The Wrap-Up

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Driving is such an experience on Statia. First of all, there’s a very humorous element to it. Because of the sun, everyone has the top of their windshield either tinted, or covered in a sticker. If you’ve ever traveled to another country and seen people wearing English writing on their clothes then you’ll know exactly what a road trip around the island is like. Because the stickers have words on them that make no sense at all. I’ve been keeping a running list of my favorites. Here’s the count down of favorites from seven:

7. Live Yuh Life

6. Wha Nex?

5. Feel the Heat

4. Quad Lord

3. Even yo mother

2. Independent Woman Haha

1. Bun Fire

What exactly does ‘Bun Fire’ mean? And why is it in your windshield? That’s all I ever want to ask when I see that car. It doesn’t make any sense. I’m just so confused.

The other thing about Statia road trips (I use that liberally because the absolute farthest you can drive is about 5 miles), is that they have a very deep, existential quality to them if you take the time to notice. Here it is, the deep, dark secret that takes a whole month to realize…

Every road leads to where you want to go.

Seriously.

You have to actively try to get lost on this island. If you go too far in one direction, the road stops. The airport is in the middle. There are hills on one side and a volcano on the other. No matter how you want to get to the bay, you’ll end up there. Don’t know what road you’re on? Doesn’t matter. So basically, wherever you are, is the same as wherever you want to be. And it doesn’t really matter which fork in the road you take, there’s no difference between the more traveled and the less traveled, because they’re the same road. Think on that one for a second.

Sadly, no roads lead down Crooks Castle Bay. It’s more of a disaster zone that you reach by walking through the desalination plant and port authority. It’s a rocky strip of beach covered in coral that I have to patrol once a week. Why? I’m not sure. There has not been a single nest there yet because there’s nowhere to actually nest. A 30-meter strip of sand is about 2/3rds along the walk but I highly doubt any turtles will brave the rocks just off shore. Lynch and Compagnie are the same. No sand, just lots of rocks and death traps. I’m honestly surprised that I haven’t broken an ankle yet trying to patrol those three.

Here’s another abrupt change of topic. It’s illegal to kill animals that come on to your property and destroy things. Now maybe this is the gun crazy American in me, but I think that is absolutely absurd. The pigs have been invading the island and I’ve been chasing them out with a machete. Which, I was complaining to some people, is hardly the right object because it’s not strong enough to actually do any serious damage. I’ve scarred a few here and there, and drawn a little blood, but nothing major.  I even caught a little one the other day and through it over the fence by its feet. But none of it is having the hoped for effect—keeping them outside the botanical gardens. No, they keep breaking through the fence and rooting up plants, some quite valuable and sensitive. They’ve also thrown our garbage everywhere and broken into the kitchen to eat all the dog and cat food.

So we talked to the agriculture office about shooting them. It takes warning the farmer several times, though, before they can do so. But this farmer gets warned every few months when they break out of his farm. Finallyyyy, a meeting was held and it was agreed that if they weren’t gone by this Monday then STENAPA would have the right to start shooting. That got the farmer’s attention and he was out here all weekend reinforcing our fence and patching places they had broken it down. But it turns out, that even if they do break in, we normally don’t have the right to do anything about it. That’s. Just. Crazy.

But speaking of gutting wildlife, I’ve become quite the lionfish hunter. Six in the bag the other day. It’s quite satisfying to get one. But the word on the street is that it’s the most painful thing you’ll ever experience if you get stung. Liv watched someone get stung and they screamed for an hour straight. She, herself, got one in the finger and her arm started turning black for a day. That’s one way to end a dive quickly.

Normally we put them in a bucket and bring them back with us to the office. We have to open them up to see if they’re females or males and measure how long they are. Some days we leave them, though, for situational reasons, i.e., sharks. Last week four reef sharks were getting extra curious and following Steve and I around finishing off our disposed of carcasses. How’s that for an example of when it’s best to hand over your kill?

Last thing I want to say about Statia. When I walk the road into town there is a section near a couple of cow farms that has a lot of cow patties on it. I would normally complain about that except for one difference—they make for the best scenery to walk through. I’m not talking about them specifically (it’s weird you thought that’s what I meant), but what they attract. Butterflies! Clouds and clouds of butterflies that take off as you walk by. Hundreds and hundreds of little white butterflies swirl around as you make your way down the road.

