Something possibly unique to living in a big city through winter is an ever-increasing yearning for the COMPLETE opposite in surroundings come March or April. That’s right, we pray for a land where everyone lives underground like mole people and worries of what the weather is doing above are a thing of the past….maybe a little 12 monkeys meetsfraggle rock!??

Though we will surely keep THAT dream alive, another option is to escape NYC and head to the equator. There is a promised land of palm trees, buckets of cerveza, and lightly-crashing, azure waters a mere 4-hour direct flight away. Its a place where slushy sidewalks and bone-chilling gusts of angry skies are distant memories. This year we were invited to slowly roast in the St. Maarten/St. Bart’s sun with Irene’s sister, Mel, and her bf, Aksel. With accommodations so graciously provided by Aksel’s fam, the trip was a no-brainer and only required around 43 seconds of thought and kayak.com processing.

The itinerary included a good amount of lounging around on the beach, eating well, and one of my favorite island past times, driving up steep meandering cliff-hugging roads on a 350cc ATV with Irene hanging on for dear life. Now with the sole life mission of building a house on St. Bart’s firmly implanted, it’s clear this is an experience that will surely one day be repeated.

Continuing the promotion of Cooliris and abstaining to foster facebook’s world domination, photos from our trip are available here.