Well, first let me say What a vacation!!! and then let me add this is a way too long post! Sorry! We just had so much fun. My husband and I had decided on our first visit to St. John to celebrate our 15 year wedding anniversary. We left our two boys at home with sitter for the week. (now you know why we had such a good time!) We flew out of Philly without any problems into St. Thomas arriving at 2:00pm. Figured we catch the 3pm ferry from Red Hook. NOPE! Luggage took 1 hour to come off the belt...but it all showed! The taxi ride was $11.00 per person to Red Hook ferry. We did two drop off's on the way. We called the management company and l&L our auto rental company at the dock in Red Hook (our cell's were still working then) We caught the 4pm ferry across to Cruz Bay. he ferry across was $5.00 per person $2.00 per luggage. Ferry was smooth with no problems. We arrived in Cruz Bay around 4:20pm. We were greeted by Robin from Cimmaron Management company. She had a sign with our name on it making it real easy for us to find her. She told us where the L&L guy was..he was wearing a red polo and was to the left of the dock area in the parking spaces after the taxi's. They can't pull up so you have to go there to meet them. They gave us a nice red jeep in great condition and we were off to our villa following Robin. Our villa was in Fish Bay. It was a 15 minute ride from the docks. We had rented our villa through a private rental www.vrbo.com/71531. The owner was really nice and easy to contact. The villa was called Sundancer. It had everything we needed. It was an older villa that was very secluded and private. It had 3 bedrooms & 2 baths with spectacular views of Fish bay from all areas of the deck and house. The bedrooms had AC which we really liked and used. It had a nice "Kiddle" pool which is a fiberglass pool set into the deck as a one piece unit. It was about 8 feet x 12 feet in size. It also had a hot tub. The hot tub sat right on the edge of the deck overlooking Fish Bay. The views were awesome and at night you could sit having cocktails and see the stars. While the villa inside was simple and clean it had everything we needed and at a fraction of the cost of the never villas on the island. We felt lucky to have found this place. Saturday after our long day of travel we basically unpacked, fired up the blender with the Margarita mix we had packed and threw some food on the grill (we had packed a few items in a small cooler to get us started). We just vegged at the house, pool and hot tub and loved it!
Sunday: Now the adventures began. My husband is into Geocaching so he had located all of the possible cache's on St. john and he was determined to find them during our stay. Happily we did accomplish that goal. We headed first to Trunk bay to beat the crowds. We enjoyed snorkeling along the trail and did see some nice coral and fish but the snorkeling in other areas of the island was hands down better. From Trunk we headed over to the Anneberg Ruins and toured them and took lots of photos. When we hiked the Leinster Bay Trail up to the ruins there and then over to the Waterlemon Cay. We snorkeled out and around Waterlemon Cay and it was amazing. There we saw some of the largest brain coral I have ever seen..especially considering it grows only like 2 millimeters per year! There was also awesome fan coral and so many silver sides that it was hard to see at times. After all of that we headed back to our villa for margarita's and relaxation.
Monday: We headed into Cruz Bay for a little shopping at Mongoose Junction and then hiking. We hiked up the Caneel Hill trail. Which was very steep and very hot! But the views at the top were spectacular. We then continued on reaching the top of the Margaret Hill trail where again views were amazing. The whole hike we looked for donkey's because there were droppings everywhere...but no donkey! We followed the trail down to the Caneel Resort and what did we find???? 4 Donkey's ! Just meandering around the resort in the grassy area out front! We enjoyed some drinks at the Caneel bar and then headed out to Honeymoon and Salomon were we relaxed on their beautiful beaches. Only a few people were on each beach maybe 10 at the most. We finished off our day by hiking the Lind Point trail back to our jeep in Cruz Bay. Needless to say we were beat and headed back to the tranquility of our villa to swim, relax and drink margarita's.
