Diving for Goats, St. Thomas: Part 1

Cruise Dock, St. Thomas,
originally uploaded by Adventures in Paradise.

“That goat is getting strung up,” she said.

We were driving on a winding road on the side of a mountain on the Caribbean island of St. Thomas. We had come from the cruise ship docks through the town of Charlotte Amalie. Because this is part of the United States Virgin Islands, there was, of course, a McDonalds in town. But because this is still the Caribbean, there was also a Rastafarian with braided hair in the parking lot of the McDonalds, waving to us.

The view back towards the harbor, on the other hand, had been spectacular and exactly post card reality: beautiful flowers, gorgeous blue-green water, green mountains and huge, classy, colorful cruise ships docked in the harbor. From the sea, St. Thomas is one of the most beautiful islands in the Eastern Caribbean. It looks like the mental vision one has of the volcanic islands of the South Pacific: very green, jagged teeth-like mountaintops. Exotic, romantic.

It was when we topped the mountain and started our descent towards Coki Beach that we saw the goats. They were in a fenced in area near a tree. Out of the corner of my eye, it just looked like a goat with its front paws up on top of the fence. But my wife insisted that the goat was strung up by a rope, ready for slaughter. But we had no time to be sure about it; the bus sped forward around a curve towards our own uneasiness: our first time scuba diving.

We had no certificate and had never even been close to an air tank. It had seemed a great idea, a new adventure. And for me, it was the fulfillment of a childhood fantasy. But one stupid mistake, and you could be seriously injured or even killed.

“There you are, enjoying your life and the next thing you know, it’s over,” she said, shaking her head. Was she talking about us, I wondered, or the goat?

The view around us now turned into what might be called “local,” the behind the scenes reality. We were out of the United States so we didn’t expect to see an American standard of living (and certainly the United States has its slums). But the amount of loose garbage in people’s yards was appalling, to say nothing of the derelict cars. And we had the island of St. Maartens (both the French side and the Dutch side) to compare it to. This was bad. The good news, on reading some recent articles in the St. Thomas newspaper, is that the local government has voted money for increased sanitation and has begun a campaign against abandoned cars. A favorite sport in St. Thomas is to drive (or push, pull) an unwanted car into town, park it, lock it, and leave it.

Then we gradually came down again to where the sea meets the land. To the right of the road was a misty bay with a finger of mountains jutting out and a series of small islands with miniature volcanic mountains. As we came to sea level itself, Coki Beach was to the left. And there, with a white sign printed in red and blue, was the Coki Beach Dive Club. Part of the sign was missing, but in red and white it announced, “No experience needed.”