VIRGIN ISLAND TRIP, 1965

There were few books in Leos childhood home because they would have been a
luxury for a family of 6 just coming out of the Great Depression. The adults time was
consumed with daily household tasks and with earning a living and supplementing
income by raising a Victory Garden. Fanciful, abstract or hypothetical ideas in print
were not immediately useful, anyhow. Opportunities for exotic vacations and sports were
for the Rich and Famous, and Leo didnt interact with any of that class.
But, when Leo was a youngster, he went to Saturday afternoon movies at the
Dunes Theater on Sheridan Road, just south of Zion. For a child, the cost for a movie
was 14 cents. Leo collected empty glass pop bottles for the refunds hed get and earned
his movies admission. As he remembers, he didnt have any money left for popcorn or
candy. The films offered him a glimpse into a wider world of possibilities.
Those movie afternoons included News of the World and sports shorts, serials
and cartoons in addition to feature films. From some movies he learned of pirates in the
(1) Caribbean, of Robin Hood and (2) castles, of the (3) Wild West (horse operas) and
the (4) Rockies and of (5) German and (6) Japanese soldiers fighting in W.W. II. From
the sports shorts he learned of (7) saltwater charter-boat fishing and (8) wilderness trout
fishing in places such as the Throughfare area beyond Yellowstones eastern edge. He
watched (9) skiing in the winter Rockies with wide-open eyes, imagining the speed and
jumps. Though in a cushioned seat in a movie theater, he accompanied (10) people
snorkeling on coral reefs and (11) hunters stealthily pursuing big game in forests of giant
trees. So, you see, even before TV, film from the Entertainment Industry offered a map
of the avenues and addresses for future searches for adventure and new knowledge along
the Journey of Life. Leo had the beginnings of a Bucket List. He would later add to
his List as he became a reader in high school, and read voluminously for courses in
college.
PARTIAL LIST OF FULFILLMENT:
On our 1958 honeymoon in Colorado, he finally saw the Rockies in person. (4)
In 1960 Leo got his first taste of trout fishing in Wyomings Bighorn and Idahos
Clearwater national forests. (8)
In 1962 he went fishing in the Pacific for salmon on a charter boat based in Neah
Bay, Washington State. (7)
In 1963 we visited (at the invitation of an exchange student from Austria) castles in
Europe and looked for aftereffects of W.W. II. (2, 5)
In 1965 we vacationed in the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico, taking several
opportunities to snorkel on coral reefs. (1, 10)
In 1968 we met the Wutzke family in Wyoming on our summer trip that year and
got started with riding horses in the Wild West. We joined them on pack trips into the
Yellowstone backcountry and adjacent wilderness areas and even got to the Thoroughfare
region. (3, 8)
Sometime around 1980 Leo got to attend a wintertime education conference in
Denver and got a chance to ski in Vail, his first of many skiing experiences. (9)
In 1983, Leo got a look at Japan on a trip sponsored by the U.S. Joint Council for
Economics and Japanese Ministry of Education for the purpose of informing a selected
few U.S. teachers concerning the Japanese economy. (6)

Not until the mid-1990s did Leo get to go big game (elk) hunting next to our WY
home, the Crazymoose. (11)
Back to the Caribbean.. In the early 1960s we began canoeing on
rivers in Illinois and neighboring states on spring and autumn weekends with the
Chicago-based Prairie Club. Leo felt that we could enjoy that recreation together and
could eventually include one or more children. Actually we were able to expand to
include Roses sisters family and one of Leos nephews and a niece, as well as various
friends. Around campfires, fellow canoeists shared travel experiences. One time John
and Josephine Krusack described their vacation in the U.S. Virgin Islands and
emphasized snorkeling and sailing.
Our decision to experience for ourselves a vacation in the Caribbean in April of
1965 (Spring Vacation) came about because Rose was 6 months pregnant with Carl and
would not be going back to teaching for at least several years. Therefore, there would not
likely be any surplus $ (or time) for airfare and hotels and restaurants for the foreseeable
future.
In those days, most people used a travel agent to make reservations. Ours was able
to find accommodations perfectly suited to us on the island of St. John. It was the Lille
Maho Resort. At that time the majority of tourists to St. John stayed at Caneel Bay, a
Rockefeller resort. But this would have been quite expensive for us and restrictive in that
we would have been required to dress for dinner and we would have felt overly
programmed in recreational opportunities and entertainment options. There were not
many other accommodation choices for tourists. The Rockefellers had contributed to the
nation, however, by buying up much of the land on the island and handing it to the
government for a national park.
There could have been a campground possibility, but that required reservations
months or even years in advance, and we were too late for that. Besides, as this might be
our last classy vacation (and, actually, first) for a long time, we didnt want to
complicate it with getting camping gear and groceries on the main island of St. Thomas,
transporting the stuff to St. John and doing our own cooking. We wanted to be free to
play. There were a few scattered tourist home possibilities in Cruz Bay, the islands
largest (but still small) town, but we werent sure how that would work out.
So, on a Saturday morning we flew off from Chicago to Miami, changed to a plane
headed for San Juan, Puerto Rico, and changed again to a small plane bound for the
island of St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands. We took a taxi to the islands east end and
boarded a ferry to get to nearby St. John. We landed at Cruz Bay and hired a taxi to take
us to an assigned remote, unoccupied spot on the coast. The taxi driver unloaded our
luggage and drove off. We were all alone. It reminded Rose of the Alfred Hitchcock
movie North By Northwest, where the main character follows mysterious directions,
takes a bus to a lonely, dusty crossroads in rural Indiana farmland, gets off and sees
nobody in any direction to meet him. From there on he gets into real trouble.
But our predicament was soon resolved when we saw a rowboat slowly making its
way to our location. The young man pulled his boat partway onto shore. Rose was
dressed for travel, though not of the row-boating variety. She took off her high-heeled
shoes and he helped her in. Leo climbed in and we shoved off into the Atlantic Ocean.

