La Casa Loco and Sailor Sam

Before I bought my one way ticket I had found as many toll free numbers in the Virgin Islands as I could and called to ask people there what it would be like for me to move there. Most people I talked to were friendly and honest. They told me it would be expensive and there were dangerous people to watch out for. I was told that many people did move there without knowing anyone but find work and have a great time. They said it was like any other place in the United States but it was an island. I had all the info I needed and $500. I was ready.

One of the people I talked to at the tourist board gave me the recommendatin of staying at a place where many newcomers go when they first land: La Casa Loco. I made a reservation. A few nights later, when I realized the name of the place translated meant The Crazy House, I called around 2 am and asked Charlie, the owner, what kind of place it really was. He said it was clean and comfotable and I would be safe. He didn't sound very pleased to be awakened in the middle of the night. As it turns out, he may have just gone to bed. He not only lived in and ran the boarding house, he was the owner operator of a patio bar located down underneath the building. It was a very poplular local hang-out. I found out it also would stay open until around 1 am, sometimes 2am and my room was right upstairs.


I stayed at La Casa Loco for about a week. It did turn out to be clean and comfortable and it was a good starting point for my journey but my radio headphones were stolen, by the housekeeper, I believed, and I really missed them because it drowned out the noises. I didn't spend any time there in my room. I was always out. I had a lot of people to meet and jobs to find, fun and exciting things to do and places to go. By the end of my first week on the island I had found a couple of jobs (retail clothes and restaurants) and I met a girl named Tina who needed a roomate so we moved into a small apartment a couple of blocks from La Casa Loco.


Tina had moved there with a boyfriend from St. John and introduced me to several other people. We almost never saw each other at the apartment we shared because both of us were always on the go. It was a good thing that I got that job at The Cruzian Connection selling clothes because my luggage didn't arrive on St. Croix for two weeks. I had bought three cheap t-shirts and a couple of pairs of shorts to wear and made due with those but with my emplyee discount I was able to add a few more, nicer things to my wardrobe. I remember a dress I bought that had a low neckline and a wide skirt to it and a skirt that was a very short mini. I was feeling young, sexy, and free and went around with no underwear on for the first time in my life. It was thrilling but I didn't do it but a few times because once a guy at a bar got himself a free peek by accident and I didn't want that happening again.


That first week, I met Sailor Sam, a ruddy sea seasoned red head who drank lots of rum and promised to teach me to sail. I wanted to learn to sail. Sam introduced me to the owners of a popular bar in the center of Christiansted's waterfront district where I was offered a job. I never showed up for that job, however, because I had the opportunity to go sailing to Buck Island on a sailing yaught with Sam and some other girls. It was a fabulous day. We all went topless and caused a scene! Sam took some pictures and I remember sending a copy of it to his brother, Daniel, in prison, who I had begun corresponding with because he would write to Sam but Sam never wrote back. Daniel said the prison officials kept that picture for a long time before they ever gave it to him. He had to guess which one was me.


Sam and I had fun but things just didn't seem to work out sometimes. He got us a job as charter crew for a nice sailboat. We provisioned it with food and supplies and were ready to go on our first charter to the British Virgin Islands when the customers cancelled at the last minute. We tried again and sailed over to St. John but, again, there was no charter. I was dissapointed because I really wanted to learn to sail and travel around the islands. I did learn two things about sailing: boats take a lot of scrubbing and fixing and when the seas are rough I turn to total mush and am no help to anyone. Sam was laughing at me on our way back from that trip to St. John. We passed through a small but very rough squall and I was so queezy I had to just lie face down on the aft cabin bed and hold on while the mattress and I slid all around the cabin. At one point I made my way up to the doorway and asked him if he needed any help. He was wearing a yellow fowl weather jacket and had himself locked to the boat with a sturdy line and clamp. He was eating some grapes and just laughed at me and told me to go back to bed. I did.

Sam was crazy about me. He said I was the most peculiar girl he had ever met. I think I made him crazier sometimes, especially when I had found other jobs and moved on from him but he wasn't ready to move on from me. I enjoyed our time together but I was on a great adventure and so, like the jobs that came and went, so did some of the people. I was not going to allow myself to get stuck in any job, relationship, or situation for too long. I wanted to experience many things, go to as many places as I could and learn from it all as much as I could.

Here is a picture of Sam and I on the dock in Chritiansted. Thanks for the fun times Sam!

I'll never ride another bus for as long as I live

I bought a one way ticket to Paradise, to St. Croix in the American Virgin Islands. I bought a one way airline ticket from Miami. I thought it would be cheaper to take a bus from Little Rock, Arkansas to Miami. It was but...........


From my journal: 12/11/88

Atlanta, GA 3:20 am - Somehow I managed to sleep most of the way from Birmingham. I was miserable before I got to Memphis. There are too many strange people and most of them smoking. A nasty man sat behind me and blew his smoke on the back of my head. I'm so tired. I can't breathe. Thank God, I will never take another bus as long as I live.

