Mike in the Wild

Most people with a limited amount of time on St. Thomas head immediately to Magens Bay Beach.  Cruise ship passengers by the hundreds include at least a short stop at the longest and, possibly, most beautiful beach on the island.  While undeveloped and protected as a park, I've always understood that it's not known for its snorkeling, lacking easily swimmable coral reefs.  As a result, on my recent visit to the Virgin Islands, I headed to Coki Bay at the northeastern end of the island.  As the taxi driver reminded me in the cruise port about my favorite pastime, "I've lived on St. Thomas for forty years; believe me, it's the best!" I actually had a list of several other snorkeling spots to consider: Secret Harbor, Lindquist, Brewers Bay, and Sapphire.  Each was off of a sandy beach, and each had its own attractions.  However I was familiar with Coki already, having snorkeled there just over six years ago.  It was a pretty beach with the requisite Virgi...

A stop in Old San Juan is often the highlight of any cruise to the Eastern Caribbean.  Founded in 1521, the capital city of Puerto Rica is the second oldest European-established capital in the Americas. Well-preserved Spanish colonial buildings and streets crowd an easily-walkable area, making for a colorful and history-filled visit.  While I've been to San Juan several times, I've never ventured any further away from the city than the international airport.  As a result, I never witnessed any of the tropical island's countryside until my latest cruise, when I booked a tour to El Yunque National Forest in the east.   About an hour-long drive from the Old San Juan cruise port, the protected area is the only tropical rainforest in the national forest system.  While it's one of the smallest in size - not even 29,000 acres - it's one of the most biologically diverse.  My tour, called an El Yunque Rain Forest Drive, promised me a brief look at the landscape...

On my nature walk through the Damajagua Forest in the Dominican Republic, I wasn't surprised to see a wooden sign that said the forest supported more than 200 jobs. There had to be over a thousand tourists on the trail, nearly every one of them wearing a helmet, life preserver, and rubber water-shoes rented at the very busy visitor center at the trailhead.  In fact, many of the visitors were off of my own cruise ship, on a separate excursion described as "an adrenaline-filled adventure" on seven of the Damajagua River's waterfalls.  Whooping it up on a birding tour?  Fortunately I soon discovered that the noisy crowds belied the fact that the forest was home to an interesting variety of native flora and fauna.   Damajagua is more of a wide stream than a river, cascading down the forested southern slope of a verdant mountain range defining the  northern coast of the Dominican Republic.  The water apparently flows into the Rio Bajabonico which the guided...

I made the decision a long time ago that when I visited Maui during whale season, I would stay in South Maui.  So during my five-night visit last month, I chose a rental condo in South Kihei where from beaches like Kamaole One, right across the street, I could witness the spectacle of humpback whales breaching in the distance.   Another reason informing my decision was that I wanted to give Northwest Maui and Lahaina some space while they deal with the aftermath of last summer's tragic fire.  While the resorts and beaches outside of the city proper were unaffected and are open for business, it was hard for me to imagine driving through the devastated landscape to have a day of fun in the surf.  The much more practical excuse for sticking to South Maui was that the winter season brings frequent swells to the northern shores of the Hawaiian Islands: great news for surfers but bad for snorkelers.  In fact, the Snorkel Store's morning report was frequently advi...

Two visits to Maui and one to Oahu within eight months is a lot for even me, a person enamored with the Aloha State.  But I had never been to Maui during whale season, when thousands of humpback whales migrate to the surrounding waters for a winter of calving and mating.  While I was disappointed to discover that I had missed the peak of the season by a week, I was nonetheless thrilled to not only see dozens of the giant creatures but to even hear them.  Like when I visited the Big Island three years ago around the same time of year, the whales were easily visible from the shore.  The clouds of mist from their blows were usually the first sign they were present, often followed by their back and knobby dorsal fin cresting out of the water.  If the whales dived, their tail fins sometimes emerged high out of the water.   One evening at sunset on Charley Young Beach in Kihei, I watched a pair of whales far in the distance toward the community of Maalaea ha...