Working Vacation

After a few weeks of furlough days, I began to spread the word around looking for bits of work to do to keep myself busy and hopefully make some cash to help out. Other than a few calls by people wanting cheap corner cutting electrical work a few good things popped through, one was fixing a friends 66 bronco, which went particularly well, also was doing a bit of work down in the virgin islands. painting and some insulation work, taking some old junk out of a building and such. honestly, just about anyone could have done it but i am very grateful for being given the opportunity. the flight left in the wee hours of the morning in Detroit on Monday, and we landed Monday night about an hour before sunset, grabbed the jeep and hopped onto the car ferry from St Thomas to St john island. the jobs throughout the day went well, hung out at a lot of the local bars and restaurants at night and managed to have a bit too much fun on Tuesday...paid for it Wednesday.

all the local people my traveling companions knew were cool, and welcomed me and treated me like a friend...I haven't encountered that much. our accommodations put us about 100 yards from the ocean. we could hear the waves breaking on the shore and the songs of the jungle at night. I managed to go swimming in the ocean every night, had a blast body surfing due to some impressive waves in the 5 foot range. it's pretty cool to tread water as the waves get bigger and bigger till you see the whitecaps rolling in and then get ready and get blasted into shore.

I only had 3 full days down there (2 days were travelling) but I have a feeling I'll go back one of these days with the family. working caused me to miss when the kayak rental place was open, so I didn't get to fulfill my dream of kayaking in the ocean. quite odd to go from wading in the ocean in the face of an 85 degree breeze to 27 degrees with a dusting of snow....