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January 15, 2013July 17, 2019

Honeymoon Beach, St. John, USVI

Honeymoon Beach, a north shore St. John, USVI beauty.

Access: hiking or boat
Hiking: there are 3 ways to hike to Honeymoon Beach.
1. Hike the Lindt Point Trail from behind the National Park Visitors Center in Cruz Bay.
2. Drive up Route 20 from Cruz Bay up the hill, past the Cruz Bay Overlook and turn left, right before the Virgin Islands National Park sign.

There are a few parking spots to the immediate right after you turn. Walk past the National Park sign until you see the Caneel Spur Trail sign. Follow it down the hill to Honeymoon Beach.

Caneel Spur Trail (Access #2)

3. Park at Caneel Bay Resort (there is a fee to park there) and take the path from the parking lot to Honeymoon Beach.

Beach: Honeymoon Beach is a long stretch of beautiful, light colored sand with a gentle access. Some shade is available.

Honeymoon Beach looking left towards Solomon Bay.

Honeymoon Beach looking right towards Caneel Bay.

Amenities: Watersports Center, Gift Shop, restrooms, hammocks, picnic tables, guided eco-kayak, hike & snorkel adventures. Chairs and water toys can be rented.

Honeymoon Hut at Honeymoon Beach.

Tip: We visited Honeymoon Beach fairly early in the morning and it was just us and these guys:

Wild donkeys on Honeymoon Beach

We hear that later morning and early afternoons can get quite busy with boats bringing guests over for excursions, so if you’re on St John during high season and want to avoid the crowds, you might try to spend time on Honeymoon Beach earlier in the a.m. or later in the afternoon.

To see more posts on St. John and other islands, check out our Island Blog Directory

copyright©Rum Therapy
Pictures and other content may not be re-used without written consent from Rum Therapy, LLC. All information is correct to our knowledge at the time of writing, but be sure to verify current information before your visit.

October 5, 2011June 5, 2019

Rum Therapy On St. Croix

Last spring we had the opportunity to go to St. Croix for the first time. We’d spent some time in the two other US Virgin Islands, St. Thomas and St. John, but had not yet gotten to venture a little farther south to the sunny shores of St. Croix.

After just a week, St. Croix quickly became a new favorite destination. It’s the largest of the three islands but has about the same number of residents as smaller St. Thomas. The pace on St. Croix is decidedly relaxed, the people are warm and friendly and you can either find a quiet beach, relax and do nothing or be as busy as you want with activities like diving, snorkeling, kayaking, sailing, hiking and enjoying stunning scenery, great bars, music, restaurants and shops.

We’ve determined that one week on St. Croix is not nearly enough to truly experience this Caribbean gem, but until we can go and stay longer, we’ll share with you the things we’ve experienced so far that we think shouldn’t be missed! Click on the links for more pictures and info.

1. Cruzan Rum Factory Tour – if you enjoy rum, this is a must see. Interesting tour and a rum drink at the end!

2. Drive to Point Udall – the eastern most point in the US. – beautiful vistas.

From Point Udall, hike down to Jack’s and Issac’s Beach at sunrise…

3. Sail to, snorkel and explore Buck Island. (See Turtle Beach, Buck Island and Snorkeling at Buck Island) Great snorkeling, an underwater snorkel trail, hiking and an amazing powder soft beach.

4. Enjoy the wonderful Cruzan Rum drinks available everywhere on the island!

5. Explore Fort Christiansvaern in Christiansted and other historic buildings in the area to learn some of the the history of the island.

Be sure to spend time walking around Christiansted shopping, exploring and enjoying some of the great restaurants and bars. Join the fun at the Crab Races in Christiansted and the Divi Resort on the SE side.

6. Head to the northwest part of the island and hike one of the trails in St. Croix’s rainforest. Stop by the Mt. Pellier Domino Club for a cool drink, visit with some of the locals and feed a can of beer to one of the famous “beer drinking pigs”. (Read more about out visit to Mt. Pellier Domino Club here: Mt. Pellier Domino Club)

7. Spend some time in Fredriksted and check out the pier where the cruise ships dock. Snorkel, dive, jump off the pier or just enjoy a spectacular sunset. Head over to nearby Coconuts on the Beach and Rhythms at Rainbow Beach to enjoy a cold beverage and live music.

8. Spend a lazy day at Sandy Point. One of the prettiest beaches on the island and the location of the beach scene in “The Shawshank Redemption”.

9. Enjoy “life in the left lane”. Rent a jeep to explore the entire island and drive on the left side of the road – from the left side of the jeep!

