T minus a week and counting...

Unbelievable! Leslie gets on the plane five days from today!

There's been a whirlwind of activity, and a mountain of tasks yet to tackle as we prepare for this move - but more on that later. Let's back up just a little and see how it is that we came to this point where we're leaving our home, family, friends, and worldly possessions behind to move to a nine mile long rock far, far away...

Like so many other folks, our first encounter with St. John happened while we were on a cruise that had neighboring St. Thomas as a port call. The first time there, we walked off of the ship, then followed the hordes downtown where shopping ruled. The streets and downtown area were interesting, but we really like a little more activity than that offered, so the next time we booked a scuba diving excursion through the cruise ship. That allowed us to see more of the island, but for a number of reasons wasn't a great experience for us.

The next time we were headed there we met a couple on the ship that suggested we take a taxi to the east end of the island and catch a ferry to neighboring St. John. So we followed a different horde, to Red Hook, on the ferry to St. John, then on a taxi to Trunk Bay. The views of the water and beaches that we saw during that taxi ride were phenomenal!

We hung out, snorkeled, swam, all of the usual stuff. We had beaches at home, but there was something about the sand and the water here that was...different.

We took a taxi back to Cruz Bay and just missed a departing ferry, so we had an hour to walk around and soak in the ambiance. That hour changed us! We didn't do anything exceptional, although it must be said that sipping mango daiquiris while gazing out at the water didn't suck too much!  But this place just had a "vibe" that we liked, and long after we were back on our ship, sailing off towards the next port, we still felt it, and wanted more of it...

Once we got home I went online to see what I could find about staying on St. John. The internet didn't have nearly the presence then as it did now, and the few options I was able to track down were well out of our comfortable vacation budget range, so the flame flickered a little.

As scuba divers we had always preferred the western Caribbean cruise itineraries over the eastern, mainly due to port calls in Cozumel and Grand Cayman, both top dive destinations. But for some reason we found our reluctance to take the eastern routes had diminished, and we managed several more day trips to St. John. Once we even had a few members from our group rent jeeps and take them over on the car barge for the day, which allowed us to go beyond the Cruz Bay to Trunk Bay route that had defined all of our previous visits.

I was hanging out with my buddies in Cap's Place, having a beer while waiting for the car barge to arrive to the National Park Dock area, as they did back then, while some of the ladies hit the nearby shops. That old feeling was returning. I could see glimmers of it in the faces of my friends - we weren't crazy! Yet a trip here still wasn't in the cards - not yet anyway.

In late fall of 2006 we took what would be our last cruise to the eastern Caribbean (and with the exception of a last minute Thanksgiving week cruise with our boys to the western, our last cruise to date). Maybe we didn't want to tease ourselves with another all too short visit to St. John, but we decided to do something we hadn't done before. We booked a daysail out of American Yacht Harbor in Red Hook. We motored/sailed to Christmas Cove to snorkel, cruised around Pillsbury Sound, and had a really fun day. As we made our way back into port I commented on a beautiful house perched high atop a hill overlooking the water, wondering aloud who might live there.

Our captain told me that no one did - at least not full time. He went on to explain that a lot of these houses, which they call "villas" down here, are short term rental properties, and that they were ubiquitous on St. Thomas...AND on St. John!  I guess my interest level and excitement were hard to conceal - he also gave me the name of his ex, who he said worked for a company that managed some of those rentals...

It turns out that this particular company only managed really upscale villas, so going to their web site didn't leave me any more encouraged than I had been years earlier when I explored accommodation options on STJ.

But there was more. As we left the dinghy that day I told the captain that I would give his operation a hearty thumbs up on a cruise travel forum that I frequented (he had actually been referred to us by someone from our first choice that was booked that day). He thanked me, then asked if I might also/instead put that on a VI specific travel forum. I dutifully did so, and perusing that forum I saw references to a different forum, one that seemed to be very STJ-centric.

Then it was just a matter of time....

We found a bunch of friendly folks offering all kinds of helpful advice. We found a place we could afford, and FINALLY booked our first visit to the place that had been tugging on our hearts for years. It was, in a lot of ways, a very different vacation than any we'd had before. You had to take your own garbage to a dumpster every day, there was no daily maid service. There were signs in the bathrooms reminding you not to flush every time and to take "navy showers". Many of the beaches we drove to were unmarked and uninhabited, roosters crowed randomly, and we even found a scorpion on the floor next to the bed one morning.

After a week...we were head over heels in love with the place and already plotting our return!

The next year we went for 10 days, stayed on a different part of the island, and met some of those people from the travel forum. We cried on the car barge when we left.

Soon we were going twice a year. We took one, then both of our sons with us. We shared rentals with people we'd only briefly met, and convinced friends we'd known for years to come and stay with us. We stayed for as long as two weeks - the time still flew by and we still teared up upon our departure.

This was getting out of control. It was said, almost as a joke at first.

"We should just move here"

Every visit we made it a point to talk to the people that do live there. What do they like? What do they miss most? What are the biggest challenges?

We had (relatively) somber discussions about what we didn't know about island life. One of the things that came up was that we'd never been during high season, so we didn't know if the crowds would change how we felt about the place.

Spring break trip with one of our sons. Bam!

But...we stayed in Coral Bay, kept away from the crowds...did that really count?

So....February, 2013. Our 10th visit to St. John. Ostensibly this was all about checking 8 Tuff Miles off of the bucket list. Also a trip in the highest of seasons, staying in Cruz Bay...

Leslie had sent an application to the USVI School Board for a physical therapist position she saw advertised on craigslist. They had received all of her info, but no one had even been interviewed for the position despite the fact that it had been posted for months. Before we left home Leslie called them, told them that we would be on island, and that she would take the time and trouble to go to St. Thomas for an interview. She was told "give us your number - maybe we'll call you while you're down here"

So she decided to reach out to someone on St. John who, as far as we could tell, is the only practicing PT on island. Just to let her know about Leslie's background, and to see if she'd mind getting together for an information gathering chat. Almost an immediate reply - "you arrive on Thursday? Can we meet for an hour Friday afternoon?"

So...I'm sitting at one of tables outside of Sam & Jack's Deli upstairs at The Marketplace while Leslie is having her meeting in one of the adjacent office suites. The appointed hour comes and goes, then ten more minutes, ten more, ten more - you get the picture. Not that I'm complaining - there are a whole lot of other places that I could be less pleasant than where I'm sitting right now, and I'm people watching, daydreaming...

The door opens and Leslie comes out and as she makes her way over to where I'm waiting I see that she has a look on her face that's part ten million miles away, part unbridled excitement, and some other stuff that I can't even fathom.

Then she spoke the words that would change our lives:

"So, do you want to move to St. John?"