My legs keep falling asleep. I can't stop thinking about lying horizontal in a warm and comfortable bed, alone, without all these ugly, scary people around me. I'm so thankful I was not born one of the ugly in the world, one of these sad and creepy people.
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I have taken buses many times before this. When I was in high school I went between Little Rock and Fort Smith many weekends to visit my boyfriend. I remember them being fairly nice, clean and rarely ever full. There were the occasional weirdos that I avoided but nothing ever happened and I don't remember being afraid or uncomfortable.

Travel has changed since then and with it the buses and the people who ride them. Too many of them are no longer commonly used by families and anyone who preferred not to drive and wanted to save some money or just couldn't afford the more expensive airfare. Many of the cross country buses are used primarily by transients, mental patients without a hospital, and the poor or pathetic who are just trying to get someplace. Many of these people are rejected in one place and shuffled off to another or may be the type who prefer to stay on the move. Whatever the case, it's not hard to see from the crowd that they are not stable, healthy citizens.

I must confess, I did ride a nice bus recently. It was from New York City to Easton, PA and it was as it should be, normal people trying to get somewhere. I recalled my conviction to never ride another bus again for as long as I live but reasoned that I was in a city where almost no one owned a car and many lived in the surrounding areas so the bus is the most logical and economical way to make the commute. I was also assured by people who knew that they were very nice and they were right. But I will still not take a bus from Arkansas to anywhere, ever.
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12:30 noon - I missed my bus connection while I was writing my last journal entry. It left at 3:25 am. I spent 5 hours sitting in the Atlanta terminal with the transients. I put my bag in a locker and wandered around trying to find a clean, quiet, and safe place to sleep. I slept about an hour in the ladies restroom on a table.

I sat by a Shoshone Indian named Raymond for a while. He was a large man with very long black hair. I thought he was going to catch it on fire when he lit his cigarettes so I gave him a rubber band to put it up with. He asked me to do it for him but I declined. He was interesting to me, because I had never spent any time with Native Americans. He stunk of a hangover and kept jiggling his cheeks, shaking his leg, closing his eyes and chanting. I soon found that it really wasn't possible to have a real or interesting conversation with this native.

I stepped outside briefly to see the snow and look at downtown Atlanta but a voice on a loudspeaker repeated the advice of not going outside because crime was so bad. I saw a scarred and mean looking man and went back to my seat. I tuned my radio headphones to a classical music station and tried to tune out my surroundings. I will never, ever ride another bus as long as I live.

12/12 6 am - Because I missed my connection, I was late getting to Miami. My bags were not at the bus station. The building was nothing more than a small room with a door and a few chairs inside. It was situated in the middle of an open field area. I could see lights all around and the airport not far away. I waited about 3 hours, hoping my bags would arrive on another bus. Only one other bus arrived but no bags so I took a taxi to the airport in time to catch my flight to San Juan. I was going to my unfamiliar island destination with only a backpack containing a change of clothes (sweats), makeup, and some peanuts. I thought for sure my bags would be forwarded and catch up to me. I will never ride another bus as long as I live!

I just kept thinking ...beaches....susnhine....warmth

I gave my old blue raincoat to a Haitian woman. It was an ugly old thing that I brought along just to have something rather than nothing and had planned to discard it when I got to a warmer latitude. This woman was trying to get to New York but seemed unable to make it happen. She didn't have any money and didn't know what to do so she just sat there, going nowhere, doing nothing. Pity.

I flew to San Juan, my birthplace, but had a very short time between flights so only I saw the airport. I vowed to get back there someday and visit the fortress at El Morrow where I was born when my father was stationed there while serving in the army in 1964.

I arrived, wearing sweats and carrying only my backpack, in balmy St. Croix, in the afternoon and took a taxi to the guest house in Christiansted where I had made a reservation, La Casa Loco. I was in an old world, island city. I was tired and really needed a bed to sleep in but, of course, I had to see more of my new home. I checked in, dropped my backpack on the bed and set off to explore the waterfront city of my new home.

I knew that my bags and I would be reunited eventually. I had phone numbers for the Greyhound Bus and Airline I flew on. I would call them the next day. This first day I just wanted to enjoy the warm air and get orientated, meet some people, and relax.
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It was two weeks before I saw my luggage. In my inexperienced and naive youth, I had assumed my bags would follow me and end up sitting at the St. Croix airport because that was how they were labeled for my final destination. I called repeatedly trying to locate my bags and finally found them at the Miami airport in the cargo storage with all the lost packages, shipping crates, and boxes. I got on the phone with a man who was working there and I asked him to look around. I said "Do you see a beige suitcase and a burgundy colored garment bag?" He said, "yes". I said, "Do they look like cargo"? He said, "no". I told him that my contact lenses and clothing were in those bags and I needed them as soon as possible. I asked him if he would please put them on the first plane to St. Croix and he did. I got them the next day. I just had to get the right person on the phone.