Other Hotel Options

Although we're recommending that people stay at Bolongo Bay Beach Resort (due to proximity to the wedding venue, access to lots of beach fun, and nearby restaurants), there are plenty of other options for varying price ranges.

I suggest you check out Kayak.com to start. Click on 'Hotels' and enter 'St. Thomas, Virgin Islands (US)' and the dates you intend to stay and then check out the offerings after you click 'Search'. There are several options listed, and I find that the best way to look at them is to view them in a 'Map'. From there you can see where Bolongo Bay is located, as well as the other hotels that are available at different price points.

My one warning when you book alternate hotels is that there might be a need for a rental car, which might negate the cheaper price in some instances, so it's worth considering.

Please post a comment or let me know in some other way if you'd like me to do a little search for you, we really want to see everyone there, so if there's a way that I can help I am MORE than happy to do so.

Bolongo Bay Reservations

Here is the breakdown of pricing for Bolongo Bay – we were given a 20% discount but it’s only good if rooms are booked by November 30th 2010. Of course, they only have so many rooms on the property, so the sooner it’s booked the better:

Ocean View Room Rates:

All Inclusive - $505.60 for 2 people per night (additional adult in room $136, additional child in room $78.40) Everything included.

European Plan - $317.40 for 2 people per night (additional adult in room $20, additional child in room $12).

Value Room Rates: (the person I was in touch with made it clear that these are not great rooms, in an older section of the resort, and have no view at all since they face the Lobster Grill)

All Inclusive - $479.80 for 2 people per night

European Plan - $217.35 for 2 people per night

All reservations include use of all beach toys, kayaks, hobie cats, windsurfers, all snorkeling gear, towels and chairs, free scuba lesson, free sailing lessons just to name a few.

To make reservations people should call (1-800-524-4746) and give our names (Seelig/Goetsch) to get the rates listed above.

Here is a link to the website: Bolongo Bay

If anyone has any questions let me know and I’ll do my best to find out the answer.

Looking forward to seeing you there!

Hotels and Accomodations

What a boring, non-clever title to a blog post. If I were you I wouldn't even bother continuing to read, but I thank you for trying anyway. I was attempting to set the tone that this is meant to be an informative post, but frankly, I have very little to tell you. We have yet to block rooms at any hotel, but there are several I wanted to give you a heads up about so that those of you who like to plan ahead can start doing so (I'm looking at you, Hayden).

So here are a couple of options that we're looking into, all are suitable for your visit but maybe give it a week or two before you book so I can let you know what secret passwords you need to give them (most likely Goetsch and/or Seelig) to get the best rate.

Marriott Frenchmen's Reef and Morning Star is your standard Marriott hotel (if your standard Marriott hotel is on a cliff overlooking the Caribbean) - you have an idea of what you're in for before you arrive as far as service and the types of rooms. There are some cool amenities that you should take a look at on the website, including proximity to beaches and pools and golf nearby with extras that come at an extra cost.

Bolongo Bay Beach Resort is a smaller, family owned and run resort, and the one that we're thinking most people will be drawn to. The highlights for this spot are that (a) included in the price of your room is access to all non-motorized water toys like kayaks and windsurfboards and snorkeling gear and the like, (b) there is live music every night at one of the bar/restaurants on the property, and (c) there are condos available for families that need a little more space. So this might be the way to go if you want more than a hotel, with the fun sort of built right in, so to speak.

My third and final option (for now) is for people traveling down in a group - you may be interested in renting a villa, and the place that's been recommended as being very reputable is Vacation Rentals By Owner. You have to do some weeding out to find what works best for your group, but this might be a perfect option for those of you who like to be on your own schedule and want to do your own thing while you're visiting. Please keep in mind that a rental car is supposedly a MUST if you go this route, and you're going to want to look for something on the EAST SIDE of the island.

I hope this sheds a little light on the possible accommodations and gets you thinking about what kind of a vacation you'd like to have in St. Thomas. I assure you I'll have more information in the coming weeks, so check back again soon!

