Well, I finally got around to writing about our trip. It's amazing how things are already fading. Several times I asked my wife, "do you remember . . .?" and we were both a little fuzzy about some little detail. Sigh. I wish I had found this forum months before we went on vacation instead of just days as I did. Would have been a valuable resource!

If you have any questions, feel free post them here, e-mail me or PM me. I'm now perusing the Relocation Message Board . . . who knows what might happen on down the road!

John

Tuesday, 4 July 2006

Traveling with my family (daughter – 19, son – 12, wife and myself). Departed St. Louis, MO (STL) on-time for Miami, FL (MIA). On-time arrival and departure for St. Thomas (STT).

When we got to STT, we were met by my brother. He arrived earlier in the day, picked up our rental van, dropped his family (son – 13 and his wife) at the Marriott at Frenchman's Reef and returned for us. Had read about the ladies in the airport terminal passing out complimentary Rum Punch and somebody complaining about them asking for tips. Received our punch and didn't even see a tip jar. Went to get our baggage; yes, it's in what amounts to an un-air conditioned warehouse type building . . . but then so is Burbank Airport in California and probably many others across the country. Baggage appeared in a reasonable time; no baggage security. We just walked out with our bags without anybody checking to see how many we had or who they might belong to.

My brother and family arrived earlier from San Juan, Puerto Rico. Their scheduled flight was canceled due to mechanical problems, and they ended up catching another flight. Good and bad. Their luggage did not get loaded with them and at the time of our arrival, they were still waiting on it – no swimsuits, sandals or anything. The beach was right there and they were frustrated. They picked up a new suit for my nephew so he could swim. Luckily my wife had a spare for my sister-in-law and I had a spare for my brother. Good thing we're family!

We got settled into our room while the boys hit the beach just as fast as they could. We spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach swimming, watching the sun set and a cruise ship head out of port. MAN! Those things are big! They depart just west of Frenchman's Reef and still, at least from water level, looked taller than the Marriott Resort. The Iguanas are everywhere! They are really something to watch. Another vacationer told us that they will go after women's red-painted toenails. We left the beach to get cleaned up and run to the airport to look for luggage. My brother had made multiple phone calls and been left on hold extended times trying to find out the status of his luggage. He was finally told on one of his calls that his luggage had been sent on, should be in around 5.00pm and not to look for it until after 5.30pm. We got to the airport around 6.30pm and found his luggage sitting in the middle of the floor all by itself. We grabbed it, hoofed it back to the van and headed for Red Hook. We had hopes of watching the fireworks on St. John and getting dinner someplace. Red Hook was crowded! Cars crawling back and forth on the streets, in and out of parking lots and people everywhere. We finally found a pay parking place up behind the Esso Station and supermarket. That was interesting . . . we pulled up, didn't see anybody so drove on up and found a parking place. On the way out a guy stopped us to pay for parking; something like $3.00. We got as far as the street in front of the Esso Station when the fireworks started, so we just stood there with the rest of the crowd watching. A ferry from St. John must have just come in, as we saw lots of people pouring out of the fenced in area across the street and too the east. After the fireworks, we wandered around looking for a place to eat and finally settled on Duffy's Love Shack. Duffy's is not much to look at, which is part of what makes it so fun. Located in a parking lot, the majority of Duffy's is outside seating and a fun atmosphere. The wait staff had fun with their jobs and there seemed to be a lot of regulars. The roads between Charlotte Amalie and Red Hook are really interesting after dark.

