This details our who knows what number trip to SXM from Dec 21 – Jan 3. This adventure began with paying extra money to get non-stop CVG – SJU tickets. We chose to do this as we have several times been trapped at ORD due to bad weather, strikes, union problems or American Eagle personnel’s poor attitude about canceling the ORD - CVG portion of the trip if they wanted too. Then came the war. The original non-stop became a two flight segment CVG-ATL and ATL – SJU with a connection on American Eagle from SJU to SXM, with a 4hr 47 minute layover. Of course the layover became another hour longer as Eagle flights are always late in the evening. We finally made it into SXM at 11:00 pm. Our bags were among the first up and within 15 minutes we were driving away from the Hertz lot in our rental car. It had a great assortment of minor dings which we prefer since it is not uncommon to get a few minor scratches in parking lots.<br><br>We reserved our car and our Club Orient vacation through Jim & Mary Ruos at Caribbean Islands Travel Service, who are sponsors of this forum.<br><br>Overall Island:<br>The island is as green as we have ever seen it. There has obviously been a lot of rain. The golf course even looks good! There were a number of people playing a round at times. <br><br>Club O:<br>The road to Orient was better than usual, although there were still some monstrous potholes on the paved section. The dirt portion had apparently been graded a short time before. As expected the office was closed for the evening and we picked up our key from the security station.<br><br>We were assigned to Mini-suite 142, which is right across from the center path to the beach, so the location was ideal. A few things have changed at the mini-suites since last Christmas. First of all as we noted last summer, the glass louvered doors have been replaced with wood doors. It is a big improvement as we have seen many of them break as the wind would whip the door out and slam it against the side of the building or the door frame. The only draw back to the new doors is that they don’t offer the cross ventilation that was enjoyed before. However, the AC is more than adequate. They look a lot better. The other good change was that there are definitely less fire ants. We were plagued with them last winter and in the past summer in beach chalet #62. For those sensitive to their stings, there are still some left, but the numbers are greatly reduced.<br><br>While we there, the Brinks (Reint and Truus) apparently retired and went back to Holland, at least that is what we were told by some other guests. We never saw Gina either. Apparently Martin Brink is now the general manager. We don’t know if there will be any great changes in management style. I actually hope there isn’t much.<br><br>I was able to get one massage from Ana at the Spa Center. She is very good and has over the years done a lot for my herniated disc. It appears that Dinah is no longer doing massages on the beach. Her beach side booth is now the security outpost. Have no idea what happened to her.<br><br>Coin laundry:<br>As usual the coin laundry was dominated by locals (not employees) who filled all of the machines, and then left their laundry in the dryers for hours on end. In one case when I needed a dryer, I simply removed the other person’s laundry, dried my clothes and then put the persons’ clothes back in the dryer. They still weren’t back when I left.<br><br>Pappagayos:<br>This restaurant is still undergoing changes and still has a ways to go. Service is getting better. The menu is changing a little, but not enough. For lunch they have great hamburgers as well as a variety of daily specials. We were disappointed with one lunch special, jerk chicken, which was advertised as hot, hot. Someone must have forgot to put the sauce on it as it was as mild as a Wendy’s grilled chicken patty. To us Jerk means – Jamaican hot. We ate at the Christmas Buffet party and were pleased with the selection and taste. Each year it seems to be getting better. Our only complaint is that they have David’s Jukebox as semi-live entertainment. When the music starts it is so loud that you can’t communicate with someone right next to you. It is painfully loud. I would estimate that on the far edge of the restaurant where we sat, that the sound level was about 110 dB. (I manage an industrial hearing conservation program, so I know a little about sound and hearing loss). Even on return to the mini-suite we could still hear the music loudly, all the way across the compound. We didn’t bother to attend the New Year’s Eve buffet since we knew David’s Jukebox was the main attraction and he would be too loud. We did go up when the Brazilian Dancers arrived and did a few numbers. How did we know when to go? Well thanks to David we could hear the introductions from the mini-suites. They also had a female impersonator do a few songs. I’m not sure what the fascination is there, but that’s just me.<br><br>Other restaurants:<br>Most of our evening meals were taken at the New York Chinese Restaurant in Simpson Bay. This restaurant served both Chinese and Spanish style foods and is good at both of them. Complete dinners range from about $5 to $15 per person. The egg rolls are the best we have had.<br><br>Peg Leg Petes: Could not find, perhaps a better sign would help.<br><br>Texas Pit Bar-B-Que: We think this place has the best BBQ on the island – much better than Pedros and cheaper. They have live music on weekends. It’s near the food center in Cole Bay.<br><br>Roasted chickens to go: Several posts have indicated that the grocery on the hill north of Orient (Soliel or Sol something) has good roasted chickens, and we tried to get some from them, but they seem to have a rather erratic and unpredictable schedule and were closed every time we went. If we were headed elsewhere, they were always open.<br><br>We did find some good roasted chickens on the road that leads past le Hoste. It has no name but is one of the first shops in the coming city of Orient and is in the building where there is an insurance agency and 1hour photo place.