WATER SHORTAGE
Probably the biggest problem for Charlotte Amalie is that of good water, particularly drinking water. It is scarce and during the dry season, very scarce. Mr. Maguire told me drilling for wells is out of the question. They are either dry, or salt water. St. Thomas has no lakes, natural ponds, rivers or streams. It is even said that women sometimes wash their hair in the ever-present Coca-Cola. As a result of the water shortage, large patches of steep mountainside are cemented with water catches at the bottom for the rains when they do come.
All the police, the woman behind the window at the post office and the school children were Negroes, neatly dressed. No race problem here that I could see. A very few women carried loads balanced on their heads. When the ship docked about five or six rowboats of boys gathered on the bay side. The idea was to throw pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters down and they would dive for them. They rarely missed. . . They stayed from 10:30 a.m. to 3:40 p.m., when the ship sailed. One of the ship's officers told me the average take was three to four dollars.
Since leaving the island of St. Thomas we have moved steadily on. The ship averages something in the low 20's of our land miles- per-hour. . . Now we are far past the eastern hump of South America, have crossed the Equator, turned back southwest and are running along the coast of Brazil, and tomorrow we dock in Rio. The ship has a tiled swimming pool, well-patronized. The cabins, dining room, bar, latticed verandah, etc., are air conditioned, and well need be.
This is a fine way to rest and eat. Other than the ship's activities, all you see is a very few cargo ships, five miles to invisibility away, porpoises, flying fish, a gull or so, occasional low, dim landheads, the sky, the stars and moon—and water, reasonably calm but still as restless as a candidate on election night.