10. Take a day trip to St. Thomas or Puerto Rico by seaplane.

Whatever you do or however long your visit, be sure to slow down, relax and take advantage of all that St. Croix has to offer!

See our St. Croix Map for locations of these attractions

To see more posts on St. Croix and other islands, check out our Island Blog Directory

Copyright©Rum Therapy
Pictures and other content may not be re-used without written consent from Rum Therapy, LLC

May 23, 2011November 9, 2020

Cruzan Strawberry Rum

Cruzan Rum recently announced the launch of their newest spirit, Cruzan Strawberry. It’s the 11th spirit in their family of flavored rums, and the recipe is crafted with a touch of ginger to give a unique spin to the strawberry taste. Here are some other details:

Tasting Notes and Aroma:
•       Taste – Ripe, wild strawberry coupled with subtle ginger root
•       Aroma – Fresh and juicy strawberry
•       Finish – Smooth with a light spiced ginger finish

After reading this press release from the folks at Cruzan Rum, we’d been eagerly awaiting the arrival of the new Strawberry Rum. We’re recent fans of Cruzan Rums since our Cruzan Rum Factory Tour in St. Croix in February, and have enjoyed using the Cruzan flavored rums in many boat and beach drinks such as the Cruzan Confusion! Last week, we were lucky enough to find a bottle of the newly released Cruzan Strawberry Rum after visiting nearly every liquor store in our area.

After scoring the desired bottle, we asked our Facebook friends for recipe suggestions. In addition to some excellent suggestions from our readers, Cruzan Rum Representative, Justine, also kindly volunteered a few recipe ideas. We asked a couple of friends if they would assist us in some Strawberry Rum recipe testing this weekend, and with minimal (no) arm twisting, they obliged!

We picked two recipes to start with and began to assemble the necessary ingredients.

First on the agenda was a Strawberry Mojito using the recipe from Cruzan Rum. The recipe called for Cruzan Strawberry Rum, sugar, mint leaves, juice of half a lime, and club soda. We muddled the sugar, mint, lime juice and a splash of club soda.

We then added the rum (note the exceptional choice of shot glass!),

Then poured it over ice in a tall glass and garnished with lime and strawberry.

After a little sampling and tweaking, this is the version of the recipe that we liked best.

Strawberry Mojito
(makes two)

3 to 3.5 oz. Cruzan Strawberry Rum
2 tsp. sugar
4 mint leaves
Juice of half a lime
6 oz. plus a splash of club soda

Muddle the mint leaves, sugar, lime juice and a splash of club soda. Add the remaining club soda and stir. Pour into a tall glass over ice. Garnish with a slice of lime and a strawberry.

It seems easy to overpower the taste of the strawberry with too much mint, so we initially tried 8 leaves then reduced the amount to 4 leaves per serving. The overwhelming consensus of all 4 taste testers was that the Cruzan Strawberry Mojito was crisp, light and very refreshing – an excellent summer beverage!

To make a Skinny Strawberry Mojito: Substitute 1/2 – 1 packet (.5 – 1 gram) Stevia for the sugar and/or Sprite Zero for the club soda. Tweak the amounts until the taste is just as you like it!

Stay tuned – more Cruzan Strawberry Rum Recipes (Part 2) in tommorow’s post!

photos: Pamela Ott

March 12, 2011June 6, 2019

Snorkeling at Buck Island, St. Croix

I’m scared to scuba dive. There, I said it. I thought about doing a resort course once, but when I learned that you had to be able to take the air tube out of your mouth and share it with someone else and that there is actually a chance that you could run out of air that many feet below the surface… I’m actually in awe of those who do dive, I mean, the pictures I’ve seen of their underwater world are stunning.

Anyway…John, the other half of this team likes to dive, but thankfully he also likes to snorkel – and I LOVE snorkeling.

Here we are, foggy lenses and all!

So we’ve been talking lately a lot about our awesome recent trip to St. Croix. On the list for this trip was a visit to Buck Island, an island just off of St. Croix that has been designated a national monument. Snorkeling there was purported to be amazing, and at the easternmost part of the reef there is an underwater trail – similar to the underwater trail found in Trunk Bay on St. John.

We’d snorkeled Trunk Bay several times – way back before it got so darned popular and crowded and so we were mildly interested in comparing the two trails, although we were more interested in seeing the vibrant coral and fish.

We found a charter recommended by Fodors and Frommers tour guides and booked a tour to sail, snorkel and explore on Teroro II the following day. The Teroro II is a trimaran and we boarded with about 12 other guests.

