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A most amazing rainbow Christmas morning, seen from my front deck.

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Go for a car ride, folks enjoying the beach.  I don't 'beach' much, I dislike sand!!

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Some folks laugh at the tiny beaches here,  they're used to the humongous continental beaches that are  thousands of miles long.  But I say we have 'Designer Beaches', each with a special charm of it's own.  This is Cane Bay Beach, where I most often dive.  I get in the water by that boat ramp.

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This another beach, Butler Bay Beach.  I went to Thanksgiving day dinner here, a great picnic!  The big blizzard that snowed in the USA a few days ago came here in the form of big ocean waves, washing away a lot of sand, see the edge?  The sand will slowly build back up, a natural process.  Ha, big waves here are two feet high!
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Lovely big brown Senepol cattle.  A breed created here on St Croix, from Angus, Brahma, and some others.  They don't mind the tropical heat, and they get huge!

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These cows were shy, and turned away, this is a sort of telephoto photo

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The road leading on past the estate where those lucky cows live.  The big trees are Mahogany.  Most roads are two lanes here, and the Island speed limit is 35mph, for the most part.

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Another estate, I've been inside this one.  The construction is massive.  The outside walls are four feet thick, and the interior walls are three feet thick, solid stone.  You feel like you're going through a tunnel between rooms!

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The entrance to the estate.  Old old walls built by slave labor two hundred years ago

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More old stuff, ruins of a rum factory.

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Another driveway.  The families that own these estates almost never sell them.

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Oh boy, these pretty pink blooms are on the Coral Vines.  An invasive plant from South America.  Pretty, but it takes over like Kudzu and Wisteria

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A view of the Carambola resort.  A very nice golf course, and expensive homes.  There are two other golf courses on St Croix.

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One more 'ruin' they seem to have filled in a doorway.  I guess the slaves with the donkey cart went off to find stone, brought back a load, then went off in another direction for more building material.  Old buildings are made of every kind of rock on the island, and coral 'stone' also.  The bricks are Danish, brought from Denmark as ballast in the sailing ships long ago.  When the ships left, they left the yellowish bricks here, as they were loaded heavily with rum.

OK, all for today!  Thanks for stopping by.  My next lot of photos will probably be topside also, as the sea is so stirred up with the high surf that underwater photography won't be very successful for the next few days.  I'll be gardening for the most part.  Cheerio!

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