St Thomas Run

St. Thomas USVI & Moms

First thing we see is they are changing up the airport a little.  I can remember flying in here and you walked through a boarded walkway with wire on the top to meet your party at the end.  It really felt like you had gone to a remote island.  No jetbridges yet so you still walk down the steps out of the plane and the rum shot stand still greets you as you enter the airport area so I guess not too modern yet! Met Mom ~ always so good to see her! then off to Bluebeards Castle to meet up with Captain Paul for lunch. This is also one of the few places according to mom that serves breakfast late into the day and I love that!! 

The view from the pool there is stunning~

Cierra & I must have been starving as we inhaled a full breakfast in moments!

Headed home for the evening and going to sail tomorrow.  Mom & Pauls place is on Bunker hill next to Blackbeards Castle.  They occasionally have rental units avail if you are looking for a specific time shoot me an email and I will find out if they have anything open.  Their place is great!  Comfy, convenient, pool and views!

The best place for morning coffee - moms place!

We all headed out on the Dancing Dolphin for a sail - I recommend this fun, sun & rum!  2 stops with great snorkeling, rays, turtles, fish and a shipwreck.

Feel blessed to spend time with Mom!  

Lunch on Water Island ~ what a great view ~

Sailing back into St. Thomas harbor and the views of Charlotte Amalie are beautiful ~ 

We spent our last day with Mom & Paul running a couple of errands, picking up more Critter Oil (it helps keep off the mosquitoes that are causing Chikungunya, I brought some home) checking on their Sail Marilee and of all things a fish spa!!  

What a great visit.  Always too short but am so glad I get to see them more often now!  Already planning the next St. Thomas run!

2015 kick off

Kicking off the 2015 with a new blog and travels!

Cierra was out for winter break and I ended up with the first week of Jan as vacation so we decided to take off~
Planned a trip to visit my mom in St. Thomas, but decided to make a side trip first to New York!! We have never seen the Rockefeller tree, gone to the top of the Rock or seen the city all lit up.  Phoenix to JFK was to be our first flight.  We flew in Jan 3 and were set to fly out JFK to St. Thomas 8am Jan 4 so not much time but what the heck.

**Now here is lessons learned while traveling~  JFK has a 24 hr bag check in terminal 4 down by baggage claim, for min. cost they will keep them for you so you aren't carrying everything around the city.  Love that!  (Admirals club and other terminals bag checks are open only certain hrs)
Terminal 4 also has a cab line that seems to move pretty fast - but according to local friends met on the flight ask the cab driver ahead of time how much...should be around $50 or so.

Since we were limited on time we opted for the cab this time around and made our way to Rockefeller Center.  Total for us was $60.
Stepping out of the cab at night in the middle of Rockefeller Center during the holidays is magical. Rainy & cold, but once you become immersed you don't even notice!

We were taking pictures and wandering - Total Tourists!  

Made our way over to Rockefeller Center to go to "the top of the rock"  so determined that when they said visibility was limited we didn't care....visibility wasn't just limited they were being nice, visibility was none!  We were lucky to see the observation deck floor feet from the door.  We bought tickets ahead of the time here Top of The Rock tic sales

                                                                      

             

Good thing about being on the top of the rock during no visibility is there are no crowds and nobody walking through your pictures!!  One other person was there the whole time we were!  Thanks for taking our photo Mr. fellow die hard tourist!

Made our way back down and ran into a one of New York's finest who said yes when Cierra asked him to take our picture we couldn't leave without a picture with him ~  

                             

Such fun working our way around Rockefeller Center

Decided to head over to Times Square as it is only a short walk 

Thank you Starbucks for the hot chocolate to keep us warm!

About 1am we called it a night and walked into the Marriott Time Square parking area to see about a cab.  Thank you for finding us a black towncar for the same price as a cab to comfortably get us back to JFK. $60 back to JFK.

We picked up our backpacks and since we couldn't get through security until 3:30-4:00am found a "quiet corner"  to lounge in.  

**Next lesson learned - when you stop moving around and early am hrs set in it is cold in an airport. The warmest place is standing next to the air dryer in the restroom.  

Cierra fell asleep and even though this picture looks like I have been traveling way more than 1 day I feel the need to post to show friends & family that yes if I can do it you can do it ~ overnight in the airport is doable!  Entertaining myself learning to work my new selfie pole Craig bought me for Christmas (like this selfie pole)

End of our New York adventure as we head through security to catch our St. Thomas flight we look back and see this ~

Good Bye New York it has been GREAT!