St. Thomas in the US Virgin Islands

My daughter and I lucked out on the trip of a lifetime. A friend of hers worked for a travel agency and had a five day four night stay in St. Thomas to give away. We hopped on that and booked our plane tickets in December for a trip in June. We paid for the trip and were happily planning away.

We flew out of Metro airport at 6:30am planning for breakfast in Ft. Lauderdale, where we had a three hour lay-over. That the Spirit Air terminal does not have enough seating for the number of passengers who pass through there an unlike any other terminal I have been in, there really is no place to eat.

We arrived in the afternoon in St. Thomas to a light drizzle and tropic humidity. The bus ride to the hotel had us both wondering where we would be staying. We were in the waterfront area. It turned out to be wonderful.

We found food at the Green House just down the street where the waitress was friendly and the food was fantastic. We spent the next morning snuba diving…a cross between snorkeling and scuba diving. Neither of us had sunscreen so were both burnt. However we wasted no time worrying. At the market down the street we both had our hair done in corn rows and then did some shopping and treated ourselves to a free drink in the hotel lounge.

If you get the right cabbies, you will learn the history of the islands. We were lucky in that we had two wonderful drivers. They told us different things about the islands and the people who live there. It was very educational.

We found food on the island to be extremely expensive and learned that was due in part to the fact that everything had to be imported. Bumpa’s was a great place for breakfast and sandwiches. It’s above the street and has a wonderful view of the harbor.

We took the forty-five minute ferry ride to St. John’s Island. There we had views of Trunk Bay and we swam at Cinnamon Bay. We shopped in the market there too. Had lunch at this hidden little restaurant called the Lime Inn. We ordered lobster and it was first boiled then grilled over an open flame. It was without a doubt the best lobster I’ve ever had.

We caught the ferry coming back and for dinner that evening we ate at a beach bar and restaurant called Iggies. There was a wedding reception taking place under a tent next to the bar. A gentleman in the bar was kind enough to take our photo together. Mother-daughter memories for the ages.

Magen’s Bay was our last big stop. It is the most beautiful beach and it is not built up with resorts. There is one food stand and bar. They will actually deliver drinks to you in the water. We had lunch there, did some snorkeling and just in general had a good time swimming.

For our last night in the islands we went back to the Green House, but were both too tired to really eat much. We were at the airport two hours early only to find out that we had an hour wait before we could check our bags and go through customs. Then there was an additional hour wait once inside. The lay-over in Ft. Lauderdale was less than an hour and we were winging our way back to Detroit. All-in-all it was one of the greatest vacations ever.