Hey there everyone! Here is my trip report, as promised! Thanks to those of you who were so helpful to me before we went.

Beware, its long - here is a summary to help you decide if you would like to read on:

My husband and I are in our early 30s and went with our 2 children, BOY - 9, GIRL - 6. This was our second trip to STT, and our second stay at the Wyndham. We rented a car for our day trip out to STJ with Varlack Ventures and Budget for our stay on STT. We saw Maho, Cinnamon, Trunk Bay, Magens Bay, Sapphire, Coki and the Wyndham beach, ate at several restaurants, we did not take the all inclusive plan. I apologize if I am posting obvious info or things that have been said before. Any ratings are my opinion only, of course.

April 13 – Thursday

DAY ONE - SLOWING DOWN

After a very choppy flight and 1 airsick child, we arrived in STT at about 2pm and were on Wyndham Hotel Property by 2:45. Our room was not ready til about 3:10pm (not too bad) so we sat around and enjoyed the rum punch they had available for us ) Also stopped into their plentiful gift shop to pick up a hat for my boy, as he totally ignored me when I told him to grab one on the way out the door. We had a spectacular view of St. John from our balcony, and the room was standard: 2 double beds, a bathroom with 2 sink areas each with its own mirror, large closet, refrigerator, bed linens were crisp and clean, the bedspread looked new, the carpet was spotless, shower curtains, and corners of bathroom floor free of any dirt (one of the things I look at too to see just HOW clean things really are…), all chrome was shiny, satellite dust free TV, free use of room safe.

MORE ABOUT THE WYNDHAM:The hotel has 2 ATMS, a tour desk, 1 restaurant near the lobby for breakfast and dinner as well as a video lottery room. The property has a spa, a new mini golf area, tennis courts, swimming pools with waterfalls, a kids club, (pool towels), small boat charters leaving from the property, jet ski rentals, chairs on the beach, snorkel rentals, hair braiding, a bar by the pool as well a restaurant by the pool for lunch and dinner, a grill for lunch where they start making pizza at 6pm, and a BUDGET car rental lot on the property. We saw 2 weddings while we were there, interesting J. Somehow, there was 1 towel in the room so I called to ask for more, and by the time we hit the beach to do some really decent snorkeling and came back, there were already plenty of towels in the room. We walked the steps up and back each way, but the shuttle that runs from the lobby to the pool to the lower parking lot was running all day, we saw it go by several times. We had dinner at the Mangrove Restaurant (a buffet that includes all you can drink, and I know we were on island time, but we barely got our first drink and actually stayed as long as we could to make sure we got a second. The buffet was $35 after all!!!)

April 14 – Friday

St. JOHN BEAUTIFUL

Woke up to POURING and I mean POURING rain. But since we knew better, we packed up our beach bag and got the kids dressed and headed for Red Hook. By the time we got there, skies had cleared and we were off to St. John on the 9am ferry. This part cracked me up. We got to St. John and headed for Varlack to pick up our car.( Its very close and easy to find.) Our car wasn’t ready…”there was a delay because of the rain” I thought it was kind of cute, made me think of the 2 feet of snow we got a few months ago. So we went to have some breakfast at the little smoothie place at Wharfside Village. (I don’t remember the name!!!) Very good. By the time we headed back to Varlack, our car was ready and we were on our way. It was already 10am, so we decided to go as far as Maho and work our way back. Maho was basically deserted. (YES!) We parked over by the old building and just enjoyed the quiet (yes, my kids like quiet too - they actually picked this vacation over Disney when given a choice-they are 6 and 9) Since my husband wanted to get in some good snorkeling after swimming around and relaxing, we packed up and headed to Cinnamon. The kids loved this place, too. The waves were great, I couldn’t believe that there was surfing going on!! The snorkeling was good too, although, it’s a bit of a swim and my 9yr old got a little tired and needed some help. (my six year old is usually semi-permantly attached to hubby) My son and I went to Tree Lizards to pick up some lunch to bring back to our spot. Great Hot Dogs for the kids and absolutely delicious Tuna Sandwiches for me and hubby (it was Good Friday…) A bit after 3 we decided to move on to Trunk Bay. The underwater nature trail is interesting and informative. One advantage with Trunk over Cinnamon was that one did not have to swim that far out to see some good stuff, great for the kids. We cleaned up and headed straight back to Cruz Bay for dinner, rather than stopping at Hawksnest (which I really wanted to do but the family was just too pooped!) We cleaned up in the Trunk Bay facilities and headed back to town. The facilities there (changing rooms and showers) close at 4:30pm SHARP. They shut down the grill for food at 3pm.

