News Americas, NEW YORK, NY, Thurs. Mar. 10, 2011: The Governor of Vermont, Peter Shumlin, has returned to a big brouhaha over his secret vacation in the Caribbean island of Dominica.

Shumlin offered no apologies for his four day secret vacation without his security detail, instead stating he had purposely asked his staff not to disclose his whereabouts so he could be a private citizen.

“We thought it was best that the little island of Dominica didn’t know that I was the governor. They didn’t. … It was great to be an ordinary citizen for a few days,” he said. “The people in Dominica and the small communities where I were had no idea who I was, and there’s no better security than that.”

Patricia McDonald, chairwoman of the Vermont Republican Party, was among those who’d criticized the handling of the absence.

“The bottom line for me is that, when asked by the press, his key staff — his press secretary and secretary of administration — said they did not know where he was. That, to me, was not an acceptable answer,” she said.

While Shumlin was in the sunny Caribbean, the state got walloped with a snow storm.