SOUTHERN CARIBBEAN REVISITED

Our latest travel adventure was a 12 night cruise on the Carnival Liberty beginning in San Juan, Puerto Rico & ending in Galveston, Texas. It's becoming more of a challenge to find Caribbean islands that we haven't already visited but we managed to find three new destinations on this trip. 

Downtown San Juan from our ship. We spent a couple days sightseeing in San Juan several years ago & decided to skip it this time. That was a good thing since we were both totally wiped out from three flights with long layovers. Air travel is such an ordeal now days - it used to be a fun adventure. Not anymore!

Our first port was St. Thomas, one of the U.S. Virgin Islands. Thirty-five years ago I had visited St. Croix, another Virgin Island & a couple years later Lou stopped at St. Thomas but immediately took a tour to St. John, the third Virgin Island. Technically, St. Thomas was new for both of us.

We walked the 1-1/2 miles into downtown Charlotte Amalie & found the landmark known as "The 99 Steps". But in reality there are 103 steps that lead to Blackbeard's Castle. We climbed them all only to find that the castle was closed that day but it offered some beautiful scenery.

I love impressionist art & one of its most well known painters, Camille Pissarro, was born in this house (with the yellow & aqua shutters) in Charlotte Amalie where he lived for 12 years before attending school in France. It is now an art gallery for local artists.

These pickup truck/sightseeing buses are extremely popular throughout the city. 

I couldn't resist taking a photo of this sign outside a local bar in the main shopping area of  Charlotte Amalie.

The skies opened up on our long walk back to the ship. We had umbrellas but still ended up pretty well soaked by the time we arrived back onboard. The good news is that it made for a pretty picture with the rain clouds over the harbor - but, fortunately, it was the only rain we had on the whole trip!

Our cruise a few years ago stopped in Barbados. We visited the island again on this cruise & didn't even leave the cruise port. It was the first of three consecutive ports so we saved our energy for tours of Tobago & Grenada which were new countries for both of us.

Tobago is half of the island nation of Trinidad & Tobago. Trinidad is the more populated, urban island & Tobago is the scenic, laid back & much smaller island. It's main city is Scarborough where over half the population resides.

Our island tour included a stop at Mt. Irvine Bay Hotel & Golf Course with its panoramic view of the Caribbean Sea. Not many cruise ships stop at Tobago which gives it a more natural feel. Although it was perfectly obvious that the bathrooms were not designed for busloads of people with long lines for the 2 of 3 stalls in working order (sort of) in the ladies room. I spent half of my time here waiting in line commiserating with the other women.

The most popular tourist site on Tobago is Store Bay with beautiful beaches, boats for hire & handmade local crafts. There seemed to be as many locals as tourists at a few of our stops. 

One of our stops was Fort James which also provided some stunning views. 

Our final stop before heading back to Scarborough was Fort King George on a hill overlooking the city. If you look closely between the cannons you can see our ship in the harbor, the Carnival Liberty, with its red, white & blue smokestack.

Most Americans have heard of Grenada because of the United States invasion in October of 1983. President Reagan ordered the Marines to invade & secure the safety of nearly 1000 American medical students when in fact he was really preventing a new Communist regime in the Caribbean according to our guide.

Grenada is such a beautiful island that I wanted to forget the politics & just enjoy the scenery. Our first stop was Fort Frederick with some gorgeous views of the city of St. George's. Our ship (on the right) & one other were in port that day.

By turning about 90 degrees I was able to see the spectacular coastline of the island. As with most of these islands, the majority of people seem to live in one major city. Grenada is mountainous with small, winding roads - I swear we traveled 20 miles to go 5 miles as the crow flies. The entire island is only 10 by 12 miles but we drove for literally hours.

In the sparsely populated interior of the island we happened upon two women washing their laundry in the stream with buckets - just like in our pioneer days.

This unique plant is called a "Traveler's Palm". Each leaf can accumulate up to 1/2 gallon of water from the rain giving thirsty travelers a chance to drink. 