Tuesday: We drove out to the east end of the island. We hiked Yawzi trail to some really beautiful views and saw lots of sea turtles just swimming around the point. We then check out Little Lameshur beach and then back up to the Jolly Dog shop at Shipwreck Landing. From there we headed over to Skinny Legs and had the best burgers around. When we were off to Hanson beach and Long Bay Beach. We snorkeled out and around Pelican Rock. It was loaded with amazing coral and lots of fish. Then when we were just about done and heading toward shore a large 6 foot black tip shark made his appearance! He scared the daylights out of us but was totally not impressed with us. He just kept on going. But we headed quickly and quietly back to shore! Finished off our day at our villa with a few extra margarita's after that sightening!!!
Wednesday: We headed out early to do the Reef Bay Trail. That hike is relatively easy getting down...up is another story! We had thought about doing it on Thursday with the National Parks Services where they hike you down and a boat takes you back to cruz bay..but with Hurricane Dean possibly on it's was there was concerns about the ability to bring the boat around so we decided just to do it on our own. The trail down is nicely marked with lots of interesting information on the plants and trees in the area. We headed up to the waterfall which wasn't running and the petroglyphs which were neat to see. They were apparently done by the Taino indians back in the 1300's. Finally at the bottom 2 hours later...the Bay Rum plant ruins are in remarkably good shape and can really give you the feel of how things use to work. Many fruit bat have made their home inside the ruins and are just hanging there when you are looking aorund. The beach at reef bay is known for good snorkeling but we couldn't bring ourselves to check it out. There were about 5 small 1-2 feet black tip sharks just enjoying themselves in the shallows and riding the small waves in and up on shore and then sliding back into the water! We just thought maybe just maybe mama shark was near by keeping a watchful eye on the kids so we opted out of snorkeling! We just relaxed enjoyed lunch on the beach and then headed back. We return hiked back up to the Lamesur trail break off point and headed up to the Reef Bay Great house. The ruins are pretty ruined at this point and the trail is not well maintained ( I dont think they want you up there right now) any restorations that were going on have certainly stopped for some time now. It is a remarkable building and if restored could be quiet amazing. We then followed yet another unmaintained trail down to some old slaves quarters and reconnected with the reef bay trail for the hike up back to the car. The last 10 minutes of the hike up are a killer but otherwise it wasn't too bad. The walk back with the detours of the other ruins took about 2 1/2 hours so it was a full day. Back to the villa for those margarita's again!
Thursday: We went to Cinnamon Bay and checked out the campground and the beach. The snorkeling was very good and the beach lovely. We saw tons of Squid around the rocks to the right of the beach. By now the winds for Hurricane Dean were starting to kick up and the sand was whipping a bit but the sun and water were just great. We wanted to use Kayaks but there was a small craft advisory and we didn't want to risk it being too rough for some inexperienced kayakers like ourselves. We stayed there for several hours and then headed to the Peace Hill trail and up to the ruins. We then took the little trail off the peace hill trail to Denis beach. Here there is a nice small sandy beach area (a larger beach area to the right is private so we didn't go there!). The snorkeling off Denis beach out and around the little rocks was awesome. HUGE, HUGE fish were everywhere. Some of the largest Parrot fish I have ever seen were out there along with these huge silver fish called Permit fish. It was also loaded with lots of purple and green fan coral and relatively large brain coral. It was amazing! Also no one else was on this little sandy beach so it was fun to have it all to ourselves. We finshed off the day by getting showered and heading into Cruz Bay. We dined at Morgan Mango's. Thursday is their 1/2 price Margarita night!!! The food was good. Then we shopped around Cruz Bay. We visited Ruth at St. John Spice and picked up Grill Rub. Her stores( the spice store and the kids store next door) have lots of really neat things and the spice store smells great! Loaded with spices, teas, coffee's. There are tons of great finds there. Ruth is great and can answer lots of your island questions. It is a must visit place in Cruz bay. The other place we loved was Pink Papaya. Linda there was just delightful. Her store is loaded with beautiful pottery, jewelry nick nacks etc and she can ship them home for you!
