USVI-On-Line

We are going to be in St. John Thanksgiving week, arriving at St.Thomas on Friday November 21, spending the night at a hotel there, and heading over to our house on the 22nd. We will be checking out of the house on the 29th by 10 AM, and our flight time out of STT is currently 7 PM. We are trying to think of things to do for that day, on St. John or St. Thomas, to enjoy ourselves, not just kill time (such as sitting at a beach bar all day! We will have the 11 year old grandson with us, and he would find that boooooring.) There are tons of places to go and things to do, but we thought we might check and see if anyone else has ideas, maybe what you have done under similar circumstances. The airport doesn't really have much to offer, so we dont' want to get there much sooner than 5 PM. Any bright ideas?
Thanks. You guys on this forum are awesome.

mcpenguin5, where are you renting your vehicle?

Cheers, RickG

We will be renting our car from ST. John Car rental, near the ferry dock. We decided against renting on St. Thomas due to the problems we have heard about, getting service when renting on St. Thomas. there was a hillarious post a while back about a family with 2 cars, one broke down, the forum poster opted to head to the bar while hubby ranted over broken down car. That decided us.

So, a St. John rental narrows things down. An 11 year old boy is going to need to be entertained. You'll need to be at the airport, assuming checked luggage, by 4PM. If you do carry-on only you can show up at 5PM.

Me, I'd drop off the luggage with the porter at the STJ dock for the CA ferry and head for a leisurely breakfast at the Tamarind Court. Show up 15 minutes before departure time and buy your tickets. Ask the taxi dispatcher at CA to have someone watch your bags and do some shopping in CA with lunch at Cuzzins.

Now, if you rented your car on STT you could take the car barge back and do whatever you wanted all day back on STT.

Cheers, RickG

We are planning on doing carry-on luggage only, so we figured that 5 PM at the airport was good. I do remember that there was a place to put luggage for safe-keeping at the ferry dock in CA, but I thought it was only for people who would be leaving on the next ferry. So is this the same place as the taxi dispatcher? And more important, how secure is this? Have you ever used this service for your luggage? I know you are a regular down there, so I figure you have all this down pat by now!
Thanks!

I use it all the time just ask the taxi dispacter at the ferry dock that you want some one to hold your bags they point out the taxi you work out with him when you want to be picked back up and just meet him at said time.

Thanks! We will definitely want to use that. Now if we can just narrow down our options in CA... I have a feeling the hubbys won't want me and Daughter-in-law to get too excited about the shopping!

mcp,

we have always rented on stt and barged to stj and then toured stt before late afternoon flight. we've had excellent experience with depenadable car rental on stt our last 2 trips. thus maybe another option

follow ricks suggestion till 1st ferry stj to ca, but on arrival in ca have dependable pick you up with a rental CAR, much cheaper than jeep, no airport taxes, and for day, car will be adequate (roads much better on stt). get a stt map and do north shore, skyline and mountain top. maybe stop at coki to let son see coral world. views at mt top are fantastic and you can see stj from the other side. we have taken shore line dr to west end past vi university and pulled over at shaded beach and watched few planes take off and land. maybe do bluebeard (or is it blackbeard) castle tour for son (never done).

while we do late lunch at best west emerald beach close to airport, fair food and reasonable prices, you might check their schedule for a late afternoon lunch since food pickings suck at airport.

one word of caution. thursday usually heavy cruise ship day so gets crowded down town until folks get back to ship so beware of downtown traffic jams. on flip side the view from skyline overlook at all big ships in ca harbor is site to behold!

good luck.

papabou

Wow Papabou, you have given us some really great ideas! I like the idea of seeing St. Thomas, as we have never explored it outside of CA. The freedom of having a car, as well as a solution to the luggage problem, makes for a lot more possibilities. I am excited about this, and I think this is what we are going to do. Thanks so much for the input.

We rented from St John Car Rental and they let us leave our bags in their lobby (even though it's tiny) while we bummed around Cruz Bay for a few hours.

You could also pay to keep your car for the extra day and spend your last day at the beach. (If you go to Trunk or Cinnamon you can use the showers before heading home. Just bring some extra Ziplocks for packing your wet suits.)

I'm not sure how the car rental works, because we picked up our car at about 4pm but still were supposed to return it by 10am; seems like we should have been able to keep it until 4. If you ask, maybe they'll cut you a deal to keep the car a few more hours. One more day at the beach would be so worth it!

Check with your rental agent and ask if the villa is rented the following week. Several times Kathy (Islandgetawaysinc.com) has given us permission to linger.

With a flight that late a day sail or 1/2 day sail might be an option too. You could ditch your bags at Connections (right by the ferry - I think for $2/bag) and set sail from Cruz Bay. Most daysails are back by 3.