The Journey, The Climb, The Reward – Ram Head, St. John

This is a guest post by the beautiful Castaway Crystal. Enjoy the story!

“The ones who climb the mountain don’t wait for permission…They just start walking.”

I stumbled across this quote the other day and instantly it reminded me of our hike up Ram Head Trail on St. John.  Unlike RumShopRyan, I don’t do much research when traveling. I like to go in blindly with no expectations and just let things unfold as they may. I think it makes you appreciate the experience more and keeps you in the moment when you have no idea what kind of amazing things you’re going to see or do. Ram Head Trail was a perfect example of this and I think RumShopRyan got a little taste of that not-knowing amazement as well. He knew about the trail, but had no idea where it was going to take us.

It was our first full day on St. John and we decided to do an exploration day to get a lay of the land. Nothing was really planned, so we hopped in the jeep and we were open to whatever the island wanted to show us that day.

After our first stop at Peace Hill and Denis Beach, we drove to Coral Bay.  We had lunch and a couple beers at the famous Skinny Legs, took a picture of a goat or two, and then drove to Salt Pond.

Once we got to Salt Pond we did our usual videos and pictures. We saw a sea turtle, a few sun worshipers and snorkelers. After that it was time to hit the trail which is on the opposite side of the beach from where you enter.

The mile-long trail starts out on a rocky path along the edge of the shore. As we kept walking up, the scenery changed. It went from a tropical beach setting to an Arizona desert. The path became red dirt and rocks with cacti all around us.  From the desert landscape we then walked down to a pebble beach. Here we saw cairns or zen stones that pervious hikers have built. We added stones to the stacks for good luck.

Once we were done playing on the pebble beach it was time to walk up the steep hill to Ram Head Point. It was not an easy feat. It was one switchback after another and there were times you weren’t sure where the trail actually was. It was not labeled all that well. There were also times it got pretty scary because you are right on the edge of this massive hill. One slip would really put a damper on your vacation. So if you choose to do this strenuous hike, make sure you have the right hiking shoes and plenty of water.

After the last long stretch of walking up hill on an uneven and unmarked path, we finally made it to the end of the trail. The final destination is at the top of Ram Head Point. It’s the southernmost point of St. John. It’s 200ft. above sea level and we were in awe of the view. The deep blue Caribbean and British Virgin Islands stretched out before us. We were in awe of the hike we just conquered. We were in awe of what we had just accomplished. We had no idea how long the trail was. We had no idea that the landscape was going to change so much. We had no idea we were going to be climbing a huge hill and be 200ft above sea level that day. RumShopRyan and I got to see and experience all of this because like the quote above says…we just started walking.