Miami & St. Thomas Trip Roundup
Miami & St. Thomas
Trip Roundup
As the Buffalo winter drags on and we forget what sunshine looks and feels like, it is time to head down south to the warmer weather and chase away the winter blues. With the NFL playoffs still going on, I convinced Brian to book a quick trip to Miami Beach, FL, for the week, with the intent of returning home before the next Bills game. Unfortunately, the Bills were eliminated from the playoffs the night before we departed. With a return flight home booked for Friday and no real reason (besides cuddling with LWH) to be home, we opted to head further south to the US Virgin Islands for the weekend. Here is a quick recap:
here’s how it went down
first stop: Miami/FLL
We flew from Buffalo to Fort Lauderdale direct on JetBlue and rented a car through National Rental car.
JetBlue is a preferred airline in Florida as they have direct flights to Orlando and Fort Lauderdale in South Florida.
As Emerald Club members with National rental car, we enjoy taking advantage of their Emerald Aisle car pickup, where they have a few rows dedicated to letting you select the car you want. This cuts down on having to stand in line or interact with anyone at the counter. Just check out at the rental car garage gate.
We stayed at St. Regis in Bal Harbour. As Marriott Bonvoy members, we combined points + cash to ease the cost of staying at one of Marriott's premier hotel lines. We opted for Bal Harbour for a more chill vibe, and the location of restaurants and shopping directly across the street in the Bal Harbour shops
We ate at Makoto (sushi - highly recommend, even while pregnant, they were very accommodating) and Hillstone, located in the Bal Harbour shops, and also the restaurants located in the St. Regis
We mostly hung at the pool, walked around a bit and had spa treatments at the St. Regis which overall was a great experience and we also did afternoon tea!
MOCKTAIL @ THE ST. REGIS POOL - THEY HAD SEVERAL NON-ALCOHOLIC OPTIONS!
AFTERNOON TEA @ ST. REGIS | DRESS (XXL) (MINE IS OLD) | HEADBAND | SIMILAR HEADBAND
And then the options were to go home or go warmer
Off To St. Thomas
We rearranged the car drop at the Miami International airport as American Airlines has direct flights to St. Thomas. We chose the direct flight to maximize our arrival day there as the Virgin Islands are one hour ahead of the US East coast.
Arriving in St. Thomas was super easy as it’s a US territory so no need to wait through customs, we were able to get a shared taxi for roughly $24 per person to our hotel.
We stayed at the Ritz Carlton St. Thomas
As Marriott members, we opted for this over non-Marriott properties for the point-earning potential.
We had two days in St. Thomas and after sitting at the hotel pool in Miami all week so we were ready to explore a bit. We hit up Magen’s Bay for the day Saturday, taking a taxi from the hotel to the beach. We had the kindest taxi driver named Myron, feel free to hit him up at (340) 203-0004 and tell him Brian and Caralyn Koch sent you!
Magen’s Bay is usually ranked up there as one of the best beaches in the world. It’s over a mile long and has a beach bar that makes BK’s favorite rum drink, the Painkiller. Beware, after 2-3 of them, you will feel ZERO pain. It tends to get busy on the weekends or anytime a cruise ship is docked. However, we enjoy it for the sun chair rentals, the bar on site, and of course, the people-watching.
We took a quick cab ride into Red Hook and went to The Easterly for dinner, it was fantastic!
In the spirit of being spontaneous, I booked us a private boat charter through Local Flavor Charters for Sunday.
VIEW FROM THE RITZ CARLTON BEACH
Luckily we brought our passports, so we could head over to the BVI. Our boat charter picked us up directly at the Ritz Carlton beach, and after wading through waist-high water, we were on the boat and heading to the BVI. We had to dock at customs, which our captain Waclin took care of, and we didn’t have to get out of the boat. From there, we did some snorkeling at the caves at Norman Island, then headed over to the legendary Willy T’s for lunch. BK downed a few Painkillers then decided to jump off as is tradition aboard the Willy T. We bounced around a bit, admiring the beauty of the Islands before anchoring down in White Bay in Jost Van Dyke, home of the one and only Soggy Dollar Bar!
We were able to scoop up some beach chairs and hunkered down for a few hours while BK tried to see how many PainKillers he could drink during that time… Before we knew it we were back on the boat and headed back to St. John to go through customs and get back over to the Ritz in St. Thomas. Customs in St. John took about 5 minutes, and we were back in St. Thomas about 10 minutes after that. Should out to Captain Waclin at @localflavorcharters for the hospitality and expert navigation of the seas.
We were sad to leave but had a very successful trip.
We started the journey home the next morning!
OTHER THINGS WORTH MENTIONING,
I always like to prepare for beach/pool trips with a spray tan. If interested, I have a recent post of my sunless tanning and bronzer favorites here! That way, I arrive tan (which helps me feel more confident in a swimsuit), and as it fades, my natural tan appears, so I maintain color throughout. If you want to keep a sunless tan throughout your trip, I highly recommend Luna Bronze or St. Tropez products.
I kept my makeup pretty simple throughout the trip, still navigating some new products through my changing skin! I used my top five summer beauty favorites and also packed a bunch of my vacation beauty must-haves.
I saw a bunch of swimsuit-related questions, I strongly encourage you to check out the swim tab of my blog, especially my Swimsuit Guide from last year, and my swim ‘22 highlight for more in-depth reviews and sizing feedback. I plan to start a 2023 version very soon!
If you’re looking for more outfit inspiration, check out the shop tab of my blog, which I update daily with my outfits. I also have many options saved to my Amazon Storefront, organized by category, including many under $50 finds. I also did an Amazon try-on while we were away featuring 6 items under $50, all linked here!
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Thanks for reading!
I also brought this under $20 belt bag that was perfect for our boat day. It fit way more than you’d think it would and kept our passports safe and dry! Thanks for reading more about our recent trip, we have a few more planned, for be sure to leave any suggestions or things you’d like me to cover on the next trip roundup. Be sure to leave any questions below, and check out the travel tab of my blog for more trip roundups and travel inspiration.
xoxo CMK