We hired a car and went to the eastern most point of the US, at Point Udall in St Croix USVI. There is an interesting sculpture there that is in the shape of a double M that was unveiled on 1 January 2000. A marker pole in the middle of the Ms shows the azimuth of the sun on that date, while the shadow of the pole on the true north line shows local noon time.

We then drove to the second town, Fredericksted, with its fort built by the Danes in 1700. It is distinguished by the fact that the then Danish Governor, Peter von Scholten, declared the slaves to be free there in 1848, and that the blacks burnt it to the ground in 1878 during a labour revolt - perhaps they still weren't being paid. Cruise vessels stop there, and one was there while we were, so the tiny town was active. We saw more mongooses and a deer en route, but none of the Senepol cows that have been specially developed on the island.

Dinner at Balters, back in Christiansted, was good - one of the best restaurants we have been to in the Caribbean. I can recommend the tamarind sorbet.

Christiansted has another claim to fame - Alexander Hamilton, one of the US founding fathers, lived here as a boy. His parents never married and his father, the son of a Scottish laird, deserted Alexander's mother and her two boys. His mother died when he was about 13, in 1770, but his talent was recognised by the local merchants and they sent him to the US to be educated. He became the US Secretary of Treasury and head of the Army, and has gone down in history for inter alia being killed in a duel with Vice President Burr in 1804. Serious politics in those days.

We sailed back to St John in the British VI in an uneventful smooth passage this time. We were very glad to have visited St Croix, especially for the amazing Caribbean St Patrick's Day. We enjoyed being in a town of Danish origin, in the Caribbean, part of the US, with people of African origin celebrating the monk who brought Christianity to Ireland. The blog photo is of a painted Moko Jumbie. (Moko was a god in the Congo and Nigeria, and jumbie means ghost.)These are costumed people with cloth masks who stilt walk or dance in carnivals. We saw stilts and Moko Jumbie dolls, but alas missed a performance.