Teroro II

Carl was our Captain for the day. He was full of information and stories about Buck Island and St. Croix and did his best to make sure everyone was having a good time.

Captain Carl

We had a great sail out to the island and attached to a mooring ball offshore. We donned our gear and quickly jumped in.

The Buck Island Underwater Snorkel Trail consists of a series of underwater plaques indicating some of the flora and fauna found around the reef. After diving in, we soon found one of the plaques in the underwater trail showing the beginning of the trail.

We saw a rather large fish just a few feet away and began swimming after him to get a picture.

Then saw this plaque…

Thankfully he wasn’t interested in us.

We followed the trail for a while and then veered off on our own. The sun was out and the water was warm clear – although a tad choppy. Fish were abundant and the coral was colorful.

An hour flew by and we were signaled to come back to the boat for our short sail to the other side of the island for some beach time!

Find Buck Island on our St. Croix Map

To see more posts on St. Croix and other islands, check out our Island Blog Directory

copyright©Rum Therapy
Pictures and other content may not be re-used without written consent from Rum Therapy, LLC

March 2, 2011June 6, 2019

Glass Bottom Kayaking in a Bioluminescent Bay

During our recent vacation in St. Croix, we had one evening left to experience something special. I would have loved to have been there for Jump Up, a carnival like party held four times a year in Christiansted, but we missed it by a week. So, I got online to search for an adventure and quickly found it. Glass Bottom Kayaking in a Bioluminescent Bay! “What the heck is that?” was the reply we got when we told our traveling friends what we wanted to do that last night. Kayaking – AT NIGHT – in a pitch black lagoon? Were we crazy?

We had read about a bioluminescent bay in Vieques, but didn’t realize there was one in St. Croix. The organism that creates the luminescence is called a single celled bioluminescent dinoflagellate. This organism emits a greenish light when agitated at night. The conditions, including how bright the moon is that night, need to be just right to get a good effect and our guide thought that tonight might be just right.

We were to meet our guide at Altoona Lagoon on the northeast side of St. Croix at about 6:30p.m. We were excited, but a bit nervous given we had really only kayaked once and it was in broad daylight.

Craig and Bryce Scott, the owner/operators of Sea Thru Kayaks VI met us at a small bonfire close to the mouth of Altoona Lagoon and had smore’s ready for us to prepare while we waited for the rest of the group.

The Scott’s own 10 glass bottomed kayaks called Molokinis, an all-transparent two passenger kayak made out of the same durable polycarbonate material used in the production of bulletproof glass and fighter jet canopies.

The rest of the group arrived, Bryce and Scott loaded us all into our kayak (two per kayak) and we were off. We ended up at the back of the pack somehow and as we headed off in the pitch dark toward the big lagoon we both wondered what we were getting in to!

Bryce did a pretty good job of keeping all of the kayaks together even though he was only equipped with a glow stick and a flashlight. He warned us that we may have fish jump right into our kayak and not to panic! No problem! We had to work pretty hard against the current to get to the other side of the lagoon where the bioluminescent organism had the strongest concentration. About halfway there, we started to notice bright little sparkling flashes under us – cool! It was really hard to get on camera – our flash was not conducive to capturing the glow of what we were seeing, but you can see a few of the sparkles on the bottom of the boat here.

As we got to the other end of the lagoon the luminescence got stronger. Whatever touched the water made it glow – the oar, your hand, even fish underneath the boat! It was quite a sight! We played in the lagoon for about 15 minutes until raindrops began to fall. Bryce rounded us up and said we better be getting back – sometimes these squalls can get quite nasty! Hmmm…in a kayak in the dark in the middle of a lagoon and no clue how to get back. We got right in line behind him!

Sure enough, as we headed back, several minnows jumped right into the kayak. A little freaky at first to feel them flipping around against your leg in the kayak in the dark. Glad he warned us…

We arrived back at our base in good shape. What an adventure. Wish we could share more pics, but guess you’ll have to see it for yourselves!

To find out more about Sea Thru Kayaks, VI, check out their website: Sea Thru Kayaks, VI

More posts on St. Croix that you might be interested in:

Rum Therapy On St. Croix

Turtle Beach, Buck Island, St. Croix

Sandy Point, St. Croix

Cruzan Rum Factory Tour

Snorkeling at Buck Island

All information is correct to our knowledge at the time of writing, but be sure to verify current information before your visit.

Pictures and other content may not be re-used without written consent from Rum Therapy, LLC

February 26, 2011May 29, 2019

Coconuts on the Beach, St. Croix

When visiting a new tropical place, we always try to scope out the funky beach bars and the locals hangouts. Before visiting St. Croix, we asked the folks at St. Croix Lime for recommendations. They obliged and also reminded us to check the calendar on their website for live music and updates.

