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Susan's Comment: Beautiful, early sunrises have been magnificent. I wanted to be sure to capture it!
Went to bed early last night. Slept until 6:30 am. Got up, and had a cup of coffee, a bowl of granola, and a last piece of good whole-wheat French bread with prosciutto and Dutch cheese. Time to clean out the fridge.
I needed to take one more dip in the ocean before we left town. So Susan and I drove down to Dawn Beach this morning. Dawn Beach is almost the perfect beach. There were only a few people on the entire beach when we arrived. I took a refreshing swim and then air-dried for a few moments.
Came back to the condo, showered, and packed up. Clay, Jean, and Susan each had a last Heineken. Can’t leave good beer behind! We will be checking out at noon.
We headed down to our familiar parking lot at the dive shop with the plan to eat a big lunch, return the car and go to the airport. We settled on a restaurant right on the roadway from the ocean to Simpson Bay and right beside the drawbridge. There is excitement when the bridge is up and the big boats come in. It only happened once while we were there. A big Coast Guard cutter coasted in. It took them three maneuvers to park the big boat. The food was excellent. I got grilled mahi mahi with salad and fries. The other three got the fish and chips. Mine was terrific. There’s were excellent also. Fortunately, Susan couldn’t eat all of hers. So I got my last big portion of fresh seafood.
Next, we took the car back. I had backed into a low planter on our day trip to Orient Beach and popped the rear quarter panel. We had purchased insurance, thank goodness. They were going to ascertain the damage, charge us, and then we would have to submit a claim to the third-party insurance company. Sounds a little wonky. We’ll see how that goes…
Got a shuttle to the airport and stood in line for an hour. Then we stood in line for security. Then we stood in line for passport control. We finally made it to our gate. There is no rush, just the urge to get it all over with. We are at our gate two hours early. Our flight is at 5:25 pm. We won’t be home until after midnight. Yuck. The wait at the gate was almost interminable. Eventually, we all answered the cattle call and shuffled out the door and into the plane. Luckily Susan and I had an empty seat between us. At the last second, Clay moved to an open seat with an empty middle seat. That made it a little more comfortable. It was a long six-hour flight. I snoozed fitfully and did four NY Times crosswords to make the time go by.
We landed just about on time and then breezed through customs anticipating a quick exit from the airport. Alas, not to be. As we stood at the luggage carousel waiting for our bags, a cheerful voice came over the loudspeaker informing us that our luggage should be arriving in about 15 minutes. That did not make us all feel any better. Finally, we retrieved our stuff, caught the car park shuttle, and took off for home. The weather had been unseasonably warm the entire time that we had been gone, even breaking an all-time high of 59 degrees. Right now it was 32, so not a flake of snow was to be seen. Fine with me. That made our drive home easy.
We just dumped our luggage in the living room and hit the hay.
On Sunday morning we all went to Good Day Cafe for a sendoff for the Harmons. Nicci joined us.
*Susan’s Comment: The biggest and best thing that struck me about Sint Maarten is just how culturally diverse and international it is. Sure there is the French side and the Dutch side, but you are in the Caribbean with its huge mix of cultures. It was a really nice environment that embraced you while you were visiting. Yes, the island completely relies on the tourists $$ but I always felt welcome. It was a nice feeling.
*JT’s summary: When people ask me if I liked St. Martin, I tell them that the weather was perfect, the beaches clean and the water beautiful, the infrastructure was solid and well maintained; the people cool and open and the food almost universally terrific. The diving was surprisingly good with good visibility and abundant sea life. The dive sites were not crowded and the people that we dove with seemed to really appreciate and value the underwater experience. So I guess that I would rate it 4 out of 5 stars on my approval rating. One thing that detracts from my giving it a perfect score was the sheer amount of people on such a small island. The island is only eight by nine miles in size. There seems to be at least one or two cruise ships in the harbor at all times which disgorge thousands of tourists, packing the roads, restaurants, shops, and beaches. To accommodate all of these people, beaches typically are operated and serviced by bars and restaurants. That means that to sit on the beach, you almost have to rent one of their chairs and umbrellas which occupy most of the prime beach space. The roads are almost always clogged with cars and driving is stressful. The beautiful harbor draws yachts and people from everywhere. There are literally hundreds of boats docked at all times. It introduced me to super yachts which Clay aptly described and “tax write-offs for millionaires”. There is little untrammeled, unpeopled land to explore. So if relaxing on a beach and eating out are your main priorities, it’s a great place to visit. It has the usual tourist trap experiences like zip lining and four-wheel riding but if hiking and exploring are priorities for you like they are for me, you might want to go somewhere else.
Put simply, I loved the trip! It was a great getaway. Am I ready to explore another warm-weather destination? Absolutely.