Hurricane Shmurricane

You might be a little concerned about the fact that Hurricane Earl has passed right through the Caribbean, and has even gotten dangerously close to St. Thomas, the place where I hope to see your smiling faces in a few short months. While St. Thomas is often disrupted by hurricanes during certain parts of the year, we've based the timing of our wedding on when this will not be a threat, and from November to June we're good to go. Which means no one can use that as an excuse not to come.

So, take a good look at that photo up there, with all the wind and rain and cold, and then give me a high five when you see me next, because I had to twist Bill's arm to schedule our wedding for non-hurricane season (Bill's a risk taker, as you may know, and I'm a liiiiittle more cautious as you also may know).

Flights to St. Thomas

So here is the first post regarding flights to St. Thomas. First, I want to point out that you don't have to worry about the very disturbing thing happening in this image - very few men wear speedos these days (thank goodness), so please don't let this horrific possibility deter you from coming. Oh, and also, the plane doesn't come in this low in St. Thomas - this photo is from St. Maarten.

Anyhoo, back to the flights. A couple recommendations: I think the best sites to look for flights are Bing Travel and Kayak because they compare a bunch of cheap comparison sites, so they're worth checking out.

For those of you coming from New York, it's looking like the consistently cheapest flight is with American, and it's around $350 round trip. I'm not sure how long that will last, so consider this your fair warning.

For those of you coming from California or elsewhere on the west coast, you'll need to do a little prioritizing and here's why - the cheapest flights ($420) appear to be out of LAX, but they include a ridiculously long layover (like, 9 hours) which might be awesome if you've always wanted to check out Philadelphia, and who hasn't wanted to spend a few hours in the City of Brotherly Love? If you wanna kick in an extra $60 for the flight you can cut your layover time down to 2 hours and stop in Miami. Out of other major airports there are some similar prices, but so far I've found that LAX is the cheapest, so it might be worth it to drive a few hours to get there and take advantage of the prices. So basically what I'm telling you is that you're going to have to finagle a little bit, but you Californians are so resourceful I have full confidence you'll be able to sort it out. If you have any questions, please feel free to give me a call and I will be more than happy to search for the most competitive rates for your specific scenario.

In all of these searches, keep in mind that you're going to Charlotte Amalie airport, whose airport code is STT.

Did that help at all? Probably not really, but you DID get to see a fun picture with speedos, and now you know the St. Thomas airport code.

St. Thomas!

Bill and I have decided on our wedding location, and we are really excited that it's going to be on St. Thomas, one of the US Virgin Islands in the beautiful Caribbean. There were lots of reasons for this decision - it didn't seem fair to make the New Yorkers travel to California, or to make the Californians travel to New York, and we didn't want to make it even-steven and force everyone to meet in the middle because who wants to go to a wedding in Kansas? (No offense, Kansas) Besides that, Bill and I were lukewarm in wedding planning for the first few weeks of our engagement - none of the ideas we threw around felt quite right and we weren't as excited as we thought we'd be at the thought of planning such an exciting event.


Until we considered a destination wedding. We love the idea of being married on a tropical island, in warm weather at the end of what will undoubtedly be a cold New York winter, with as many friends and family members who are willing and able to make the trip. It all just seemed like the perfect answer for us, and since then, we've been over the moon and so very eager to plan a memorable experience for everyone who can make it over.


So, I'm really sorry to do this to all of you, but if you want to be there to see Bill and I get married you're going to have to fly here:


Again, I apologize.

Gettin' Hitched!

You read that right, Bill and I are getting married! We're both so excited, and in a break from my tom boy ways, I'm extremely excited to be planning what will likely be the most awesome wedding ever. I'm sure everyone feels this way about their own wedding, and in every instance it's true - I LOVE weddings and have been to some pretty amazing ones in my life, but this will be the only one where I know and love every single person who will be there! Not to mention that we have some pretty cool friends and family, most of whom know how to get down and have a good time, so I think it's going to be pretty great. So check back here on occasion, I'm going to do my best to keep up with the details so you can prepare mentally for all the fun that will be had in a few short months. Woohoo!