Grenada has lots of beaches where tourists & locals can both enjoy the idyllic setting. Women were selling spices just behind where I took this photo. Grenada is famous for its variety of spices such as cinnamon, mace, saffron, cloves & bay leaves.

Grand Etang National Park is located in the crater of an extinct volcano in the middle of Grenada. This lake is in the center of the crater.

Annandale Falls is a popular tourist attraction. Buses & cars drop off tourists for the short walk down to the falls. Local men jump from a cliff above the falls into the pond for tips. Lou caught this guy in mid-flight. In the short time we were there the two men jumped numerous times. I'm guessing there are several of them who take turns jumping in pairs.

This was our third visit to Aruba! Although it is a beautiful island, we weren't too excited about another visit. BUT we were pleasantly surprised to see all the improvements made to the city of Oranjestad & to discover a park we had missed the last two times.

As we walked to a nearby Starbucks that we found last time where for the price of a frappacino you can check email on their WiFi, we discovered these new blue horse statues all over the downtown. Apparently there is some historical significance to them & the city included them as part of the renovation of downtown. 

The picturesque boat harbor in Oranjestad, Aruba. 

Wilhelmina Park, named after Queen Wilhelmina, is just a few blocks from the cruise port. It had interesting trees & was right on the Caribbean Sea.

There was a huge population of iguanas all over Wilhelmina Park. You have to look closely to see this bright green guy who blended in with the green grass.  He was close to two feet long including his tail.

I had to take several iguana photos for two reasons - they are all different & they stay still making it pretty easy to get good pictures. I loved the "spikes" down this one's back.

They all have this fascinating prehistoric look to them. I'm not sure exactly why but I am really intrigued by their appearance.

Someone had dumped a bunch of lettuce on the lawn causing a feeding frenzy with 10 or 20 iguanas of all sizes. The biggest ones here are probably 2-1/2 feet long. Amazing creatures!

Lou zoomed in & captured this great close up of one of the iguanas. I love all the subtle detail in his face & expression.

The final new port for us was Grand Cayman. This is a popular stop on many cruises but somehow neither of us had ever visited this destination.

The shoreline of George Town, Grand Cayman from our cruise ship. Unlike Tobago & Grenada, Grand Cayman is totally flat. As we drove over a small overpass crossing a river, our guide said, "This is one of our mountains in Grand Cayman."

Our first stop was a ride in the Nautilus. It is called a semi-submarine - the actual vessel doesn't go underwater but we  are sitting underwater looking out through windows. We passed by coral reefs, two shipwrecks & numerous colorful fish. It was extremely difficult to get any sort of good pictures, but this little guy with his black & yellow strips came out okay.

During our 45 minute journey, a "mer-man" goes into the water with a glove full of fish food to attract them to him. 

The final stop on our tour was a visit to the Cayman Turtle Farm Wildlife Encounter. They breed, raise & protect these giant sea turtles. This one was close to three feet long. Unfortunately, we learned that while 10% are released back into the wild, the rest are eaten by people!

There is a "holding pond" where visitors can pick up the young sea turtles. Here is Lou with one of the babies. I held him first & he was flapping his flippers like crazy. Our guide told me to rub his chin gently with my finger. I did & he settled right down letting me hold him without squirming.

The main shopping street in George Town, Grand Cayman.

Here are some of the gorgeous flowers that are common throughout the Caribbean islands.

One of the things I love about tropical locales is all the beautiful flowers. 

The array of colors, shapes & sizes of blooms seems endless.

In this photo, it almost seems as if my camera focused on the orange flowers & blurred the yellow ones - kinda cool.

Not sure what this is but it certainly is fascinating. I'm in awe of all these incredible creations.

Another thing I love is blue sky & puffy white clouds - add them to any photo & it is suddenly breathtaking.

While I was playing around taking iguana & other photos, Lou managed to get this butterfly before he flitted away. Great photo!