USVI-On-Line

My husband and I are headed to STJ in June. I read somewhere that a lot of people bring those blow up rafts with them to lounge in the water. I've been in the Carribean several times but never noticed that the water was THAT calm. Would you all recommend that we bring one?

We were there in Feb and experienced very calm waters at Francis and Cinnamon. Could have definitely floated on a raft on those days. Conversely, the days we were at Trunk and Hawksnest the swells were in and the waves were huge. I guess it just depends.

Yes. I pick them up at our local big box for 3.50. (we also use them on our trips to Florida)

Some people also like to use them as floatation aids while snorkelling.

I pick up a few of the little ring floats and some of the bigger layout floats at Walmart or Target to take along. They don't take up much space at all and come in really handy.

We mostly use the big ones in our pool (never occured to me to take them to the beach, though it is calm enough usually) but we do take the little ones for the kiddos to the beach.

We usually go in June, and the waters are typically quite calm. You will probably be able to float on your raft comfortably at most beaches--not Cinnamon (too windy), and maybe not Hawksnest (reef too close to shore), but the other North Shore beaches will be fine, especially Maho, Gibney, and Francis.

We take rafts with us, but not the kind you blow up completely...we use the ones that fold up nicely but are only inflatable around their perimeter...that way they don't take forever to inflate. They are mesh in the middle, which is nice because then the water seeps up around you when you're in the water.

This is the kind I'm talking about:
http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-Inflatable-Kels ... dZViewItem

If that link doesn't work, you can search for item #330105532543 on ebay.com.

We take those rafts with us every year...they're very light weight and easily portable. Wal-Mart sells them for $15.

One time my husband fell asleep on a raft at Cinnamon Bay and before I knew it he was all the way at the other end of the beach. So I came up with something to avoid that problem. I take a plastic bag (like a Wal-Mart bag), fill it with sand and tie it closed, tie a piece of string/twine to it (the length being equal to the depth of water you're in), and then attach it to the raft. It's a little anchor that'll keep you from floating away.

Yes, I buy a couple of the little .88 cheapie ones from WallyWorld.

My daughter spends hours comatose in the water lounging on one that is 3/4 of the way blown up. She says it's best that way.

We just leave them at the end of the trip.

We bring inflatables for the kids and leave them at the villa. They are a hit. We were laughing about coming back to a villa a year later and seeing the cheap things had become a fixture at the villa!

We love using floats on the calm beaches. In December, our villa had the really neat kind Teresa_Rae posted about, that fold up into sort of a neat little package with a zipper case. Anyway, it was so compact, we just threw it into our snorkel bag. Well.....when I got home, I realized it was still in there! I stole my villa float!!! Good thing we're headed back to the same villa in May...I'll just discreetly replace it....