Wednesday, 5 July 2006
Everybody slept in after our day of traveling, both to STT and on the island. Had breakfast at Coco Joe's at Frenchman's Reef. Be prepared for $12-16 a person for breakfast. Stopped by K-Mart to pick up a few things and made the mistake of going through the drive-thru at McDonald's for the boys. I think we were in line for 30 minutes from start to finish. Definitely 'Island Time'. Once we got going we did a little touring on the way to Magens Bay. Found the scenic overlook at Drake's Seat and enjoyed the view of Magens Bay below and Jost Van Dyke in the distance. A local had a goat on a piece of rope. After getting pictures of our kids with the kid in their arms (bad pun) we learned a lot from him. Gave a good spiel about the area. Left him with a tip and headed for Magens Bay. Next stop was another scenic overlook with a view of C.A. A local there had a donkey with sunglasses and a hat he told us was named Monica Lewinsky. Another local was selling towels that folded up to make a beach bag; my sister-in-law had to have one. On the way to Magens Bay we stopped at Udder Delight at St. Thomas Dairies where we all enjoyed some of their frozen delights, then on to the beach. We understood that Magens Bay was one of the 10 most beautiful beaches in the world and were not disappointed with its appearance. Big sweeping bay, palm trees, white sands, beautiful bay and pleasant waters. Our wives got to talking with another lady who used to live in the area, so they got lots of good information. We stayed there till late afternoon then went to Indigo Restaurant and Bar for dinner. Neat outdoor dining experience. Our waitress told the boys they were welcome to swim in the pool while they were waiting for dinner to come out and they were off like a shot. This turned out to be their favorite restaurant. After my dinner of pan fried sea bass, it was one of my favorite places to eat as well! We watched the sun set over Magens Bay while we talked and ate.

Thursday, 6 July 2006
Staying at the Marriott, we had the 'opportunity' to listen to a time share presentation. We had done this when we went to Colonial Williamsburg with my brother two years ago. A time-share was not even a consideration then. Today . . . well, we're finding the island beautiful and were really tempted. Took a rain-check. That ended up taking more of the morning than we had anticipated.

After we got done we decided to look into a dive trip. The Adventure Center at Marriott was very helpful about setting that up for us with Underwater Safaris. Ended up going out in a rush to make a dive at noon. We got set up with dive equipment and taken out to the boat. A short ride took us out to Buck Island (not to be confused with Buck Island Reef National Monument off St. Croix), two miles south of St. Thomas. We did a reef dive, followed by a wreck dive on the Cartanza Senior (very interesting history on this wreck). Enjoyed both. My wife and children, not being divers, snorkeled the reef and had a good time. They saw a small shark, as sea turtle, lot's of fish and had an excellent view of the wreck. They thought they could just swim right down to it. My brother, his family and I dove with the guide and a couple other people that came on the trip. We were very pleased with our experience with Underwater Safaris and were well taken care of.

After we got back from the dive I grabbed my son and nephew and did a couple of geocaches ( http://www.geocaching.com) that are located near the cruise ship docks. This was a first for my nephew and he thought it was pretty fun. Didn't get to do as many geocaches on vacation on STT as I would have liked.

Back to the beach at Frenchman's Reef to finish up the afternoon with some more swimming. That evening we went to Cuzzins (Charlotte Amalie) for dinner. Great Caribbean Menu and we all enjoyed dinner. Stopped by K-Mart to pick up cereal, milk and some donuts for breakfast the next morning.

