Posted By Tom W. on Nov 7, 2016 in Beach Bars, Beach Bars - St. Thomas, Beach Bars - US Virgin Islands (USVI), Travel | 2 comments

Tagged: bbbusbvi, caribbean, st. thomas, travel, us virgin islands

It’s a question I hated to have to answer – the beaches of St. Thomas/Virgin Islands or Anguilla/St. Martin/Maarten? A response had to be formulated, however, since the only other option was going nowhere this winter. The decision wasn’t easy, as one can only imagine, since both destinations had many things going in their favor that I really don’t need to get into here. At the end of the day, though, it came down to one thing that was the deciding factor for me – going somewhere new.

I have this unquenchable desire for discovering new places. For me, there’s nothing like the feeling that comes over you when you’re blown away by a new place, a new view, a new experience. It’s quite the opposite of my everyday life, where the norm is expected and welcomed and the new shunned like it’s a long lost relative trying to hit me up for my millions of dollars (the millions of dollars part isn’t true but it’s the only thing that came to mind). It’s a feeling of wanting to be blown away, of having new experiences and memories and stories to tell, that keeps drawing me to the unknown in the land of travel.

That’s why I chose St. Thomas. Anyone who knows me knows how much I love Anguilla – not just its beaches and beach bars but for the people that call it home and that I’ve been lucky enough to call “friend.” And St. Martin/Maarten might very well be where I spend my retirement years. So when my wife said that we could go to Anguilla in the spring, choosing St. Thomas became easy. With its proximity to St. John and the British Virgin Islands, a visit to St. Thomas became more than just a visit to one island – it became an opportunity to discover more islands … in two different countries.

When I finally found a resort on a west facing beach with a really cool beach bar that was within our price point (All beachfront rooms? Yes, please!), the planning began in earnest, tickets were purchased and rooms were booked. I’ll get more into what drew me to Emerald Beach Resort in future articles and you’ll be seeing plenty of posts and live updates while I’m there.

This year, though, it’s St. Thomas and the Virgin Islands in a close one with an “I’ll see you next year” adieu to Anguilla and St. Martin/Maarten.

For those of you interested in following along with my posts on this blog and social media, I’ll be utilizing the #bbbusbvi hashtag for all trip-related musings.

Enough about that for now, though. I have swimsuits, flip flops and rum goggles to pack!