sail2wind,

DH and I have been visiting St. Maarten for over forty years EVERY year, and for the past fifteen or so, we've been coming twice a year, but with a few trips to other of the Caribbean islands thrown in for good measure, as well.

Assuming you are a seasoned island traveler, St. Maarten/St. Martin is no better and no worse than most of the other Caribbean islands. But it sure does seem to be talked about a lot more.

It is well known and well documented that crime is definitely on the upswing throughout the entire Caribbean and St. Martin is no exception. Not that any crime news is good, but the only good news along the "crime line" in St. Martin is that most of the crime that occurs against visitors consists of car break-ins.

There was a time - a long time ago - when we wouldn't worry about needing to lock our car, regardless of what was in it or where it was parked. Those days are long gone.

As the island started to become more popular, car break-ins became pretty common occurrences - almost like a cottage industry there, mostly happening at beaches and in isolated locations and they were mostly crimes of opportunity, so the word then became lock your cars completely and leave nothing in them anywhere. Most car rental insurance calls for this measure anyway.

Of late, the majority of car break-ins, of which I agree the police should be able to be bring under control if they wanted to, still seem to be happening at beaches and in cars parked in isolated areas, and the latest word from many rental agents about locking them seems to be, "leave absolutely nothing of financial or sentimental value in your car anywhere antime, and when parking at beaches, leave them unlocked."

Our preferred agency suggests we lock the car everywhere EXCEPT at the beaches and leave nothing in it that we value anywhere. Because our car was broken into once over all the forty years worth of trips, and because significant damage was done to the power door locks and the trunk lock, we follow this advice whenever we go to any of the island beaches.

As far as crimes involving personal injury, it seems like St. Martin is about on par with most of the other islands and light years safer than many. Of course there will be bad guys doing bad things but most of the violent crime, sad to say - yes - there are violent crimes happening on St. Martin - are usually crimes of severe greed or crimes of passion and they are generally not directed at vacationers as a rule.

Again, 40+ years we've never been a victim of anything beyond that one car break-in, though I will concede that as we've gotten a lot older, our habits have changed and we are much more cautious about doing 'stupid stuff' than we were years ago.

I would take all you've heard to heart but don't dwell on it. Given the high volume of return visitors, it can't be that bad, can it? Certainly not if we are any example.