Friday, 7 July 2006
I woke up at 06.00am and everyone else was sound asleep. Went up to the sixth floor deck (we stayed in the Sea Cliff area at Marriott's – the sixth floor is level with the main lobby and entry area and the first floor exits down to the beach.) and watched the sun rise over the island. Got some good pictures of the sunrise. Heck, got beautiful pictures everywhere we went on the island. I walked over to the outside seating area of the lobby, which faces town. Continued watching the sun rise over C.A. - illuminating the hillsides and working its way down to the harbor. Another cruise ship came steaming into the harbor. What an awesome sight seeing a huge floating city glide into harbor so gracefully and work its way over to the dock. Back to the rooms for breakfast and get ready for a day trip to St. John, arranged by the Adventure Center. Down to the Marriott Dock to catch our ferry to St. John and a 'safari tour' of the island. Ride was O.K., but we had diesel fumes the entire trip. Saw many beautiful homes gracing the shores of STT and had fun picking out the ones we 'would live in'. Arrived at Cruz Bay and loaded our Marriott group of 44 into two trucks and wound our way across St. John and Road 10 to the west and back to the east on 20. Stopped at a couple of overlooks with fantastic views of the island. Everything looks like a postcard. It's amazing! Toured Annaberg Historical Sugar Mill Ruins (there was a geocache nearby that I didn't get to do!) then head east along 20. More beautiful views, including Cinnamon Bay, and stopped for a few hours at Trunk Bay for snorkeling. Equipment rental was arranged with the folks from http://onehornbuttfish.com. Had opportunity to talk to Dave about snorkeling in the bay and living on the islands. Really nice folks. Trunk Bay is home of the Virgin Islands National Park Underwater Trail. Plaques set along the bottom tell you about the coral and other life that you can expect to see along the trail. The best location we found for seeing fish was just around the corner of the island. Parrot Fish, Sargent Major Fish, Yellow Tail Snapper and more. From there we worked our way back to Cruz Bay for an hour of shopping for the ladies; malts for the boys and I. Looking at the map of Cruz Bay it looks like there is a lot more there that I would like to see there. Apparently our ferry from STT to STJ broke down and we returned on a different, bigger ship. Smoother ride, but it wallowed more. Spent the rest of the afternoon and early evening on the beach. Decided to get take-out pizza from Pappa John's for dinner. While the kids were watching TV, we sat out on the balcony eating pizza, drinking beer and listening to the surf. Life is rough.

Saturday, 8 July 2006
We decided we would go to Bluebeard's Castle and Blackbeard's Castle. We found Bluebeard's (my mother-in-law had once had Banana Daiquiri's there, so we were going to look for it) and decided to pass on it. Missed the turn to 35 that would take us up toward Blackbeard's and ended up touring part of the island on 33, to 40 to 35 and came up on Blackbeard's the back way. There are no bad drives on STT. While definitely commercial (thought the $12 per person admission a little steep) the grounds of Blackbeard's are very interesting; the top of the castle provides an awesome panoramic view of C.A.; enjoyed daiquiris from the bar; toured Villa Notman and Haagensen House and sampled more rum punch in the Rum Factory. That was a pour your own, with as little or as much rum or punch as you wanted! We got lots of posed pictures of the kids around the pirate statues. The ladies all had to get their picture taken with the pirate that looked like Johnnie Depp! The boys found the pools again and swam while we toured. From there, we went down 99 Steps. The ladies went into town to shop while dads gathered the boys and returned to the beach at the hotel. The ladies had no problem catching the shopping ferry back to the hotel. It runs every half hour; costs $6.00 each way. Of course, they had lots of offers from taxi drivers for a ride back while they were shopping. Dinner that evening was at the Hook, Line and Sinker in Frenchtown. More good food. The swordfish was excellent. Might even have been as good as the pan fried sea bass at Indigo! The stuffed yellow tail snapper was quite good. We parked near the ball field close to the restaurant. Leaving we happened to look up an alley and saw the name of a bakery painted on the wall. Decided we were going to have to come back and check that out . . .

