Before we left for St. John and before we knew how smitten we would be with relaxing and the beaches of the Caribbean, we looked for things to do during the week we were in the USVIs.  One of the things we came across and that we signed up for in advance, was a full day sail on a Hobie catamaran.  The Hobie is a little cat that can go anywhere and flies across the water.  The maximum number of people it holds, including the captain, is five.  But lucky for us, we got the whole thing to ourselves!   We originally planned to go out on the Tuesday we were there, but the weather wasn't in our favor and we rescheduled for Friday, our anniversary and last day.  It was the best finish to our trip that we could have asked for!

Friday, June 7 was an ideal weather day.  We arrived at Sail Safari's and after a near mix up (they thought we were the couple going out on the big boat), we connected with Ike and set sail.  After navigating out of Cruz Bay, we headed for the back side of Lovango Cay.  We traveled light and it was a good thing, because everything we brought with us was drenched.  When you are just inches above the water, the waves come up and get you when you least expect it.   We pulled around to the back side, beached the cat and then hopped into the water to snorkel to our hearts content.  We saw a second turtle here, trumpet fish and several others that the beach snorkeling hadn't exposed us to.  But the best part is that we were the ONLY ones there.    We were able to take our time, dry out on the beach and move at our own pace before deciding to hit another cay.

Our next stop was back from where we came (and boy did we move fast!) to a cay known as Steven's Cay.  Here there is only one mooring, and it was taken by a little dinghy.  But, what makes the Hobie awesome is that we were able to find a little spot amid the rocks that we were able to pull up onto, beach the boat and jump in the waters again.  This stop was pretty awesome.  The water was clearer than even some of our previous snorkel spots and had some pretty cool natural coral reef shelves and enormous brain coral.  The sea fans and coral were really quite pretty.  We loved that stop.

After Steven's we flew to Henley Cay where we stopped for lunch.  Ike pulled out the little cooler with drinks and made us tasty sandwiches and served us chips and fruit.  It hit the spot for our starving stomachs.    We had time for one last stop after leaving from lunch (it was a late lunch), and we decided to head back towards St. John.  This time we pulled up to Honeymoon Beach.  It was pretty cool that we could just show up on the boat when all others had to hike there (including us the first time we visited that beach).   We saw a sting ray there and some of the biggest schools of fish we had seen previously.  We loved it.  We dried out on the beach and were sad when the clock turned 4pm and we had to get the Hobie back to Cruz Bay.

Our day on the cat was our #1 day on St. John.  We absolutely loved it and will repeat it the next time we visit!