In June 2016 we were fortunate enough to be invited on a week-long sailing trip in the Caribbean. A honeymoon of sorts, albeit with eight other family members and friends, we didn’t hesitate to say YES given our interest in sailing and our ever-growing excitement over global adventures. We joined Javi’s parents, an aunt, three uncles, and his cousin and her girlfriend on a 52 foot 4-berth, 4-head beast of a sailboat called the Rumba. We flew into St. Maarten from SF (via New York for us since that was the cheapest flight) and sailed from there. Originally, we were going to sail St. Maarten, St. Barts, and Anguilla. But after some local warnings over customs headaches in Anguilla, we dropped that part of the trip. It was just as well because a few extra days in St. Maarten and St. Barts was worth it.

We arrived on a Friday and set sail out of Captain Oliver’s marina on Saturday, sailing first to Tintemarre Island, a wild island within the St. Maarten Nature Reserve. We swam with sea turtles there, was that a dream?!

Next up was Ile Fourchue for lunch then we anchored at Anse de Colombier, St. Barts, where we could see the old Rockefeller estate. The next day we had a short sail to Port Gustavia, the capital of St. Barts, where we spent the afternoon walking the town and eating delicious food.

After some unsuccessful fishing, we headed to Philipsburg, St. Maarten and docked at Bobby’s Marina for a couple of nights. Later we sailed to the French side of the island (we had been on the Dutch side) to Anse de Marcel and then a couple of miles to Grand Case. At Grand Case we snorkeled around Rocher Creole before having to return our boat the next day.

One of our favorite moments was jumping off the boat in Anse de Columbier with our little dry bag full of beer and hiking gear. We swam to shore and went on a short hike with gorgeous views of different sides of the island. Our hikeable water shoes, which we got specifically for this trip, came in really handy.

Seven days, dozens of sea turtle sightings, hundreds of blissed out nautical moments, and countless Caribe beers later, we arrive back at Captain Oliver’s to say farewell to Rumba. Feeling like experienced sailors after a week at sea (ha), dreams of future sailing adventures began to expand from the “maybe someday” corner of our minds to the “how can we do this forever” section.