Virgin Islands 2026 Day 10: exploring Water Island!

Friday, April 3, 2026

On Friday we took a nice slow morning- we have these 2 full days (3 nights) and it’s not a big island, so there was no real sense of urgency.

I think I already shared this pic, but for the sake of completeness, here’s how I started my morning:

Eventually moved outside away from the sun to the other side. There are just such great views from literally everywhere on this property.

Eventually, the boys, Iván and I took off to go check out the “gravel beach” I could see from above. (It’s actually called Limestone Beach.)

The boys are digging the golf cart thing, lol.

Parked on the side of the road, then we had to “hike” down. It’s not far, but it is fairly steep and lots of rocks, branches, etc. We made it in flip flops though.

The beach itself is not the most stunning beach, but it was just us and one other couple, so that’s always cool. Definitely had that “adventure” feel that I like to find. 🙂

That’s our house way up at the top! (Not on the far left of pic, but the most visible one in the middle.)

Poked around for a bit and waded in the water. There’s some washed up seaweed and stuff here, so like I said, not perfectly picturesque, but still a pretty spot.

There were sea urchins out there in the rocks so we had to be careful…

I found this little “beach hut” that someone built, complete with a pillow to sit on and a roof.

Of course I had to try it out. Not a bad spot! I could totally have sat there with a book.

After maybe a half hour or so, we hiked back up. Asher drove us back to the house, after a slight detour around another little part of the island.

Our house:

We gathered up my parents and then set out to do a “full island tour”. We are staying on the more northern side of the island, and on the far southern point is Fort Segarra, an old WWII fort/underground bunker.

The road over there was not the best, ha. Our trusty golf carts made it, though…

Arrived!

Here is one of the… things I can’t remember what they are called, lol!! It’s where they’d have put the big guns, like a base. There are 2 of these on the site.

The best part was going inside- this was cool.

This was pretty amazing! There are multiple hallways of old rooms where they had offices, planning rooms, communication rooms, weaponry storage and more. How they built all of this back then, on this little island, is pretty crazy! I think it was mostly in use shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor.

The best part was climbing this really tall iron ladder up to a lookout spot. Only the boys, Iván and I did this.

Honestly kinda surprised they let people climb this- it’s really really high! A fall would be.. not good. 😬

Heading back down:

When we finished here, we drove back toward our house for lunch at Heidi’s Hilltop Grill, the island’s other restaurant.

It’s a super cute little place! Perched on a hilltop, as the name implies, it’s basically a permanent food truck. They have a nice menu of fish tacos, chicken and fish sandwiches, burgers, and more.

The views from the deck are amazing!!!! They also had great music playing. It was busy when we arrived but then it cleared out and we had the place mostly to ourselves.

It was pretty hot, though. I had the best freshly grilled cheeseburger- nice and thick and so juicy and just yummmmmm……

I was stuffed after lunch. We went back to the house (which was just a minute further up the hill) and all took some cool off/relax time.

I think my mom dozed off on the couch, I stretched out on my bed with some tea, my dad sat on the balcony…. This was “digest your food and relax time”. 😅

At maybe 3:00 or so we finally headed to the beach. Later in the day, yes, but it felt right. We have spent many days at the beach on this trip. I won’t say people are “sick” of it, but it just felt nice to explore and relax at the house yesterday.

The boys were itching to play more pickleball!! I didn’t realize they were so into this. Haha.

The adults grabbed a table – we did bring towels etc but as it was later, we opted to not bring all the beach chairs and stuff down.

We got a drink and just hung out and the boys played a LOT of pickleball.

Eventually I tried my hand at it, too. I had never actually played pickleball before, and I was playing barefoot on a sandy court, so I was not the best, but it was super fun! I could see getting into this!! Haha. People play it at our gym and now I’m thinking maybe I need to hop on the pickleball train. lol. Ivan seemed to like it too- and he beat me twice. 🤨

I got hot and sweaty after all the pickle balling, so Ethan and I jumped in the water. Ahh felt so good and it was so beautiful out there! They have a floating “bar”, basically just a big slab, that we leaned and sat on in the water. The views were gorgeous and I really loved just chatting with Ethan, just the two of us, for a long time in the water.

Even my dad tried pickleball:

We were not quite hungry for dinner yet (which would be at Dinghy’s again, right there on the beach, as it’s the only place open later!!, and anyway now I was wet and sandy and felt a bit gross. We decided to go up to the house so I could shower and people could change out of their sweaty pickleball clothes, if desired.

Quick shower/clean up and then back down for dinner about 6:45.

We caught the most beautiful sunset sky!!!

Look how beautiful this is!!!

I love these family pics too! The sky was perfection.

I kept taking many sky photos, haha. Just too good with the cloud/sky/sun/boat/water combo.

The boys played MORE pickleball while we got settled and ordered.

I had ceviche this time (I had the “fresh catch fish platter” the night before), several others had fish and chips and my mom got bang bang shrimp.

We had a slow, relaxing dinner. This is really such a cool, unique spot on beach.

There was a big group of girls dancing and having fun in the bar area. 🙂

Eventually we returned home – gah the moon over the water!! Would that ever get old?

We settled in to watch Monster-In-Law, the old Jennifer Lopez movie with Jane Fonda. Ha! They have an old DVD collection here and I spotted it- my parents and the boys had never seen it. It’s a cute one.

We made some popcorn and had all the screen doors open with a nice breeze blowing… so so nice!

I stayed up way too late – just sort of got a second wind after the movie ended, and I don’t think Ivan and I turned out the light until after 12/12:30! Oops. I guess I need to squeeze every last drop out of my vacation time. 😜

Now, today, our last full day!! It has been a pretty long trip. I am never “ready” for vacation to end, really, but I am looking forward to getting back to my workouts (today is day 11 with zero formal exercise- which is fine- I don’t worry about it in vacation ever and I haven’t had gym access anyway. Could I have done some full body streaming workouts, yes.. but I didn’t. 🤷‍♀️ Will resume on Monday! At least I swam a bunch.)

I’m also looking forward to having more control over my food again. Groceries are SO expensive here, we really kept our purchases to pretty basic minimal stuff that we could all share. (And still spent a fortune on groceries!)

We have primarily eaten in restaurants, which we super enjoy!, but I’m getting ready for more of my usual staples and healthier options again. I have definitely been eating way higher carb/lower protein than I had been the last 2 months. Again, it’s fine!! It’s vacation. All good. 😊

I am NOT looking forward to leaving these views – or going back to work. 😩😩 Unfortunately, the work is a necessity to fund the next trip! 😜