Sunday 5/17/15
Today was our travel day, and our first day in Saint John. We woke up bright and early this morning to meet at the Columbus airport. Because our first flight was delayed, we were all a little stressed that we would miss our flight from Philadelphia to St. Thomas. Luckily, we made it safely and on time, and so did our luggage. We saw many interesting people at the airport, and then we took a short drive to get to the ferry. We spent a few minutes in town, where we walked around and got to put our feet in the (super warm and super clear) water. Getting used to the campground was a little hard; my cabin struggled to move a bed through the door and into our room. We also had to hunt down and kill a scorpion that managed to run inside. Speaking of, there are lots of animals here, like giant crabs, donkeys, parrots, deer, and cats. After settling in, we swam in the ocean a bit, and then went to dinner, where we discussed what activities the next couple of days would hold. I think everyone is very tired, yet still very excited for teaching tomorrow.
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Sunday, May 17, 2015
Christine So it begins. Today was travel day. Starting with a little stress at the airport. Our flight was delayed by 45 minutes. We had only one hour scheduled for a layover. So I was, as my daughter would say, “freaking out.” I’ll spare all the details, but the short story is that it all worked out. We didn’t even have to run to make our connection – though we did board right as we walked up. (Thank goodness for built-in extra time!) The flights were both uneventful and I was SO happy to not have to engage one of my worst case scenarios. It’s not easy to re-book twelve people on the same flight, so all’s well that ends well. Oh and there was that other thing about not having the name right for one of our girls on the ticket. Huge shout out to Joy M. at the US Airways ticket counter for rescuing the day! I am going to have to write a note of commendation to US Air for her calm efforts. She was amazing. We arrived in St. Thomas early, took a cab to Red Hook ferry dock with time to spare, came to St. John under cloudy but warm skies, picked up our cars, and sent the girls in an open-air taxi ride to Cinnamon Bay. It’s a lot of legs to the trip. The start to our day was 5:30AM, and we finally arrived in our cabins at about 5:00PM. They are all very tired. The girls reorganized their cabins, so did the chaperones, there was some cooling off at the beach, a yummy dinner and a team meeting at the end of the day. Bill drove to Cinnamon Bay to transfer all my mailed boxes to our cars for tomorrow, and then we had free time for wifi, star gazing, and sleep. I am so excited for tomorrow! Oh, and I know you’re dying to know… how are the mosquitoes? At the risk of jinxing it, they are minimal. The island foliage looks really dry and brown, so they must have had a dry spring. Despite a few showers last night, there is no standing water (aka mosquito breeding grounds with welcome mats!). Fingers crossed. |