Sunday, 9 July 2006
Woke up early again. Had the keys to the van so ran into town to look for the bakery we had seen in Frenchtown. Found the fisherman selling fish near the ball field and browsed their wares. Dang, no cooking facilities in the motel room. Went to look for the bakery. Was parking nearby and happened to ask a local about it . . . found out that it had been closed for several years. He told me about another bakery further to the west (I forget the community) so I headed that way. Missed a few turns, but finally found it. Got pastries, rolls and doughnuts to take back for breakfast. On the way back I found an open air market on Main (?) Street and stopped to pick up some fruit. Back to the rooms for breakfast. We got our act together, ran by K-Mart for a few things and headed for Coki Beach. What a trip! We found a parking lot for a place called Coral World and were turning around to try and figure out where exactly we need to go to swim at Coki Beach. A local named Troy got us headed into a parking spot and then took us in hand down to the beach, announcing that we were his people. Got us set up with rental beach chairs, showed us where the snorkel rental shack was and where food was. We got there about 11.00am and stayed until after 6.00pm. We loved this beach! Snorkeling here was fantastic. If you get into the water on the end of the beach toward Coral World (turns out this is a commercial establishment, maybe like a mini-seaworld), you will find yourself surrounded by schools of Yellow Tail Snapper, Sargent Major Fish, Parrot Fish and more. You can buy dog treats (like Bonz) to feed the fish and they come a-swimming when you break out the food. My brother thought it would be fun to hold one end of a small piece of a treat and let the fish nibble from the other end. A large Yellow Tail Snapper came up and tried to take the whole thing, all the way up to his second knuckle joints. Fortunately, no teeth, just a hard cartilage mouth. Scraped his fingers up a bit. Saw a sea turtle out in the deeper water and found an eel along the reef. A local band started playing in the early afternoon and we enjoyed them the rest of the day. Dropped a tip in their jar. A young local named Shakira kept checking up on us during the day. Had her bring us drinks from the daiquiri stand. Let them know how much rum you want in your drink – you'll get whatever you want. Gave her money for the drinks and tips. She ended up bringing us back change and she gave us the tips back with the change. Had to pull the tips out and hand them to her again. Several food stands along the beach, so you won't go hungry. You sure won't go thirsty. Another geocache on the beach! Did that one with my son, nephew and brother. We all had fun. Dinner had to be our favorite again – Indigo. Caught it on the way back to town and the food was just as good as the first time. I had to try something different from the sea bass, even though I wanted it again.

My brother and I stopped at the dive shop yesterday and picked up dive lights. We had plans to do some night snorkeling somewhere along the line. Grabbed out lights after we got back (after 10.30pm) and swam off the point at Frenchman's Reef. We had seen quite a few fish during the day and were a little disappointed as we did not see much in the water after dark. Finished snorkeling and stopped by the Marriott Beachside Pool to warm up in the hot tub before returning to our rooms. Ran into a couple from Carbondale, IL, a little over an hour from my home. We're going to get together for dinner sometime after we're all back. It's a small world.

Monday, 10 July 2006
Decided this would be a shopping day. I was interested in walking around and looking at the shops, the ladies wanted to shop for jewelry and more, my brother and I lugged laptops along to take to Beans, Bytes and Websites in the Royal Dane Mall. Drove around downtown looking for a place to park and none were to be found. Large parking lot near Fort Christian (sp?) was packed and cones were placed in the entrances. Ended up parking up near Blackbeard's and walking down 99 Steps to the shopping district. One of the first places we hit was Dynasty /Dazzlers Inc. Nice folks, beautiful jewelry, good price on liquor and free delivery to our hotel if we bought six liters or more. Jean on the liquor side was practically pouring the rum into us offering samples of each of a dozen types of liquor in various combinations. We really like Rum Cream! On the jewelry side, ask for Moti Mike. He's a real character and was a lot of fun. Also check to see if he is still wearing the helicopter air medical pin I gave him! He told me he would – grin. From there we wandered the downtown area for a bit. My brother, the boys and I finally had enough and headed for Beans, Bytes and Websites, lugging our laptops along. Don't lug your laptop through the shopping district. There are PLENTY of terminals in the coffee shop. We sat for an hour or so and caught up on e-mail, various websites and let the boys spend some time playing on their favorite websites. Caught back up with the ladies for lunch at nearby Tavern on the Waterfront. Good food, pricey. Walked around some more checking out the open air market and more shops. Finally had enough shopping and headed back to the hotel and the beach. Stayed there until late evening and then cleaned up a little bit for dinner at Coco Joe's. On the way back to the room we ran into the couple from Carbondale and got to talking about doing another night snorkel. He's a diver and decided to come with us. Back down to the beach and into the water. Saw a large stingray right off the beach and got our hopes up. Once again, not many fish to be seen. Where the heck are they hiding at night.

