House Hunting Trip - Villa Bambooshay (Day 7-8)

We finalized our first 60 days of living quarters on Thursday. We will be staying at Whispering Winds (http://www.vacationstcroix.com/WhisperingWinds/Whispering_Winds.html). We both feel very lucky to have the opportunity to spend 60 nights in such a place! The best part of all...visitors are welcome!!

We also traveled to the Carambola Beach Resort on Thursday, spending some quality R&R time on the beach! For dinner we went to the west end of the island and ate at the Sunset Cafe. We had a table for two in the sand no more than 10 feet from the water. Even though the service was horrible, it is still a great place to watch the sun set over the water.

Although we had been warned of such poor service and rudeness in the service industry, this was really our first experience. In fact, everyone we have encountered, even the fast food workers and strangers in the street have been super nice and willing to give directions or advice.

Today we looked at several more condos, some nice, others not so much! We are hesitant to commit to long term accomodations when we are still three months away from moving in. However, the last few days have provided us with a much better understanding of the housing market on the island, and has raised our hopes of finding suitable housing for the next two years!

H also found time to shop for a "St. Croix Hook" bracelet today. A must-have for all visitors to the island.

This evening we joined another couple and their kids for dinner. He is in R's line of work and she in H's, so we have a lot of similarities. We met up at a resort bar which was having crab races! For $2 you picked out a hermit crab, gave it a name (ours were Cranky and Sophie - guess who's was whose), and then watched as they were dumped from a bucket and allowed to run. The ones who ran the farthest won...and Sophie won!! H won a gift certificate for another bracelet and a free dinner!

We have about emptied our second tank of gas since arriving 8 days ago...not bad considering the size of the island. We have attempted to see every inch of the place. R is getting very good at driving on the left side of the road (a tradition left over from when St. Croix was ruled by the Dutch)! H has even started figuring out the layout of the roads and could probably drive from our house to the K-Mart without getting lost (quite an improvement from Day 1)! Other funny facts about the island are that you can legally drive while drinking (assuming you are not drunk), however, you are not allowed to drive while using your cell phone. The joke we heard today was "after being pulled over you can ask the cop to hold your beer while you sign your ticket for talking on your phone"!!