St. John Snapshot

And now without further ado, here is my St. John snapshot post! I’ve rounded up a few snippets of info about our trip, and some of our favorite moments and photos.

Trip Details

Chris and I traveled to St. John, U.S.V.I. with my sister and brother-in-law, and we all stayed on the Coral Bay side of the island in a two-bedroom villa called All About the View. We flew round-trip from IAD to STT June 2-9 and we rented a Jeep once we arrived on St. John.

Best Moment

I’ll have to separate this category into a two-part answer this time! Best travel-related moment was our day in Maho Bay swimming with the turtles. I was so thrilled to see these guys thriving and it was a treat to see so many at once!

Best non-travel-related moment: the Washington Capitals won the Stanley Cup while we were on the island! Chris and I watched the whole game from the bar at Greengos over margaritas and nachos. Of course we would have loved to experience the watch parties at home with the massive throngs of fans in D.C. or even to attend the game in Vegas, but the next best thing was seeing our team take the cup and then to celebrate with tequila shots with a handful of other Caps fans on the island. We’ll never forget that night!

Worst Moment

Spider. Big one. Spotted in my bathroom after I finished taking a shower. My brave and heroic sister managed to catch it and relocate it outside. (Arachnophobia must not be genetic.) If you know me well, you know there are no photos of this incident. This is a spider-free blog.

Funniest Moment

I think everything that falls into this category from this particular trip is a you-had-to-be-there moment, like the four of us doing impressions from an overheard conversation of some construction workers next door. We kept ourselves giggling all week, but it’s hard to recreate that here.

Best Meal

This is a tough one on an island that consistently offers amazing options in the food and drink department. We loved so many meals throughout the week, but we all agreed that Indigo Grill was our favorite spot and we ended up eating there twice. Reasons for landing in the top spot include live music, a huge menu with tons of delicious choices, and some of the best mango margaritas I’ve ever had. Chris and I split ceviche and the Cuban sandwich, and of course we had to try their version of the island’s most popular drink: the Painkiller. Yuuum.

Perhaps a second-runner up for me was drinks and snacks at The Longboard. Those Caribbean Summer Rolls with a peanut dipping sauce were fantastic!

Something We Learned

We learned that the island is doing even better than we imagined. Recovery is well underway, the locals’ spirits are high, and the island is more than ready to welcome visitors!

We’re Thankful We Packed

A Neso Tent turned out to be a really fantastic item to have! The foliage around the beaches on St. John still needs some additional time to recover, but in the meantime this little tent is the perfect shade solution.

The tent works by filling a sandbag pouch in each corner after pulling the tent into an x-shape. Once the anchors are situated, you simply prop the poles up inside. It did take a bit of trial and error to figure out how to position the tent against the wind, but once we got the hang of how to anchor it it worked perfectly! (The trick was to heavily fill and then bury the anchors.)

We Didn’t Need To Bring

I think we packed pretty well for this trip. It helps that this was our fourth visit to the island, so we’re well-versed in what we need to bring (most important: bug spray). We used/wore everything in our suitcases!

Trip Regrets

I wish I took more photos! I did grab a couple of the four of us this time, so it’s an improvement over our last trip together, but I didn’t document a ton. Sometimes it’s really nice for me to take a break from being behind the camera all of the time.

Reasons To Go Back

We can always, always go back to St. John, no reason needed!

Favorite Photos

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