After we cleared a headland that jutted out from shore we saw a few meager signs of
habitation. We landed on the beach of Lille Maho Bay.
Our resort consisted of a few (8 or 10?) small cottages near the beach and a main
house up on a hill. Each cottage had fold-up bunk beds, a small bathroom and a
kitchenette. There were no screens on the windows, but we didnt notice any insects, so
no problem. Those little harmless local lizards (anoles?) came and went at will. We were
asked to be conservative in our use of fresh water because there was no well and water
was collected in cisterns or had to be delivered.
The resort was owned by a woman who possessed remarkable culinary skills. She
supplied breakfast necessities (bacon and eggs for us to cook, coffee to brew, English
muffins and cereal) and lunch necessities to each cottage daily. She would cook and
serve the evening meal in the main house. She used local ingredients and the food was
delicious.
Provisioning required careful planning. The North Shore Road did not pass
directly by our resort, so supplies had to arrive by small boat as we had, or by path to the
road as it passed farther inland. There was no golf course, no tennis court, no swimming
pool, no TV. It was great! Only resort guests used the sandy beach as there were no
other people or developments in sight and the road was a long hike inland. The bays
water was warm, clear and shallow a long way out. We didnt have to go deep to snorkel.
Leo had started the journey in Chicago with a bad case of bronchitis. But salt air and
warm sunshine soon cured him.
At that time communication was by way of short wave radio. That was how we
were able to hire a rent-a-Jeep from Cruz Bay. We arranged to meet a driver by
climbing the path to the North Shore Road and drove him back to town. We then spent
the day exploring the island. We had expected the island to have lush vegetation, but
centuries of agricultural use, hurricanes and possibly fires had left second (or more)
growth in most places. That is not to say that the scenery was disappointing. The island
seemed sparsely populated and there was little sign of human industry. We saw more
goats than people. We enjoyed the day, especially the long-abandoned sugar plantation,
Annaberg. In late afternoon we returned the Jeep to Cruz Bay, and the driver took us
back to our resort.
On another day we used the short wave radio to hire a sailboat and captain for a
days circumnavigation of the island. As we waited for the boat to arrive in the morning,
we saw a vessel approaching and were shocked when it tipped nearly over on one side.
We half expected it to sink. But no. It was our heavily keeled sailboat and it was simply
turning into our little bay. We started the trip on the north side of the island and headed
eastward in the Atlantic Ocean! We stopped at a lovely, lonely bay for lunch and
snorkeling. Then we returned along the south side of the island in the Caribbean Sea!
We towed a dingy, just in case anything happened to the sailboat. Leo rode in the dingy
for a while, to take photos of the sailboat. We were relieved to find that neither of us gets
seasick. It was an exciting day, and cost a whole $100 for the two of us!
We were sad when the time came to leave our resort, and additionally sad that we
might not be able to return to it in the future. The owner told us that her property was
scheduled to be bought by the Rockefellers to be added to the national park. She had
been allowed to stay this year and perhaps a few more. Then the little resort would cease
to exist.

We returned by ferry to St. Thomas and its biggest city, Charlotte Amalie. We
stayed one night in a sort of tourist home quite pleasant. The next day we walked
through the city and eventually caught our plane to return to San Juan, Puerto Rico. We
stayed two nights there in a lovely hotel, El Convento, which had once been a convent. It
was pure luxury! The first evening we saw a show of flamenco dancers. The following
day we visited the old Spanish Fort El Moro and the rain forest park about 60 mi. out of
town. On a Sunday we boarded a plane bound for Miami where we changed to a plane
headed to Chicago.
We never again took a trip like that together. Leos economics education trip to
Japan in 1983 did include luxury housing and exotic meals, but was also stressful due to
the language difference and population density and extremely long travel time, combined
with the equally large jet-lag time difference.
So, Leo accomplished his original Bucket List and more, not listed above. And,
paraphrasing the pop song, did it his way, adapted and improved over the routes taken by
the Rich and Famous.