Our Caribbean Adventures

We just returned from a once-in-a-lifetime (well, in all reality I hope not because it was so much fun) vacation to Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands with baby boy in tow and it was fantastic! It was full of laughs, sun, water, fish, birds, boats, beaches, sand castles and more...

San Juan, Puerto Rico
Lucky for Michael and me, David had a tradeshow in San Juan which prompted the first part of our getaway. We stayed at the Caribe Hilton for about 4 days, which had to be one of the nicest resorts I've every stayed in - top notch.

 

 

The majority of the time David was at his event, so Michael and I took in some sun, pool and sand at the resort.

 



 

Michael and I also took a trip to an old fort, Castillo de San Cristóbal where we had fun climbing all-over and understanding the history of Puerto Rico (for my FL family, it reminded me of Fort Pickens when nothing used to be off-limits). It took 2.5 miles to get there and back, but lucky for us we had some great views to look at and ran into some iguanas too!

 

 

 

It's not wanting to turn my pictures right side up today so my apologies.

When David's show was over, we visited old town San Juan where we had dinner and enjoyed walking around the brick-lined streets in the midst of Spanish architecture. We also took a ferry ride.

 



And every night before bedtime we'd go out on the Caribe Hilton pier to peek down in the water and say night night to the fish.

What Could Possibly Top That Trip?!

The Answer: St. Thomas, USVI
Quite possibly the most beautiful place I've ever visited, the U.S. Virgin Islands are simply magnifiscant.

We flew into St. Thomas from San Juan on Thurs. morning and were there for too short a time - but had a great time while we could. We stayed at the Sugar Bay Resort & Spa at Sapphire Bay and the resort had everything you could imagine and I mean everything... 3 pools, several restaurants, rentable everything, water boats, mini-golf and more. Check out some of the pictures I took:

 

And did I mention we got upgraded?! I feel like that's sadly, pretty rare these days, but we so appreciated our ocean view and took every opportunity while in the room, to spend it on the balcony.

In true Estes family style, we took advantage of every moment we were there. So, the day after we arrived we set sail on a catamaran where we took in the sights and snorkeled next to an uninhabited island (didn't know those really existed, besides on TV):

Then, on to St. John Island. A favorite of my Mom and Dad's, I HAD to see what all the fuss was about. Let's just say I totally agree with the fanfare - it's untouched beauty at its finest (thanks again Mom for all the tips). While there we visited Trunk Bay - a beautiful beach where sting rays swim around you (freaked me out) and there's a snorkel "trail."

And we had fun at the resort too... (in case you can't tell from the below)

 

OH and did I mention the free ice cream?! Michael just hated it...

We had an absolutely amazing week but there's so much more we'd like to do in the USVI (our new favorite destination). So, stay tuned and maybe we'll get the opportunity to go again!