It is Friday, April 9. Up at 00dark:00 (3:00 AM) to get ready for our 4:30 taxi to the airport (ugh). Plenty of time for our 7:19 flight out of Washington - Dulles. A good flight into Miami for a transfer then OFF TO THE ISLANDS. We get into St. Croix about 20 min early. Imagine that. We pick up our bags and there is Centerline Car Rentals waiting to take us to our Jeep for the weekend. (Good service and discount over the internet.). Off to the hotel. We stayed at the DIVI Carina Bay Resort & Casino. Our first time driving on the "other side" of the road. We adjusted and did just fine. We get to the hotel at about 2:45 but our room is not ready yet. So we walk around, go out to the beach, sit by the pool. Wow! What a sight. It's 85F, sunny, clear blue-green water, great company. I go over to the bar to get a couple beers. No alcohol until after 4 PM. Oops - it's Good Friday. That's OK. We walk around and strike up a conversation with the person in the gift shop. We ask about restaurants and good thing we did. She pulls out a map and starts to mark up the map for places we would like (we are only there for 3 nights). Our room is now ready and we settle in. I get on the phone and start making dinner reservations for each night. Our room is on the ground level where we can just walk out onto the sand and right into the water. The sights and sound of the water on the beach. Perfect. We take a swim, have a beer, and just sit to unwind. Paradise. Friday night dinner is at Duggan's Reef at 8:30 PM. Later than we wanted but it was Good Friday. The restaurant was great. Open air, facing the water, steel band playing. Life is good. Great service, great food. We were in heaven. As we went out to the parking lot to our car, the sky was just lit up with stars we don't get to see back home. We head back to our hotel and stop in at the casino. We are not casino people. There was a group singing but the noise of the casino was just too much for us. We were tired anyway. Time to call it a night.
Saturday was a lazy day. Sit in the sun, snorkle off the beach, have a beer, swim. Very nice. We had 6:30 dinner reservations at The Galleon. As we are about ready to leave our room, a knock at the door - room service with a bottle of Champaign and a gift certificate for dinner. Some friends back home surprised us with this gift for our anniversary. It was our 40th. What a pleasant surprise. Off to dinner at The Galleon. We had a "special" table looking at the marina. Again, great service, great food, great view, nice music from the piano bar. What a nice evening. During the day, we drove down to Christiansted to check the area out. Not many shops open but great architecture.
Sunday was another lazy day. It was Easter. We had to scramble to get to brunch at The Cultured Pelican. Again (not to be boring), great food, great service, great view, great restaurant. Life is good. We picked up some orange juice and a newspaper (wow, $10.00 for a $5.00 NY Times), head back "home" for an afternoon of sitting out, reading the paper, drinking Mimosas (Champaign & Orange Juice), swimming, sunning. Is this heaven? We had a 7:00 PM dinner at RumRunners in Christiansted. Right on the water, great food, great service, great restaurant. Went for a walk around town after dinner. We drove over to Cheeseburgers in Paradise for an after dinner drink and entertainment. That was fun. We called it a night.
Mon was another lazy wakeup. The waves lapping at the beach, some birds chirping, headed to 85F, gentle breeze, clear sky, sunny. Another day in paradise. We grab a couple hours of sun on the beach before packing and checkout. We stopped at Just-in-Case Deli to have a sandwich (and finish our last 2 beers). Then off to the airport.
It was interesting. Everyone we talked to had a similar story. They came, they liked, they stayed. Hershey, PA, U.P., MI, Portland, OR, etc, etc. We can see why.
We came without our passports. I just forgot. We were OK, though. Not needed. Still had to go through customs at St. Croix airport. A slow line. We left about 30 min late, transferred in Miami, then on to Baltimore. We left 85F, warm, clear, sunny weather and landed in 45F, cold, rainy weather. What's wrong with this picture. For a couple days, everyone commented on how relaxed we looked. No wonder. We felt like we had just dropped into a "vacation capsule" .
Would we go back? - YOU BET.

Swimmer & Mermaid