A Pirate’s Life for Him
A Tribute to St. John Icon Pirate Bill
CORAL BAY, U.S. Virgin Islands — Pirates, I have learned since moving to St. John, have discriminating taste in beer.
Grog, the watered-down rum that was the aqua vitae of all the seventeenth century seamen I read about as a kid, is passé. No modern-day pirate would be caught dead drinking it.
I sailed with one pirate who stocked only Heineken (and Stoli) in his galley. At Skinny Legs, where pirates venture in and out all the time, the Bucket of Buds happy hour special just hasn’t taken off. Every now and then a table of tourists will order it, but the locals are all drinking out of green bottles.
It shouldn’t have been a surprise, then, when I met Pirate Bill late one afternoon for an interview and he requested that our first stop be a beer run at the Calabash Boom mini-market. He emerged with a six-pack of Elephant (imported from Denmark).