We arrived in STT on July 13, managed to pick up our marrage license and make it to St John the to Maho Bay Campground! Wished we had packed more lightly! Stairs are difficult to manage with Heavy luggage!!
We got all setteled in our "treehouse" and I have to tell you that Maho Campgrounds is a really AWESOME place, the whole campground is wonderful, staff is great, and the place is so clean! Even though we didn't have the everyday utilities like running water, central air, phone, TV, room service: we loved "roughing" it. We had a fan in our room which probally kept us alive, we had plenty of bug spray (off skintastic worked wonders), and we had each other. The night creatures sang us to sleep at night, and the peacefulness of the campground was what we needed to wind down from our hectic lives back @ home!! HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!!!!!

Our first day after arriving we snorkeled both Little & Big Maho Bay. It was both our first time snorkeling, and we just love it! Little Maho Bay had lots of little & big fish for us to watch and get used to our gear. We had purchased our own prior to leaving for our trip. I'm not a lover of water, so I HAD to use the snorkel vest that I purchased, and thank God I did, I prob would of drowned without it. Our under water housing for our olympus digital camera worked GREAT! Hubby did a great job taking pics, while I floundered around staying alive was my main objective! At Big Maho Bay, I saw a 5 foot barracuda that about ate me alive 😉 hubby didn't even see it, and it was no more than 2 foot away from him, I still remember that big yellow eye stareing at me... hubby says the barracuda gets bigger everytime I tell the story!!! 😉

After our snorkel in the early morning, we took a cab to town and explored Cruz Bay, walked all the streets and alleys, looked in all the little shops and ended up at Woody for our pre wedding drink and meal! We got Conch Fritters and rum punches, bushwackers and more rum punches! Then we return to our treehouse to shower up and got dressed for our wedding on Trunk Bay @ sunset.

I was impressed at Trunk Bay at sunset, we had planned it to be on a day that there would be no cruise ships visiting, and the beach was practally ours. We had Bob Davis marry us and it was just wonderful. Being married on the beach, at the waters edge, next to the turtle nesting area, at sunset with the sound of the water hitting the shore is like a Fairy Tale and the most ROMANTIC thing I have ever witnessed!!

Friday night, well we had just got married 😉

The next day, saturday, we hiked out to Francis bay, and it is our favorite place, I know it was EARLY morning, and no one was up yet, but the beach was deserted, we had the place to ourselves. We snorkeled one end then the other. It is by far the best snorkeling that we did on the island!!
We hiked back and stayed in our campground and snorkeled our own beaches (Mahos) the remainder of the day.

Next day Sunday we hiked the Lenister bay trail. And did the Annaberg ruins. We hiked out to Lenister bay and it was a wonderful hike. We were early again, but amazingly there were lots of other early risers. Popular trail! We headed to WaterLemon bay and it is so pretty out there. Our main objective was to snorkel to WaterLemon Cay as were everyone elses who was there. There was an amazing amout of people and really the snorkeling wasn't that great. Not better than Francis bay. The water had waves and the current was strong. It made an hard snorkel. The water is DEEP while your snorkeling there and when you get across it is SHALLOW! Hubby got reef rash. We didn't snorkel long. We thought all the hype that we had read in multiple postings and books that it was going to be amazing! So we were a little dissapointed! The Annaberg ruins were pretty neat. It's amazing that they are still standing after all the years, the place was a little spooky if you ask me... sprits roaming 😉 On our way back we stopped in Francis bay again, and it was full of people, a cruis ship was in STT and the people had flocked to the beaches... we sunbathed and people watched!

Monday we went to spend the day in Charolette Armalie. Left 9ish and did lots of walking. We walked to Heavensight in search of a pirate store. Found it and didn't buy anything. Walked back to the shops in downtown and got our souviners for our kids! Found Blackbeards ale and got the flag we were looking for. Stopped at the Happy Buzzard and had a few Rum Punches. Took a couple to go and headed back to St John where we spent the rest of the afternoon/evening at Woodys. Got myself some of those cute woodys shorts. They took our pictures and we are on their webpage www.woodysseafood.com
I really don't know how we made it back in Fretts taxi to Maho Campground but we did! we watched the sunset at the restruant and headed back to our treehouse for a night of deep drunken sleep.

Had Frett drive us to Cinnamon Bay next day Tuesday. We snorkeled there and there were lots of people there, the coral was covered in sand due to all the snorkelers. We sunbathed mostly. Oh yeah, I also sat on a BEE!! ouch... I cried. Honey said of all the beach there was, I choose a spot to sit where a bee was! It hurt BAD!!! 🙁
We only walked into the ruins on the side of road, there were bee's and I was scared by then plus honey had blisters the size of China on his feet from walking Lenister trail in tennis shoes & socks. He didn't get the Keens that I had and most everyone else......

Wednesday we headed to STT to our resort hotel room. We had an early flight Thursday morning and the ferry would not of gotten us there in time. So we packed up and left St John. The Emerald Beach Resort in STT was VERY nice. We wound down, watched some TV, amazingly a war started in Iseral while we were on St John! We took HOT showers/baths, ate fine food, swam in a pool, and sleep in air conditioning for our last night on the Islands!!

The trip back is a whole new post and an experience we are still recovering from! I don't want to remember those nasty details so soon...still trying to forget!

But we are home now! The honeymoon is over, we are back to work, the kids are home, the dog is barking, laundry needs folded & put away, dishes need washed and oh yeah, the bills need paid!!!!!.............
I look at my pictures daily and I CANNOT wait to go back!!! I still smell the salt air, feel the warm breeze, and that warm rain shower while we walked on the beach. I can even still taste the Rum!! Oh how I wish I was on Island time my whole life!

Here are some of our pictures: I couldn't find a sight that I liked to put them on, I guess this one will do, if you watch the slideshow it'll show the captions: http://s104.photobucket.com/albums/m175/naturepeaceluv/

Thank you Islanders for sharing your Beautiful land with us. We will sure and be back! I think all our friends want to go now too!!!!!

Zena & Kevin