Paradise found ; These former New Englanders are laughing all the way to the beach.

Do you dream of chucking it all for an island in the sun? WhileMassachusetts was up to its earlobes in snow this winter, theseexpats were congratulating themselves on their bar stools inparadise - and not just for a week. Try not to hate them too much.

Internet pioneer Alex Randall, 59, left everything, including hisBeacon Hill parking spaces, for the US Virgin Islands.

Alex Randall: "I had the best Boston had to offer and in 1995tossed it all for Water Island. A Beacon Hill town house. Seasontickets to the Red Sox and BSO. Three parking spaces on Mt. VernonSquare. My company, the Boston Computer Exchange, was among thefirst to sell products online. If your brain works on the Internet,your body can be in paradise. When the Internet provider on St.Thomas said they had 9,600 bps, I thought, `That's enough for me.' Iwas done with the suits: lawsuits, the snowsuits, and the three-piece suits.

"Water Island is the antipode, the other end of the universe: 500acres with 163 people. The total list of things that happen here:Sunday afternoon, the beach bar has a live band. Monday night,Heidi's Honeymoon Grill shows a movie. Bingo on Wednesday. Parentinghere requires more of the parents - there's no after-schoolsaxophone lesson or tae kwon do. We bake a lot and do simple old-fashioned things like board games. In Boston, we could walk mydaughter Rose and sons Sander and Marshall to school. Grace, 9, andNina, 8, were born here. Alas, all that walking ended. We startevery morning taking a boat ride to Charlotte Amalie, then drive 20minutes across the island. We have dinner at the dining room tableevery evening. It is simple when there's nowhere else to go.

"If you're going to be an expat, you're going to have to reinventyourself. My wife, Beverly, is a neonatologist. She walked into theSt. Thomas hospital and was immediately hired. I became "The GoodNews Guy" on St. Thomas radio, a toy job compared with the ComputerExchange. But here's the flip side: Everyone knows you. In the rushof the city, everyone is anonymous. In this town, your 15 minutes offame come up once a month. I'm now the professor of digital mediacommunication at the university, teaching the only class on Webpublishing in the Virgin Islands.

"What do I miss? I loved the Sox, the BSO, concerts at theGarden, the caldron of excellence. Once a year we have a musicfestival: Carnegie-caliber musicians for three nights in my livingroom. If you want culture, you have to make your own.

"Number one favorite thing? At 6 a.m., you can watch the fullmoon set over 17 miles of ocean. Boats bathed in moonlight,moonlight that's bright enough that you can read by it. I never hadthat experience in the States in my entire life. Number two: theocean. You can see 20 feet to the bottom, and the water is warm anddelicious. As soon as I hang up with you, I'm headed for a swim."

From Cape Cod to Turks and Caicos, nature photographer DavidStone, 61, and his wife, Elizabeth, 56, found richer lives on asmall island.

Elizabeth Stone: "Like any human life, you spend the first partbuilding and adding on - go to college, marry, raise kids. Thensuddenly you're at a pivotal moment. `Do we continue what we'redoing, or drastically break out of the pack?' The first time we camehere, in 2001, we were awed. The long white sand, the beautifulwater. We wanted to whisper, it seemed that reverential. We made afive-year plan. We hired and trained David's best friend to takeover [our photography business]. Our girls are in the States incollege. They understand it's our journey."

David Stone: "The pace of life is the biggest change. Everyonejokes about island time. It can take you three hours to get througha bank line, a day to get your license. It was a real challenge toadjust. When we first moved here, I had a metal detector that couldsearch underwater. I found men's wedding rings mostly. I wanted tobe able to return them to the owner, so I decided to start a website- Ilostmyjewelry.com. It filled my time. I knew I would need to findother things. Now I'm a volunteer math teacher; a friend and Istarted a reef fund to protect the marine environment. And I justfinished photographingThe Lionfish Cookbook.The Caribbean has aproblem with non-indigenous lionfish proliferating and devastatingsmall reef fish. Our motto is `eat 'em to beat 'em' - they're afabulous delicacy. In retirement, we're busier than we've ever been.I also play Santa Claus on the island."

