Caribbean Resort Option: A Tent on St. John

05.12.09

In a midnight overcome, I figured it could be making a break for my towel, which I had primed for the next morning’s Caribbean sun on a wooden balcony perched above the sea. But this critter was making a give way in truly indigenous style; nothing on St. John , the smallest and least developed of the three main United States Virgin Islands, happens in a scuttle. It took almost half an hour to stalk the 10-foot span of the roof.

Elsewhere in the Caribbean, one could all things considered call a butler to swat away such nocturnal visitors. But not on this patch of St. John, on the fringes of a national greens abundant with bay rum forests, cactus shrub and mangroves. So I fell back to sleep with a plan of action. Should the iguana be loafing on my towel when the morning came, I would haggle it toward one of the overlying cactus branches with a trail of genips. Or something like that.

Our primary reason for visiting this bantam island a thousand miles southeast of Miami had drawn puzzled looks from our friends when we were planning the trek. We were going to the Caribbean to camp. Yup, camp. Well, kind of.

Source: New York Times