And she’s back!  Sister K mentioned to me today that lately it has been much more like 1sister1city around here lately.   Sorry for being MIA lately- work has been crazy with year-end reporting and I also took a last minute trip to St. John, USVI.  I promise to catch up on a few posts this weekend and start getting on a regular posting schedule during the week.

My trip to the Caribbean with my husband was definitely a great break from winter.  Even though I grew up in a very snowy upstate NY, I always dread this time of year in Boston.  The holidays are over and its colder and darker than ever.  It was refreshing to get a few days of warm sun (although I used my SPF 55 everyday!)  Now that I’m back, I feel like I’m that much closer to spring weather.

In St. John, we stayed at Caneel Bay.  We went to the same island two years ago and stayed in the Westin…the only other resort on the island.  Caneel definitely had a much different feel to it.  The resort was very spread out and had a bus service connecting all the major areas (although it was definitely walkable if you wanted to).  Caneel Bay has 7 of their own private beaches.  It was so great to wake up, step outside your room, and just hop right into the water if you wanted to go for a quick swim.  The resort provides you your own snorkel gear for your stay, which comes in handy as a lot of their beaches have great snorkel areas.  During our stay, we did a snorkel sail trip with Captain Pat and Bev (Sail St John) and a chartered power-boat ride to the BVIs (Captain Don of Nauti Nymph Power Rentals took us to Tortola, Virgin Gorda, and Yost Van Dyke- home of the famous Soggy Dollar Bar).   We also were able to go to a wine tasting, afternoon tea-time, and a work-out at the resort’s gym.  We ended up eating at the resorts most nights, but we will definitely try to get into the town of Cruz Bay more often next time as our meal there was the best (and probably least expensive) meal of the trip (Rhumb Lines).  The breakfast room service was also very nice…it was only about $25 total each time and arrived in a picnic basket with white starched table linens to put on our patio table.

Overall, it was a great trip and surprisingly very easy to get to from Boston.  Our flight there was direct and only took about 3 and 1/2 hours to get to St. Thomas.  The boat ride to St. John takes another half hour, but it’s a relaxing trip accompanied by rum punch.  The flight back does require a connection through Miami, but still a relatively easy flight itinerary.

-M