TandP,

Over the years, when the family was younger and bringing friends along on the trip, we used to ship full coolers of frozen food, everything from turkey breasts and hams, steaks, frozen meatballs and sauce, homemade chicken cordon blue.....you name it, we brought it. But that was back in the day and the groceries were verrrry limited and items available weren't always that great. And some days, after a busy day in the sun doing whatever, it was nice to come home and just toss an already prepared meal into the oven or on the stove without having to find it first! I do truly hate shopping......

Today we don't bother, but the groceries are excellent and there are only two of us. There isn't much if anything I can think of that can't be gotten on the island, but that said, sometimes you might have to really look around for exactly what you want.

As already stated, there is no restriction regarding bringing food to St. Maarten, and I agree with the idea of freezing it solid first but I would personally hesitate before putting frozen meat inside your regular luggage regardless of how well packaged it was.

We once met a woman there who had done just that but unfortunately, while her flight went straight to SXM, her luggage took a more circuitous route and four days after she got there, the suitcase with the food arrived. We met her while shopping - she had to replace a lot of her clothes because everything had defrosted and leaked out of the cooler bag. The likelihood of this happening is not great and I would still bring my frozen steaks if so inclined, but I would definitely freeze and put them in a cooler bag that I was carrying with me as opposed to putting them in my shipped luggage. <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/handshake.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/handshake.gif" alt="" />