Things to Do in US Virgin Islands

The US Virgin Islands are three very different islands that happen to share a flag. St. Thomas is the arrival point for most visitors, and Charlotte Amalie, its capital, deserves more than a cruise-port dash through the jewelry shops on Main Street. Walk up the 99 Steps, a steep staircase built by the Danes in the 1700s from ballast bricks of sailing ships, and you will reach Blackbeard's Castle with a sweeping view of the harbor and the scattered green islands beyond. Below, the narrow streets of the historic district are lined with 300-year-old Danish colonial warehouses now housing duty-free shops where rum, cigars, and electronics are genuinely cheaper than stateside.

Magens Bay, on the north shore, is the postcard beach - a sheltered, heart-shaped cove with calm turquoise water and soft white sand, though it gets crowded when cruise ships are in port, so arrive early or visit on a non-ship day.

Take the Red Hook ferry to St. John, a 20-minute ride that drops you in Cruz Bay, a walkable little town with open-air restaurants and a handful of shops. Two-thirds of St. John is Virgin Islands National Park, donated to the nation by Laurance Rockefeller in 1956, and it feels genuinely wild. Trunk Bay's underwater snorkeling trail is the marquee attraction, but Cinnamon Bay and Maho Bay offer better snorkeling with fewer people and resident sea turtles that graze on the seagrass just offshore. The Reef Bay Trail is a 2.5-mile downhill hike through tropical forest past pre-Columbian petroglyphs to a beachside sugar mill ruin - book the ranger-led version, which includes a boat ride back so you do not have to climb uphill in the heat.

St. Croix, the largest and least visited island, sits 40 miles south and has its own distinct personality. Christiansted's pastel-colored waterfront buildings date to the Danish colonial era, and Fort Christiansvaern, a bright yellow fortress from 1749, is one of the best-preserved colonial forts in the Caribbean. The Cruzan Rum Distillery near Frederiksted offers tours and tastings where you can sample aged rums not available on the mainland. Buck Island Reef National Monument, a short boat ride from Christiansted, has an underwater snorkeling trail through an elkhorn coral barrier reef that Jacques Cousteau once called one of the most beautiful in the world.