St. Thomas

I love the U.S. Virgin Islands! It's so nice to be able to hop on a plane to an awesome island in the Caribbean where they speak English, use dollars, and you are still in America! We spent the 4th of July long weekend in St. Thomas and St. John. What an amazing trip!

 

We got to the hotel in the early afternoon on July 3rd so we still had a few hours to spend at the beach. The Ritz was having a great promotion of a fourth night free so we took advantage of it. The travel day down wasn't bad at all. We flew to Miami, had a 45 minute layover, then hopped on an on time plane to St. Thomas. On time...that is something I am not used to. We flew American instead of United since it was cheaper.

 

Hotel lobby building.

 

Room.

 

View from our room. 

Welcome rum punch drink!

 

The beach directly faces St. John. That is St. John below.

We stayed at the hotel that night for dinner and went to the sushi place.

 

The next day, July 4th, was a resort beach day. It was also Christina's birthday!! The hotel went above and beyond for her birthday including giving us a beach cabana for the day for free ($350 value), bringing out a plate of birthday chocolates,  and comping all of her food and drinks on the beach. Not too bad!

This drink was the extent of my 4th of July celebrating. It was called the red, white, and blue and it was DELICIOUS! It was a pina colada, raspberry, blue drink. Looking back I am bummed we didn't partake in any fireworks, bbq etc. at the hotel, but we had a great day nonetheless.

Blake and Todd snorkeled off the beach.

Enjoying and taking it all in.

We then went down to the port to do a little shopping before dinner. Too bad most places were closed for the 4th.

 

We decided on doing a nice dinner for Christina's birthday this night, and went to a place called Old Stone Farmhouse. IT. WAS. UNBELIEVABLE. The food, the ambiance, and the service were all top notch. The restaurant was in a 200 year old restored plantation field house. Cool!

 

 

They brought us back into the kitchen to pick out what we wanted for dinner. 

 

And we got to sign our names in the kitchen hallway.

 

What a great dinner. Afterwards, we went to a place called Duffy's Love Shack for some drinks.  

The next day was our day trip to St. John. I had heard about a beach over there, Trunk Bay, that was in the top 10 beaches of the world. So obviously, we had to go. Its a 20 minute fairy ride over.

 

Pulling in to St. John.

We took an open air bus to Trunk Bay. Here is a view of the beach from the bus. Gorgeous.

Trunk Bay is seriously the prettiest beach I have ever seen in my life. It was perfect.

The boys snorkeled again and said it was the best snorkeling they have ever seen!

Christina and I did a lot of this...

We then had a couple of beers for happy hour at a place called High Tide in the port of St. John. It was a super cute place. Loved the local summer ale beer.

 

Here are my thoughts on the two islands. St. John is smaller, quieter, and has less poverty. Other than boutique hotels it does have a Westin. St. Thomas is more commercialized and much larger. There are nice parts and then some not so nice parts. The two main hotels on St. Thomas are the Ritz Carlton and a Marriott. If I were to go back to the USVI, I would probably stay on St. John to get more of a true island feel.

 

This night for dinner we went to Red Hook, a small port near our hotel, and went to a place called the The Cellar. The food was pretty good, but I wouldn't say its anything special.

The last day was a pool and spa day. We each got a massage and layed by the pool all day.  

 

We also found where all the iguanas hang out. There were seriously probably 100 of them. A little gross if you ask me. I am not a fan of reptiles.

At 4:00 p.m. Sea to Sails happened. That is when the hotel's fisherman bring in all the fresh catches. Cool!

For all you golf fans, Jason Dufner was staying at our hotel. He literally was the chair next to me at the pool. He was there with his wife who was way better looking than him. We never talked to him because we didn't want to bother him on vacation, but Blake was wearing a Masters hat, so he knew we knew who he was.  

 

Our last night we had a sunset sail on the hotel's Lady Lynsey.

They had heavy appetizers and an all you can drink bar that would make you anything you wanted.

 

This was probably my favorite part of the trip. It was so fun!

The trip was so wonderful, but not long enough. I think I have made it my personal mission to go to all the beaches in the top 10 list sometime in my life...

 

I can dream big, right?