Tuesday, 11 July 2006
Up early so we can be to the airport the recommended 2-1/2 hours before our departure to allow us to go through check-in, security and customs. Check-in went relatively smoothly. You have to fill out a customs/duty form stating what dollar amount you have purchased and are bringing back into the states. We estimated high for our entire family and didn't hit $500. Did lose a couple of mangoes we brought with us and planned to eat with pastries and danish from the bakery. Plantain were allowed through though. Hated to leave for home. I walked up the boarding stairs of the airplane behind a woman in sandals; She must have been on the beach that morning as there was still some sand on her ankles and sandals. Made me want to be back on the beach. As we taxied out to take off the ocean is literally just off the wingtip to the south and I kept thinking, 'I could be out there swimming in that water . . . .'

Needless to say, we thoroughly enjoyed our visit and will be back. Will have to experience things from some type of rental instead of a resort to get a more realistic viewpoint of being on the island. Dreams of moving to the island have been chasing through our heads. Wonder if my son would like to attend the University of Virgin Islands???

Car rental – Staying a week on St. Thomas we found it a must! We were two families, seven souls, vacationing together. We discussed renting a car at all, two cars versus renting a van and the benefits of being able to head off in different directions versus traveling everywhere together. We ended up renting a van and went just about everywhere together. Since my brother lives in California and we live in Missouri, it was additional time to visit on the trip. Driving on the left was a challenge but doable. Right turns at intersections took a moments pause to think through. We had to laugh about the sticker on the dash, “Drive on the left – Honk often. We learned that traffic stops anywhere, anytime, just about anything goes when encountering traffic, one quick toot was often to get your attention and two quick toots was often a thank-you. We saw few cars that didn't have a scrape on a corner of the bumper or down the side. Parking, much less driving in downtown Charlotte Amalie can be interesting, especially when a cruise ship or more is in. Made our rental at the airport, which avoided the airport drop-off fee and a taxi ride into town. The whole trip we were free to go where we wanted.

Taxis – Another side trip here. What a unique way to travel. For the most part they are full size pickup trucks with the beds converted to seats with step through sides, some type of awning top and roll-down sides for rainy weather. With five rows of seats, they seat somewhere between 20-30 people. A few are vans and cars. Anytime we were on foot, taxi drivers, or their agents, would ask us if we needed a ride. If you stopped to talk or look for a few minutes on the sidewalk, you could expect to be asked if you needed a ride multiple times; it might be a pip on the hooter (horn) to get your attention, the window rolled down and called through or approached on foot if the taxi was parked.

Cell phones – We use Cingular with the Nationwide plan. Naturally we ran into areas where there was no coverage, but we had better service than my brother did with his Sprint phones. Half the time he had little or no signal at Frenchman's Reef and we had full signal. Read a message last night that talked about hitting some of the B.V.I. Towers from the north side of the island and incurring international charges. Just checked with Cingular and found that all the calls we made fell under our Nationwide Plan.

Internet Access – Expensive access from the Marriott at Frenchman's Reef. You'd think that would be an included item at a four or five star resort! There is a bar/coffee shop located in one of the Havensight strip malls, near the cruise ship docks, that offers free WiFi. Naturally, the would appreciate your buying a beer or coffee when you come in to use their Internet access. Beans, Bytes and Websites has multiple terminals and high speed Internet access. You can find a coupon for discounted access ($3.00 an hour versus $5.00 if I remember correctly) in the information/coupon books found throughout the island. Don't lug your laptop around with you!

Tips – are pretty well expected for any service rendered, sometimes when you don't realize you're getting that service. Case in point, pulled into a gas station. Guy came out and asked me if I wanted to fill up and I replied in the affirmative. Told me to go on inside to pay when he was done and started to take care of pumping. Wanted to fill it up with premium and had to tell him to go with the 87 octane instead. Got inside and asked the man behind the counter if the 'attendant' worked for the station or was hustling a tip. He told me he was a local scrounging for cash. Oh well, that's cool. Had no idea what pumping my gas was work, tipped the guy $0.75 – didn't' get my windows cleaned or tires and oil checked!