Come Away With Me....

With the 70 degree weather in the forecast, I know I'm not the first to say that I'm ready for spring! I've never been a winter girl. The Mister knows there is no way I could move more north or farther away from the beach. So while I know that we have several more weeks of cold weather and no vacation in sight, I'm going to take these few days of warm sun and dream about being somewhere else.

When I die, I often hope that heaven is just like St. Barts. The Mister and I went to St. Barts for our honeymoon, and I honestly thought I had died and gone to heaven. He kept it a secret from me and didn't reveal the final destination until we had landed in St. Maarten and boarding a tiny prop plane. So let me take a few minutes of your time while I indulge myself and introduce you to St. Barts....

St. Barts is a small island, only 9 miles long, which allows you to easily go to a different beach each day - how luxurious! The best way, and to be honest the only way to get around the island, is to rent a car. We rented a fun little jeep that we took all over the island and discovered every nook and cranny.

The other interesting thing about St. Barts is there is a limited amount of hotels, and most people rent small villas or apartments. We used St. Barts Properties and rented one of their two bedroom villas that had amazing amenities such as your own pool, hot tub and ocean view.

(Villa Poirer)

(Villa Poirer)

Most of the larger hotels on the island are über glamorous and also über expensive, but they also host some wonderful restaurants. We decided to cook at our villa most of the week as we had fun going out to the supermarché every day and exercising the wee bit of French we know. However, we did make reservations during the end of our trip to have dinner at the Hotel St. Barts Isle de France ,which is located right on the ocean in the Flamands Bay. We dined at their delicious open-air restaurant, La case de l'Ilse that looks right out on to the beach.

(Le case de l'Ilse)

The hotel's rooms are beautifully designed, and you have an option to reserve either a single room, a junior suite, a bungalow or private villa - all of which have either a view of Flamands Bay or of the lush flora and fauna of the island. I would love to splurge and book a junior suite at this hotel for our next trip!

(Jr. Suite at St. Barts Hotel Isle de France)

As we spent the week exploring, we discovered out favorite beach, Colombier. You have to be a bit adventurous to find this beach because the only way to get there is park your jeep and take a 30 minute hike off the beaten trail. It's a beautiful hike as you really get a sense of the topography of the island, and right when you are too hot and sweaty to go any further, you emerge onto a beautiful, secluded beach. It's like finding the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, I'm not kidding!

(Colombier Beach)

We also decided to poke around at the Eden Rock Hotel, located right off of St. Jean Beach. Eden Rock Hotels are located all over the world and are the go-to hotels for celebrities, and the St. Barts location is no exception. We literally walked by Usher as he was headed back to his lounge chair with then girlfriend, now ex-wife, Tameka Foster Glover. At first I didn't think twice, but then it hit me as he passed by. It was just me, the Mister and Usher. I could have done the typical celebrity-sighting response - run up to him in tears and ask him to sign my bikini top, but I chose to let him have his vacation. We ended up being on the same plane as we headed home, and let me just say that I think Usher owns every piece of Louis Vuitton luggage! Bottom line - even if you can't afford to stay there, you should be nosey Nancys like us and check the place out. You never know who you will run into!

Last thing to wrap up this long post (thanks for sticking with me!). I am mentally planning our next trip (I hope the Mister reads this post!) as our 5 year anniversary is coming up..ahem. I thought I'd pick out a few outfits from the oh so appropriate company Calypso St. Barts. Here are just a few things I would like to take on my next upcoming trip....

(all photos via Calypso St. Bart)