Island Days

Islands and isolation go somewhat hand in hand. Besides the lack of fresh fruit or vegetables (at anything near an affordable price), and unbelievably expensive materials at the lumber yard, things here tend to move slowly. Our truck, for example, has been out of commission with a radiator problem for a whole month now. Which means, that our isolation is almost complete, and our escapes are entirely reliant on the generosity of others. Every morning Steve picks us up, and every afternoon he drives us home. Without him, we would spend two and a half hours a day walking back and forth to work. In other words, he’s a lifesaver. And it only costs him an hour and twenty minutes of driving each day.

The rides are nice, though. The windows down, a breeze off the water, sometimes music (when we can snag a station from another island, or the local one is open for business). The announcements are always vitally important, for instance, the local swim team is serving breakfast to raise money to fly to St. Croix so they can swim against another team. I love hearing those when I’m driving back and forth to the beach too. It reminds you that this island is one small town where everyone knows everything.

 

The downside to that is that it has very little going on, and when something does, you have to take full advantage of it. To be honest, we’re getting frustrated by the lack of pace. I can adjust to a degree, but being stuck at the garden gets old after you watch three movies in a day and read until you have a headache. The beach is on the other side of the island so our weekends consist of hitch-hiking to town to get internet and a short vacation. Mazinga has become my new hang out. Not just because of the pirate flag hanging outside, but also because they have a nice deck with chairs and tables that I can sit at while I work. Marta, my Spanish friend, works next door at the Old Gin House (the classy establishment on the island) and snagged their wifi password for me so now I don’t have to work in the office all the time. When she’s done working, and Leon is free, they come meet me there for a beer and a swim and I get to enjoy the Caribbean as we all envision it.

The garden is a little slow, as I said, but that is giving me time to catch up on movies. I’ve been watching everything in sight and feel quite cultured now. I highly recommend Win Win and the Devil’s Double and Behind the Pines. Excellent films. We’ve also become master falconers. Sort of. Zoe is finished growing, and entirely imprinted on us. She refuses to leave. We’ve let her stay for now, mainly because we were unsure if she was hunting or not, and because we haven’t known what else to do with her. But now that we’ve seen her catch a lizard, and our ear drums are completely shot from her chirping (24-7, no joke), Tuesday is going to be her day of release into the wilds. Just like a groundhog at home, she’s going in the cage, getting driven to the middle of nowhere, and getting left to fend for herself. Tough love on the island.

Work has been relatively successful lately. We fought for some more substantial projects and since then we’ve been working on a couple of surveys. The first, is a fish survey on a little wreck called Miss Kathy. It’s about 20 meters down and home to some really beautiful wildlife. There’s a big French Angelfish that lives there (my favorite kind!), and a massive stingray probably four feet across. I don’t know my fish well enough to be noting them all so I go as the photographer to document everything that is going on. Liv and Steve follow a transect line that I lay, and count and name all of the fish they see along the way.

Besides that, we’ve been working on turtle population surveys. These we do at night, on a big wreck called Chien Tong. It’s probably 200 feet long and home to 20 or 30 turtles. At night, they sleep there, which makes it easier for us to mark them with a big glow in the dark marker/crayon. We put a different symbol (+, o, or triangle) each night, and a number so that we can tell which turtles are returning and which are new. Using those numbers, we can estimate the size of the local population. It took us the first two dives to work out the kinks because it is surprisingly more tricky than you would think. Liv is our marker, I’m the data collector, Andrew is the cameraman, and Steve is the wrangler. Our mistake was trying to do all of the jobs on the first night. We ran out of air pretty quickly and it was too confusing.

Here’s how it works. Liv and I lead the pack. We search around the ship, over it, and eventually in it (pretty neat swimming into all the old cabins) looking for turtles. When we find one, we either identify it as one of the old ones, or determine it is new (harder than you’d think since the marker doesn’t last that well). Either way, I jot down whatever the marking is, Andrew snaps a picture, and we move on. Simple enough, right? Except that some of the turtles aren’t asleep and some don’t like be woken up. Which is where Steve comes in. The first night, when I was marking, I was also doing a lot of catching. Turtles are stronger than you’d think and it took a lot of pinning them down to hold on while Liv took the marker to number them. We switched up the jobs because Steve is a giant and has less trouble snagging them than Liv and I do together. Turtle catching takes a certain finesse; the key is pinning their front flippers back to their sides, if they’re larger, say chest size, hug them hard. The other trick is breathing out a lot. Instead of staying buoyant, it’s best to let our your air and sink onto the deck, otherwise they take you on a wild ride. Turtle wrestling is a bit like the rodeo.