Friday: We were watching the weather channel and Hurricane Dean is expected to bring some winds and maybe a little rain but nothing too serious. The villa managment company called and said that a maintenance guy would come and prep the house a little. We figured our last day...head to the beach! We headed down to Francis Beach for the better part of the day. The water hear and at Maho were really calm since they are somewhat protected. Lots of sailboads had come into Maho so we decided to stick with our plan to go to Francis. The shallows were very active with turtles, stingrays and pencil fish all around. You didn't need to go far to find something to look at underwater. Mary's point had excellent snorkeling. Turtles, tarpon, lots of sliver sides were all around this area. We headed back to the house around 2pm when the skies open and the winds kicked up. Figuring if Dean was going to bring more than we had planned for we wouldn't be driving on those steep roads when they were wet. Turns out it only lasted about 15 minutes and then was done! Anyway, the hot tub, pool and blender needed a visit anyway!! We decided after some relaxing that we wanted a burger from Skinny legs again so we headed out to enjoy the winding roads of St. John one last time. So we enjoyed some beers and burgers at Skinny Legs and watched a lively game of horseshoes being played.
Saturday: The winds during the night picked up a little but nothing more than 30 or 40 mile gusts. Only a little rain and morning came. The surf out in Fish bay was really picking up and 3 brave souls were out there surfing. Funny thing was that Fish bay also seemed to become home to about 15 large stingrays. They were hovering in the water there. From our villa they looked like dark spots and the binoculars helped us figure out what they were. I couldn't figure out why they had come into the that area but maybe it was because the surf was rough. We had to be out of our villa by 10am and drop our car off to L&L by 10 so we headed down to cruz bay. We dropped our luggage off at the ferry dock, paid the guy there a few buck to keep an eye on it and headed up to Chilly Billy's for some breakfast. They make the best french toast.. they use an egg and Bailey's dip then cook it up nice and golden brown...ummm. After relaxing and enjoying our last few minutes on the island we headed down to catch the 12 noon ferry to Red Hook. The CA ferry was also running but the water was so rough we thought 40 minutes would make us sick! We heard from others at the airport that it was indeed rough on the ferry to CA and that some actually thought they would go over because the boat was getting knocked around so much. The airport was a mess. We thankfully had priority check in with US air so we were able to walk right up and get our tickets while others were watiting up to two hours just to get a ticket. and then it took us 2 hours to get through customs and security! We figured out shortly into it that a few bucks to the sky cab guy and you could move to the head of the line. But since it was just the two of us with one back each that just seemed ridiculous. Once inside the secure area our plan boarded about 6 minutes later (good thing we didn't get to the airport late or we would never have made it). Once inside the plan we unfortunately didn't take off for almost an hour. It was raining a little in St. Thomas not sure if that was the delay or what. But anyway, I fell asleep and was surprise to hear a the captain come on and say we were taking off shortly...I had honestly been sleeping so soundly I assumed we were well on our way!! We landed in Philly around 7:45pm and then sat for a while about 1 hour later we were finally able to get to a cleared gate so we could get off the plane. That's when the baggage adventure began. We waited almost an hour for the bags to come. Then only about 50% of the plane actually got their luggage. We were one of those unlucky folks. We we went home with only one bag. But thankfully (unlike last year when it took almost 3 weeks to get our stuff back!!) the US airways baggage delivery service came around 12 noon today with our other bag.
What would I do different: bring my two boys, they would love the calm warm waters and the awesome snorkeling. Bring sneakers or hiking boots for the type of hiking my husband and I did. My little beach trek shoes weren't enough for me. Bring more food or buy more food on the island. The restaurants are nice, but I really liked grilling on the deck enjoying some margarita's in my swim suit (or not..it was pretty secluded!!). Getting showered and dressed was a pain the few nights we did it!
Overall we had a wonderful stay on St. John. The people of the island are really kind and generous. Everyone we met on the streets in cruz bay always greeted us with a "good morning" and a smile. We never, ever felt unsafe, we never had any of our belongings touched or stolen and we never really worried that . We certainly locked our vehicle and our home but we do that in our own town too. St. John has so much to offer. The beaches, the snorkeling, the views, the hiking trails, the restaurants, some unique shopping. It is truly a place worth visiting. The nicest thing about St. John is that while there is a lot of development going on right now, it will never, ever be totally developed because it can't. Thankfully the National Park will always remain. Making St. John a wonderful vacation destination for years to come.
Well, that's all I have. Thanks for letting me share my experiences on St. John with you. Also, thank you to all the advice from this forum. It really helped us in creating a perfect vacation.