026. For other information on St. Croix, call the U.S. Virgin Islands Division of Tourism Office, 800-USVI-INFO.