Trip one. . . . by open top jeep with some new friends! So St. John is even smaller than the +/- 30 square mile St. Thomas, but nonetheless, we took one turn and drove for 30 minutes without finding a beach!!! Never fear, we found a market to buy some beer and munchies and then turned around and went to the beautiful Hocksnest Beach!! A little snorkeling, a little swimming, lots of sunscreen (i put on 30 3x, troy, so you cant be upset at me!) :) Then lunch at Cruz Bay. I originally thought of gettin a job at Cruz Bay but that woulda been a crazy commute. . . beautiful but crazy. . . here's the ferry with the amazing scenery behind it! 
One more adventure of the day. . . see if you can see what is happening in this picture. . .
No? Try a closer look. . . .
So, we stop for gas midtrip. . . actually when we first arrived on island. . . and the driver, Jason, goes to open the gas tank only to find that SOMEONE switched out his gas cap for one that locks. . . and they didn't leave a key !!!!!!!! So we had to find the most able bodied guy we could and he came out of the maintenance garage and helped us out!! Good ole fashioned jam-the-screw-driver-in trick :)
Trip two was with my dear hostess, Sarah H and her friend Brian. . . another gorgeous day. . . i cant tell you how often i ask myself, "Seriously, this is my life??"
I definitely tried snorkeling here. . but i went out by myself and scooted out off the shore and kinda got myself all worked up. . . two things . . 1. fire coral supposedly stings you if you touch it (but i had no idea what it looked like besides its the color of fire. . that's real helpful!) and 2. sea urchins like to stick their thorns in you if you try to step on them (also didnt know where those resided) . . so as i was trying to calmly swim above the coral reef, the reef started getting higher and higher (closer to the water's surface--that means closer to my belly). . . and i got more and more freaked out that some wave (which you can see from the picture is NOT a big deal) was going to sweep me right over one of those dangerous reef dwellers. . so i decided to jump ship. . or really to scurry back to shore. . . so i turned around to go back to where we were on the beach and out of the corner of my eye. . . . i notice a fish about 12 inches or so long. . . with a long snout-like thing. . . staring at me. . . not moving, just staring at me. . .right at the surface. . . and let me just tell you two more things. . . 1. i dont have a prescription mask so its not totally clear, but i'm sure this fish is either bearing his teeth at me or stickin out his tongue and 2. i'm POSITIVE its a barracuda. . . which i've been told that you shouldnt wear shiny things or hang bait from your midsection cause they will . . . well let's just say you dont wanna do that. . . so i turn around and see this stupid-head fish staring at me and i got tall coral on one side, a man-eater fish on the other side, and some waves moving me a little bit :( then i become sure that there's gotta be a shark, eel, or octopus or SOMEThing at my feet ready to go. . . well needless to say, once i hit the beach i didnt go back out for more snorkeling that day. . . unfortunate too because there was some cliff jumping just on the other side of the reef :(
back on the ferry . . . just gettin ready in case of an emergency. . . watch out here i come!!!
and finally. . . . sweet dreams St. John. . . .
fire coral is yellow: sort of an orange-ish yellow color. it will just sting like a really bad jellyfish sting for up to 2 days...so no worries.
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