Island By Design

Hello All,

My wife and I have decided to commit to a year on STX to see if the calling we have had since first visiting in 2000 is the real deal. We have been on island 4x for 7 days each time. Unfortunately, the last time we were on island was New Years 2006…way too long! I will either be working remotely for my company or will be self employed (if they say no). My wife is a Medical Aesthetician doing laser therapy.

In a way we are already a part of your community as we are the kayaking couple on the gotostcroix.com website photo header. Wendy took photos of us during our first trip. I was kind of disappointed to see that Caribbean Adventure Tours has updated their site as we were the main page image plus a few others – oh well – progress. We are still on their Kayak Tours page.

I have read most of the posts on this forum and I have researched the island extensively. I am pleased to see the upgrades to internet speeds as that is the one thing I need to do my work. I only hope the reliability increases as it seems to be hit or miss from time to time. My wife will need to find work, but with her out-going personality it should not be a problem and I make enough for us to live comfortably on.

We are from Denver and after 26 and 30 years here we are definitely ready for a change. I told my wife back in early 2000 that we would live on St. Croix someday –and we hadn’t even visited yet! I just had a feeling. We will see how that plays out.

We will do this the “easy” way and only bring what we need. We will rent a furnished place and will ship a car from FL. In the long run it seems it will be cheaper than buying an island car. We sold our home in 2010 and rent now. No debt. Kids are on their own (24/29) and living their lives…time for us.

My work will be for mostly stateside clients if my current company tells me to pound sand. So that is why the internet is so important to me. I may ask you all about service reliability from time to time to understand current status.

I am currently designing a complete new sign system for SJU International Airport so I am in PR about once a month. And there is still another year of work there. I will also look to provide my design services on island and throughout the Caribbean as I also have done interior design and bar and retail design. I owned a design/build fabrication firm and I am very hands-on in that way.

I have created a plan A, B & C for this adventure with a move date of May 2015 for A, Oct 2015 for B and plan C is a six month version based on May 2015 move. The economy is of course the ultimate driver of all this and as long as construction remains strong stateside we will take the plunge. I am definitely a “prepper” and I am always planning ahead as much as possible.

Just wanted to say hello and start touching base.

Dan & Kadie King