Virgin Islands 2026 Day 4: to St. Thomas and sunset cruise!

Saturday, March 28, 2026

On Saturday we had to sadly check out of our beautiful St. John villa. Knowing we could have stayed one more night was a little hard (technically had it til Sunday!), but we had to move on.

We enjoyed one slow, final round of tea/coffee on the patios, then packed up and headed out by 10:30 to make the 11:30 ferry with time to spare. (Which was good, because the 11:30 ferry ended up loading and pulling away from the dock at … 11:08?!? Good thing we were early…..)

Our villa had flowered bushes outside with hummingbird feeders… I couldn’t capture a hummingbird but here’s another cute little guy having a snack:

After a nice morning, some clouds rolled in and it started to pour right as we were getting on the car ferry! I was a little nervous because it no longer really looked like a “passing cloud” but rather a larger band of clouds and rain.

I was planning for us to maybe have a relaxing pool afternoon upon arrival at our new resort before our 5:00 boat cruise!!

The radar indicated that it would be moving out before too long. It put a little damper on our arrival to St. Thomas though, as nothing looks as pretty when it’s grey, cloudy and rainy!

Got checked in at the new place- a 2 bedroom/3 bath fully stocked condo at a beach resort. We also have 3 balconies- one off each bedroom plus a main one off the living room.

Since it was still spitting rain, we took our time getting unpacked etc. The boys lounged around in our room fiddling around on their phones…

After a bit we headed down to one of the restaurants for lunch- a beachfront place. It was still lightly raining…

At lunch:

We had a leisurely lunch. Clouds were breaking up and it was looking more promising!! Yay.

Heading back to room- see some blue sky!

By the time we got back upstairs the rain had moved away! Phew. We had only a couple hours before needing to go to our boat cruise.

Everyone just did their own thing for a bit and relaxed. I went to the hot tub, actually- though it was SUPER hot and I burned my butt the other day(!!) so I mostly just put my feet in.

I showered and then we left by 4:30 for the sunset cruise.

Drove 9 min to the marina. Thankfully no rain, though it was initially a bit cloudier than I would have preferred…

I had booked a “private sunset cruise for up to 6”- perfect as we have 6 in our group!

We found our boat and our captain and set out. This was definitely a highlight!!! It was super fun and beautiful and our captain was great.

They provided drinks and snacks.

Talking to the captain was really cool. He and his wife and 3 year old all live on a boat here in St. Thomas- not this exact boat, but similar sized. What a different life that would be!!

I was annoyed because it was cloudy at first, but then, after like 30 min, the sun came out!!

We ended up with gorgeous views and I took approximately 1 million photos. 😆

The boys and I went up to the front, which made for some super cool photo ops!!

Asher took this one of me and I think it’s so cute!

This one too!

It was so so pretty.

Love this:

The islands are gorgeous.

This is the life!! Asher is my boating/fishing loving kid and I won’t be surprised if he buys a boat one day.

Yay for actual sunset!

So cute. Sorry, I warned you… one million pictures and I can’t choose what to post so you get way too many.

This one is my FAVORITE!! Should just use this as a senior pic, lol:

These of the boys up front tuned out cool too:

My parents had a long chat with the captain. He was such a nice young guy.

Sun dropping behind the hills…

Happy kids:

Oh, we also saw Epstein Island and his house… 😳

The captain then took some great family pics for us.

Finally, heading back into the marina. This was SO beautiful!!!

It was a great time! Really glad we did this neat experience.

We were hungry for something lighter, as we had a big lunch and then snacks on the boat. Decided to stop at Duffy’s Love Shack in Red Hook, a popular place with fun vibe and music.

Ivan and I split some jerk chicken nachos, my parents had a big chips and guac, Asher had a bigger meal of steak and fries and Ethan I think had popcorn chicken.

They also played the song “Love Shack”, which is such a fun song and I am guessing they play often, given their name! Ha.

We made it back to the resort by 9 because the boys really wanted to do some night swimming. I went down to the hot tub, and Ivan stayed in the room to try and watch the Mexico o vs Portugal game. Pretty sure my dad half dozed off in a chair and my mom lounged in bed early and just relaxed.

Relaxing hot tub at night. My fav. 🙂

It felt like a sort of different / transitional day especially with the midday weather issues, BUT in reality, the rain did not actually impact our plans, thankfully. (It rained during our car ferry ride and lunch, basically, and that was it! Much better than if it had done that the day prior when we were on the beaches in St. John….)

Now, today, the boys really want a pool/beach day at the resort. I may see if we can also go check out another beach nearby – we have some with good snorkeling not far.

Current view from my seat:

Blue sky! Sunshine! ☀️ Looking like a wonderful day ahead.

The boys and Ivan and I have a night kayaking tour booked for tonight, too.

More tomorrow! 🙂