We ended up going to Stone Terrace for dinner. The staff was very nice and the food was terrific. The view from the Balcony is a bit better (we’d gone there last year), but the sunset was not really that great that night anyway since there were clouds over STT.

April 15 – Saturday

LIMIN’

(We had a jeep from Budget: We had reserved a less expensive car, but it is all they had, so we kind of were stuck with it…at the higher price??? I still need to call them and figure that out. Apparently if another renter decides to keep their car longer, they just let them…hmmmm…. )

Unfortunately, the shaky flight and climate change, or perhaps a stomach virus brought back from the states had given my 9 year old a terrible, nauseating headache in the middle of the night. The next morning he seemed to be better until we hit the switchbacks on rte 42 towards Magens Bay. Glad I had plenty of plastic bags with us (which I always use as mini garbage bags while on the beach so we can just toss it in the bin on the way out) Magens Bay was not super crowded, met some nice people visiting from the cruise ships and just enjoyed the beautiful clear waters. My boy rested in the shade, the temperature was so perfect there, and with a fresh breeze blowing, he actually started to feel better and hit the water again. The kids used their goggles to play games in the water and we spent the entire day just chillin’ on the beach. We finally headed back to the hotel around 4:30 and went to the hotel pool for a bit and grabbed a pizza and hit our room. We had movie night with the kids 🙂 (They do have kids movies playing nightly in the amphitheater at 7, we never went). Oh, and had some bushwackers, of course.

April 16 – Sunday

PRAYER AND SNORKEL KIND OF DAY

Slept in a bit and started to get ready for church. Went to Mass at Holy Family Catholic Church. We got there for the 10am mass, witnessed a baptism taking place before the mass, which then started at 10:30. It was a beautiful service. After mass we headed back to our hotel, and get this. We had brought meat with us, LOL! a frozen kielbasa, just so that we could eat an Easter Kielbasa on Easter Sunday…c'mon..just for tradition!!!) The gentleman down at the restaurant grill threw it on the grill for us! After that we headed to Sapphire Beach. (My poor hubby is hard of hearing, he kept looking for signs for Safari beach, it was a drive of “DAD, its SAPPHIRE, not SAFARI!!!") Very nice place, snorkeling was awesome, however, a little too rough for the kids. Hubby enjoyed it immensely. We took a walk out on the little lookout area and got some great pictures and looked at some sea urchins living in the cracks of the rocks. What a beautiful, beautiful place!!! We ended up heading out to Molly Malone’s for a nice dinner (kids had chicken tenders and grilled cheese, I had scallops in butter and hubby had fried shrimp). The wait staff is really nice and the food is Good.

April 17 – Monday

SHOPPING!!! And driving….

Day off from the beach. We decided to drive in to Charlotte Amalie. Not too bad of an experience, for those of you familiar with the area, there are some detours and some 2 way roads that are now 1 way. I think the phenomenon of Road Rage is really non existent on St. Thomas…? I’ve never seen such well mannered drivers, honestly. We headed to For Christian parking lot and they had just started putting up the carnival rides, so we lucked out with plenty of parking. We asked a police officer as we drove in if we could park and he said to go ahead… hm. Ok. Shopping was great. Daniel at AZURE was very helpful (THANKS!) and we finished all of our souvenir shopping including pretty Caribbean Hook bracelets for my daughter and myself, (and of course, RUM!) we were going to walk to Blackbeards Castle, but we forgot!!! Oh well…we then decided that we would take a ride to Mountain Top. That was a haul! I would say its one of those “Go once” places, but I don’t think I would go back. The view was spectacular, but Drakes Seat would have sufficed, there are a bunch of shops up there as well as a local candle maker who has really nice scents and gave us some directions to a secluded beach. We decided to venture down…and well, I started to get nervous. First, it was the NO ENTERING sign..then it was the dirt roads on steep hills, and the final straw was the cow in the middle of the road. My husband said the look on my face was priceless, and he decided that it was probably best to turn around, or else. All I could think of was getting stuck down there somewhere…and NO ONE WOULD KNOW….Like we said to eachother, if it was just us, maybe we would have gone on, but with the kids, who needs that kind of adventure? But we were in for another mini-nightmare that evening. When we got back to the Wyndham, the power on the property was out. So we washed up and went out to Fungi’s to eat dinner. It was pretty good, one of the guys from the charter doesn’t seem to appreciate kids too much and sort of rubbed me the wrong way, but I got over it. When we got back to the resort, the power was restored…HOORAY!

