To celebrate Jenn’s big milestone birthday in February, we had a six-night vacation on the United States Virgin Islands of Saint Thomas and Saint John.

The USVI consists of three main islands (and a bunch of minor ones) in the Caribbean, east of Puerto Rico.

This post is about our travel from Dallas, Texas to Saint Thomas, USVI.

But first, after dropping off our coach at NIRVC (as in a recent blog post), we dropped off Paladin at a cat boarding place:

His room:

Checking out the play area:

Even a fish tank to watch:

Then we headed to a hotel near the airport for the night, since our flight was very early in the morning:

We left our truck at the hotel. The next morning, at 3 AM, we took a taxi to the Dallas Fort Worth (DFW) airport.

Here’s our plane:

A map of our flight from DFW to CLT:

A plane selfie; we wore masks for the flights out, just in case:

The plane needed to be de-iced before we could take off:

Dallas from the air:

Sunrise above the clouds:

Charlotte, North Carolina:

A one hour connection, so we rushed to our next gate:

Rocking chairs in the terminal:

A map of our second flight, from CLT to STT:

Boarding the plane:

Takeoff:

Several other passengers were masked, but many were not; it’s no longer required:

USVI:

Arrival:

We were picked up by our rental car, and taken to their office; we booked a Jeep to handle the hilly terrain on the islands:

Driving through downtown Saint Thomas; notice that they drive on the left side of the road on the islands, though the cars are US ones, with the steering wheel on the left; that took a bit of getting used to:

We stopped for some groceries on the way to our accommodations — and notice the chickens; there were free-range chickens all over the islands:

Next time, a post about our accommodations.