Carnival

Every island in the Caribbean has a carnival each year which consists of parades of mostly women in bikini costumes and huge sound trucks going down the streets along with a concert and vendor area. Carnival appears to have started in Italy as the festival, carnevale — which means “to put away the meat” as it was the day before lent and people gave up meat for lent. It spread thoughout Europe and over to the new world. After slave freedom it was started in Trinidad and Tabigo to celebrate freedom and spread from there. If one was very organized and did his research, one could schedule a cruise to hit each island at carnival. Neither of us are that way, or maybe we have become mature so it isn’t that important.

One of the boats

vendor booths on the harbor

 

However, we were in St. Thomas during their carnival. Carnival lasts a week and we missed many events. We did try to see the boat races the day the O’Connors left. We were told they started at 10 AM so we arrived at Charlotte Amalie’s harbor shore at 1 PM and they hadn’t started yet.



a practice run

Boats " waiting to race"

The harbor front was packed with people and food and drink stands, as we waited various boats roared by in practice runs, but no race.

 

 

 

water jet boards

Amazing board

We had some drinks and food and a couple people on water jets showed up to demonstrate how to fly in the air with these jets. Finally about 3 PM we started to leave and a couple of orange markers were towed into the harbor. We waited and eventually two jet skis took off around the course. I don’t know who won, or even where the finish line was. 

There the jet skis go!

Leslie talks to the police about the fire

 

We gave up and caught the ferry back to St. John’s only to find that the block by Woody’s had had a fire and lots of smoke damage.  Lucky, Woody’s only closed for the day.

Our new kayak

boater's beach party

Our inflatable kayaks arrived and we were back in St. Thomas to receive them, some things actually arrive in reasonable time so we tried one out paddling around the bay. That night we had our own carnival beach party with other boats anchored in Brewers Bay.

kid's steel drum band

The health center got into it

 

Later in the week was a kids parade, J’ouvert, an adult all night dance that started at 4 AM, and the adult parade on Sat. It started around 10 AM and when we got there at noon it was in full swing! The theme was a Caribbean celebration and the costumes were really great. About 4 PM it looked like the parade was over, we did not realize that it was just a very long break, so we left for dinner only to see the rest on the parade on TV! 



 

 

 

 

 

Leslie will not be left out!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The king and queen

Suzanne and Leslie with the bird

 

The Carnival town was in a big parking lot with vendor plywood shops now lining 3 sides with a big stage in the front. It was definitely quite a week, ending with fireworks over the harbor.  They made all the boats in the cove by the Coast Guard station re-anchor for the fireworks which lit up the night sky for a colorful culmination of Carnival.