Susan Solo – Photographer | Traveler | Adventurer

Tag: St. John

  • St. John 2012

    St. John 2012

    So here are a few images from our trip to St. John, as promised! Chris and I actually had a great time despite the fact that Tropical Storm/Hurricane Issac showed up to the party. The first few days at the villa were am-a-zing. The weather was incredible – bright blue skies, puffy white clouds, tons of sun, and visibility for miles. We spent our days hanging out at the house, relaxing in the pool or on the huge deck in the super comfy chairs (so many options!), and we spent our evenings trying out bars and restaurants, and then unwinding in the hot tub. Sunday, Monday and Tuesday were just absolutely travel-magazine perfect. We were looking forward to spending time at the beaches later in the week, and going on a tour excursion of the British Virgin Islands on Friday.

    But then the storm showed up on Wednesday, bringing with it a mixture of emotions – disappointment, excitement and fear. Living on the east coast, we are fairly used to hurricanes and we experience them regularly, but we’ve never encountered one on a tiny (tiny!) island before. It’s an entirely different experience. After speaking with some locals, we learned that it’s common for St. John to lose power because they manually shut it off to avoid any electrical dangers. We also learned that after one storm, the power didn’t return for six months. Can you imagine?! So as the storm approached and gained intensity, Chris and I briefly thought about flying home to salvage the remaining days of our time off from work, but unfortunately getting off of an island with an impending storm isn’t easy. The ferry wasn’t running over to the main island – they shut it down, so there’s pretty much no way to get off St. John unless you want to swim during 70+ mph gusts of wind.

    The property manager for the villa came over and put all of the patio furniture inside the house (see iPhone photos below). And our trip to the BVIs on Friday was definitely canceled. So, what did we do with the rest of our time? We stocked up on batteries and drinks, hung out in the pool and hot tub on the rainy days, and on the really bad stormy days we just stayed inside relaxing, watching TV and doing a 1000-piece puzzle. The last day of our visit was clear enough to make our flight. It still turned out to be a fun trip, even with the storm, so I’m calling it a success!

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  • The New Blogsite

    Ta da! What do you think of the new blog + website (a.k.a., blogsite)? I’ve been wanting to change things up for a long time and I knew what I wanted to do, but just hadn’t found the time to do it until now. My main requirements were twofold: I wanted one consolidated place for people to see my work (which means only having to update one site!) and I also wanted to be able to blog more about other stuff besides my work without having something super random right on the front page.

    So now, if you’re here to see my work, great! You can find it in the Weddings and Portraits menus. If you’re here to read my blog, that’s up there in its own menu, too! And now it’s easier to go straight to various sections of the blog, like if you’re specifically here to watch me learn how to cook, for instance. There are still a few tweaks I need to make here and there, but for the most part this is the new look. I hope you like it!

    And just to add an image to this post, here’s a photo I took in St. John this past August (and have yet to blog the images!), just as Tropical Storm Issac had left the island:

  • St. John 2011

    St. John 2011

    Sometimes you just have to go with the flow and drift wherever the wind takes you, or in our case wherever the storm redirects you. Chris and I had a beach trip in the Outer Banks of North Carolina planned in August this year, but Hurricane Irene decided that we would be better off going to the U.S. Virgin Islands instead.

    Part of traveling to the Outer Banks during the summer is knowing that it’s hurricane season and that there’s always a chance the weather could be unpleasant or even dangerous. We’ve spent two summers (and one Thanksgiving) in the Outer Banks with great weather, but this time Mother Nature was not on our side. Hurricane Irene hit the coast of North Carolina on the day that we were supposed to check into our beach house. Not only was it not safe to drive down, the entire area was evacuated and no one was allowed entrance to the Outer Banks. There was nothing we could do. Throughout the weekend we remained hopeful that the weather would subside, and our fingers were crossed that no damage or harm would come from the storm. (Sadly, this was one of the more costly and damaging storms in the U.S. and our hearts went out to those affected.) By Monday, the situation was not improved and we weren’t sure when we’d be able to take our vacation if at all, so we decided to utilize our travel insurance and cancel the Outer Banks trip altogether. Thank goodness for travel insurance!

    Thanks also to some quick-thinking and spontaneity, we were able to reroute our travels and book a vacation on St. John instead since we still had the week off from work. We already knew the island from our trip there in 2008, so it was an easy choice for a last-minute getaway. I found a beautiful villa called Palm Vista high on a hill overlooking Fish Bay, and it was the perfect spot for us to relax after the stress of rerouting our trip. We booked next day flights, which surprisingly weren’t outrageously expensive. Tuesday morning we hopped on a plane and arrived at the Palm Vista in time to enjoy an afternoon of sunshine and relaxation.

    We didn’t do a lot of exploring or take a ton of photos – we ended up hanging out by the pool and at our favorite bars and restaurants because it really was just supposed to be a decompression trip, but here are a few images from the five days we were able to salvage. Not too shabby, huh? Five days of gorgeous weather in the Virgin Islands certainly beat a week of rainy weather in the States.

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  • …and We’re Back!

    …and We’re Back!

    Hello there! My apologies for the blog silence. We have been here for the last few days for some summery vacation time:

    That’s St. John, specifically overlooking Fish Bay. But we’re back now, and ready to start the fall wedding season! So if I owe you an email, I’ll be responding to them shortly. We didn’t take that many photos in St. John because, if I’m being completely honest, we were just too lazy to do so, but I’ll post a few soon. Happy Labor Day!

  • Just Daydreaming

    Just Daydreaming

    I’m still here! (I feel so guilty when I don’t post anything on the blog for a few days.) I just had kind of a busy week last week, working on an album design, doing some back-end office stuff, and then I second-shot an amazing wedding for the equally amazing Kate Triano on Saturday. So I’ll have some fun pictures for you soon. In the meantime, for no other reason than sheer randomness (and the fact that I am daydreaming about another vacation) here are two pictures from my trip to St. John. I miss the super relaxing evenings sitting on the deck of the villa with the amazing view, enjoying the feel of a summery breeze high up on the hillside. Minus the mosquitoes, of course.

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