Coconut’s on the Beach was a bar we saw mentioned on the website and passed by it while driving through Frederiksted and thought we’d stop for some liquid refreshment.

There was a cloud looming overhead and no cruise ships in port that day so Coconuts was quiet, but looked like a great place to sit back and relax.

We ordered a few Corona’s, sat down and took it all in. From Coconut’s you can see the cruise ship pier at Fredriksted, you can catch a glimpse of the lovely Sandy Point Beach or you can stare out at the beach right under the bar.

Would have loved to have been there to enjoy the nightlife and some live music! By the time we left, a few more tables had filled up and as we walked through the Wall of Lost Soles, we figured we’d be back someday…

For another Corona, or perhaps a Cruzan Confusion!!

To find out more, visit Coconuts website here:
Coconuts on the Beach

More posts on St. Croix that you might be interested in:

Rum Therapy On St. Croix

Turtle Beach, Buck Island, St. Croix

Sandy Point, St. Croix

Cruzan Rum Factory Tour

Snorkeling at Buck Island

Mt. Pellier Domino Club, St. Croix

copyright©Rum Therapy Beaches, Bars & More, Tropical Travel Guide, 2013
Pictures and other content may not be re-used without written consent from Rum Therapy, LLC

February 22, 2011August 12, 2020

Bones Rum

As we prepared for a recent USVI adventure, we read about the Bones Rum shops in St. Thomas and St. John and had to add it to the list of places to visit. Little did we know, we would actually end up visiting both Bones Rum locations the same day!
(Note: the Bones Rum Shop closed in St. John in 2013, so be sure to visit Bones at their store in St. Thomas)

We weren’t able to find an address for the Bones Rum Shop in St. Thomas but read that it was located across from Charlotte Amalie, so we started walking. After searching a bit, we ran right into it. It’s located on Waterfront Drive just a little west of where you catch the ferry (from Charlotte Amalie) to St. John. (Find Bones Rum on our St. Thomas Map)

Bones Rum, St. Thomas

The store carries a variety of branded merchandise and features a bar with free rum tasting and “self pour drinks” – excellent concept! We eagerly agreed to the free rum tasting and must agree with the Bones Rum slogan “Smooth Rum for the Rough Seas”…

For $8.00 you can get a glass of one of the featured varieties of frozen drinks (including Painkillers) and then add the rum yourself! For an extra $3.00 you can get it in a Bones Rum glass that you can take home.

We sampled some of their tasty BBQ sauces along with our rum drinks.

At the time of writing, Bones Rum is only available in their store on St. Thomas, so be sure to bring a bottle (or two) home if you like it.

Here’s one of the recipe’s from the Bones Recipe Card

Pirates Grog
(makes one)

2. oz. Bones Rum
2 oz. water
3/4 oz. Lime Juice
1 tsp Brown Sugar
2 cloves
1 Cinnamon Stick

Heat in a saucepan and serve in a mug.

Find the Bones Rum Store on our St. Thomas Map

To see more posts on these and other islands, check out our Island Blog Directory

February 21, 2011March 11, 2022

The Cruzan Confusion

While spending a week in St Croix, we were introduced to a rum drink called the Cruzan Confusion. Our wonderful bartender, Dave, at the Divi Carina Resort in St Croix gave us his secret recipe for this wonderful and oh-so-powerful concoction, but we thought we’d check the internet to see if there was another recipe posted. We found a number of sites with the following Cruzan Confusion recipe, and I’ve included Dave’s, for comparison at the end. Let the confusion commence!!

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Print Recipe

Cruzan Confusion

Servings:

Ingredients

2 oz Cruzan Mango Rum
2 oz Cruzan Coconut Rum
2 oz Pineapple Juice

Instructions

Stir together in a chilled cocktail glass and serve.

Print Recipe

Dave's Cruzan Confusion

Servings:

Ingredients

1/2 oz Your choice of mix of Cruzan Rums up to about 4 oz. (current Cruzan flavors: banana, black cherry, citrus, strawberry, coconut, guava, mango, pineapple, raspberry, and vanilla)
2 oz Pineapple Juice
Splash Grenadine
Cherry and Lime for Garnish
1/4 Cruzan Black Strap Rum

Instructions

Blend the flavored rum, pineapple juice and grenadine together and pour over ice.
Fill a biodegradable straw with Cruzan Black Strap, add garnish and enjoy.

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