April 18 – Tuesday

GREAT DAY – HORRIBLE NIGHT

Got up early and made it to Coki Beach by 9. We were immediately approached and led to the beach, had a perfect spot chosen for us and chairs delivered. When I needed snorkel gear, all I had to do was look around, and someone came running over. When we got hungry, again, someone was right there ready to help 😉 The thing about this beach was that it got crowded. We didn’t mind as we had some really relaxing days, and we have been to Public Beaches on the CT and RI Shoreline! Lol. We got to watch the cruise ship folks pour in and out, pretty neat actually, and of course fed the fish, which my daughter absolutely LOVED! Amazing what a different experience that was compared to the fish on other beaches that don’t come around until you just drift along… She also got her hair braided (Mancy did a great job) So at about 5:15 we headed back to the Wyndham ( I know…LONG day at the beach) And guess what--that darn power was out again. Hm. We grabbed a couple of gallons of water that they were handing out, and got the flashlight that they handed out from the night before out, and washed up. Out to dinner we went. Roberts was wonderful (at the Elysian) Very nice place, Very good food. Back to the Resort, hopefully for a swim. But what were we thinking… that the power would be on like the night before? NOT. Out still…still out at 10pm, and 12am, and 2:30 am when I finally opened the balcony door (I was choosing to get eaten alive rather than suffocate) and then still at 3:30 when I could smell the exhaust fumes from the generator that they were starting below. Oh and at 5:30ish when the sunrise woke me up, the only light was still the light of the new morning sun…the only thing that came back was running water.

April 19 - Wednesday

LAST SNORKEL and PACK UP

Apparently they got the lobby computer systems up and the water running as a temporary measure and continued to work on the power outtage. We decided to hit the beach again, and realized there were many many upset people. (Not that I blame them.) I saw people leaving their rooms with their suitcases in the middle of the night and talked to one family that was simply cutting their vacation short. We managed one last snorkel, one more game of pool by the pool and went to pack. I sent hubby to see the Iguana feeding with the kids, which they enjoyed, and we were ready to go. We were the only family that was going on the shuttle back to the airport, so he took his time getting us to the airport so we could thoroughly enjoy the views one more time. Customs was slightly chaotic, just a lot of people trying to get through customs AND security, but we made it and I was even the very lucky person to be selected to be searched and patted down… Why I can’t win other stuff..???

My final thoughts on the Wyndham and Power Outage situation – It sucked. Agreed. It is not a usual occurrence for the Wyndham though. If it was not for the outage, I would honestly be hard pressed to find any gripes to list (I guess for me its all about expectations, I didn’t mind walking the stairs, I am a jogger so it was some of the only exercise I got out on vacation! And island time is island time everywhere, not just the Wyndham, the food wasn’t GREAT but there are so many other great places to eat that we really wanted to try…and the snorkeling is very good at the beach there) At the same time, I can see how frustrating it is to show up for your paradise vacation at the prices that must be paid, only to find out you have to wait TOO long to get your room, and have to sleep with absolutely no air circulation available when you do, cold water, and simply DARKNESS (wouldn’t you know the night we slept without power, there was almost no breeze to be found) I was told by the resort to contact them in 2 weeks to find out what will be done to compensate…

If you made it this far, even if you skimmed...thanks so much! Here's wishing everyone a safe and wonderful stay their next trip to the USVI!!!