Elizabeth: "Providenciales is a scrubby little island, not yourtypical French Polynesia image. There's no traffic light and onemajor paved road. When I come back to the US, I feel assaulted bystimulation. Two weeks ago we were in Florida, where there were fivelanes devoted to one direction! It's the smallness I love. We've putmaybe 3,000 miles on the car in three years. This whole island thinginvolves thinking outside the box. When we first moved, I broughteverything, and the kitchen sink. Now if I don't bring it, do Ireally need it? I'm forever dreaming up ways to accomplish the samething. I look out at the palm trees. They're flexible; that's whythey survive the hurricanes. The resourcefulness that peoplediscover in themselves is amazing. The locals know how to fix a car,put on a roof. We see this as a new chapter for us as a couple andas individuals. We've been married 30 years, but because we don'thave those routines that we had in the US - like it's `steak night' -it brings out a different facet of our relationship. I see him in adifferent light because he's changing in front of my eyes. No, Idon't miss [the United States]. We're very happy here. I think wemade the right choice."

Weston native Sam Treadway, 26, used to be a bartender atBoston's Drink. Now he's serving cocktails in honolulu.

Sam Treadway: "A bartender from Miami called me out of the blueand said, `Hey, you want to bartend at this new hotel that's openingin Hawaii?' I had three weeks. I put in my notice, moved out of myapartment, and flew out with two big bags.

"Hawaii has been an ongoing experience of surprises from what Inaively thought versus what it is. Before I came, I was looking atads for a cabin on the beach for $600. North Shore? No problem. Inreality, that would be a three-hour bike ride over a mountain range.I imagined Honolulu as a resort-style city, but it's more likeMiami, with lots of cars, offices, every modern convenience. Itamazed me to find so many people in the middle of nowhere. There arestatistics that say Oahu is the most remote inhabited island on theplanet.

"I didn't want to buy a car, so I found a place with roommates onCraigslist on the 27th floor of a luxury apartment building closeby. I don't have to be at work until 4 p.m., so I head to the beach.I had never surfed before and really like it. On my first go out, Iwas able to stand. Recently, I biked about 8 miles down the road,went on this big hike up to a volcanic crater, and was able to hikeback down, cross the street, and jump into the water. Stunninglybeautiful.

"It's very easy to meet people because I'm working in a hotelwith lots of employees. The cocktail culture is pretty small. Comingfrom Boston where I was just another bartender, suddenly I'm a bigfish in a small pond. What's nice is that I'm slowly getting peoplemore interested in cocktails.

"My mom sends me pictures of this huge icicle that's continuingto form outside my childhood bedroom window. It started at 4 feet,and it's a 12-foot icicle now. In five months I've acclimated to thepoint where the other day I was going to leave my apartment and Iwas like, `Hmm, it's a little chilly.' The temperature was 72degrees."

Braintree natives Terrie and Mark Hayward, 41 and 42, fulfilledtheir dream of running a guesthouse in Culebra, Puerto Rico.

Terrie Hayward: "Mark and I met at Braintree High. We loveBoston, but the whole gray winter thing . . . When we applied forthe Peace Corps, we had one stipulation: No snow. They placed us ina village in Papua New Guinea. We got what we asked for!

"We loved the South Pacific but wanted to be closer to family. Inour Peace Corps interviews, when they asked about future goals, wehad said we wanted to own an inn in the Caribbean. We moved toTortola first and applied several times for business licenses. Wehad influential people helping us and everything, but it wasn'tmoving. Then we found the Palmetto Guesthouse for sale on Culebra.Everything just seemed to fall into place.

"Culebra is a US territory, so it was easier to buy property andstart a business. That's `easy' in quotation marks - nothing reallyis easy! But we're not shoveling snow. We can be at the beach in aminute; there are four beaches within a 2-mile radius of us, and wesee the beach from our back porch. We enjoy running, swimming,walking our dogs. The outdoors is available to us all year.

"Puerto Ricans are familiar and inviting. They might be having abig, loud party next door, but at least you're invited. It's a smallisland with only 2,000 year-round residents, so you can write`Terrie' on an envelope with a ZIP code and the letter will reachme.

"What do we miss? I take pictures of the yogurt aisle in the US,it's so vast. We don't have access to a giant grocery store. If youhave to have that brand of cereal, you could be disappointed.There's no gas on the island, so we wait until the gas truck comeson Wednesday. Our car is put on the ferry to San Juan for repairs.Once you know that's life, you adapt. When visitors ask, `When doesthe bus come?' we say, `When it comes.' "

Patricia Borns, a frequent contributor to theGlobe'sTravelsection, lives on Amelia Island, Florida. Send comments tomagazine@globe.com.

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