<br><br>Poulet d’Orleans: this has been a favorite for several trips. We intended to have New Year’s Eve dinner here, but due to the French Power & Water strike that was impossible. We’ll eat there again this summer. We ended up grilling some steaks at the mini-suite for New Year’s Eve. We don’t like to go very far from the resort on New Year’s Eve due to amount of drinking and driving we have witnessed.<br><br>Grand Case/Grand Cost: Through the years we have dined at several of the more popular restaurants in Grand Case, but honestly have never found one we would go back to. We can get a better French meal at our local Mobil 5 star restaurant for less money. A number of the Grand Case restaurants are not on the water and thus are hot, noisy from traffic and there is too much exhaust from the roadway. Service varies from outstanding to Paris style haughtiness. There may be some good ones, since we haven’t been to every last one but there are so many other choices around the island.<br><br>Le Piccolo: We had found this to be a great restaurant last summer but it is now an all appetizer restaurant so we didn’t bother.<br><br>Le Pinel: This restaurant was highly recommend by Jim Ruos, but due to our short visit we were unable to dine there. It is at the top of this summer’s list.<br><br>Beach Conditions:<br>Orient beach was somewhat wider in the area of Pedros. The steps were no longer hanging in the air, but actually touched the sand. It appeared that the sand was slowly shrinking over the course of our vacation. In front of Club O, the beach was definitely less wide than it was this summer, but still more than adequate. There is a volleyball net, but there is no longer any room to play. The shortened beach requires that chairs be more concentrated and they are set up on both sides of the net.<br><br>Sand gravity was awesome. In fact we never went to any other beach during our stay. Weather was generally good although there was a little bit of rain during the first couple of days. But then it may have been a blessing as it is best not to spend too much time in the sun during the first two days (especially on Orient!).<br><br>Even though there were lots of cruise ships in (everyday) port, there seemed to be less of them wandering on Orient Beach than usual. Still there were plenty to go around. We even saw one with actual black socks and sandals. No plaid socks or beer socks!<br><br>Shopping:<br>Crowds were sometimes heavy in Phillipsburg but it didn’t appear that many people were buying much. Some camera equipment was less expensive that in the states, which is generally not the case. In general, there appeared to be lower prices for those willing to bargain.<br><br>My wife purchased jewelry at both Butani Jewelry Stores (Downtown and Maho). <br><br>In Marigot, the new West Indies Mall opened just before Christmas. This is a multi-level air-conditioned shopping mall and office complex located at the port. It even has an elevator to help you get from the lower shops to the upper ones. There is nothing else like it on the island. Only a few shops were occupied in time for the grand opening, but it still had that Neiman-Marcus feel – very out of sight prices. Here you can spend several hundred dollars on a blouse or pair of pants.<br><br>Grocery Stores:<br>Grocery store stock was at the lowest point since the 1995 hurricane. There were lots of empty shelves. There was a fire earlier this year that destroyed one of the larger wholesale houses, which may account for this problem. For Pepsi drinkers, we found not one single can of diet Pepsi and only 6 regular Pepsis on the island.<br><br>Traffic:<br>As usual traffic was a mess. We did note that there were fewer of the suicycles on the road this trip. There was supposedly a crackdown on them in the late summer, but my guess is that they are killing themselves off with their insane driving techniques. The suicycles we saw behaved like always, the riders taking every chance possible to save 1 or 2 seconds at a time. We saw no auto accidents during the trip. This is a first for us.<br><br>Airport Security:<br>Generally more lax than before 9-11. At CVG they did open my camera bag and make a very cursory look. They didn’t remove any lens or look through them. The norm there for years is to turn on every camera and look through every lens. No mention was made of my lead bag of film. Random inspection was limited to a lady with two infants, an elderly woman with a walker and a 70+ year old couple who due to arthritis had trouble getting their arms up for the wands.<br><br>At SXM they hand check all check through luggage. Again ineffective. They opened one of our suitcases. It opened up so that two items, that were banned out of SXM (but not USA) a pack of matches and a can of hairspray, were right on top and plainly visible. The guard didn’t notice them. When the carry-ons were run through x-ray, the operator wasn’t even looking at the screen. The so-called random checks at the gate were not random. Everyone who was first in line got checked, those of us who held back a little were allowed to board without inspection.<br><br>At SJU, no one commented on our lead bag, but they went nuts over the guy behind my wife who had a box of rum bottles. That carton was run back and forth through the x-ray and then hand inspected so that any with broken seals could be confiscated (I think party time for the guards).<br><br>At all checkpoints, the guards are most interested in shoes. To avoid hassle, I would suggest shoes that do not have metal eyelets or metal shanks. Put everything in your carry-on that is metal (coins, belt buckles, watches, rings, eyeglasses, leg legs, etc.). Wear clothing that has a minimum of metal (buttons, zippers, snaps, pins, metal underwire bras, etc.). If you don’t set off the metal detector they will spend less time on your carry-ons. We watched as number of women get patted down for the underwires, and for fancy vests with lots of metal decorations.<br><br>Our return trip was really nasty. We had bought CVG- SJU nonstop flights to avoid flying through Chicago or Philadelphia as prior experience has taught us these airports are often plagued with bad weather in January. As noted previously, Delta canceled the flights in both directions. We had a nice 4.75 hour layover in SJU. We arrived on time in Atlanta, and then spent 2 hours waiting on an open gate. Atlanta had a crippling 1 inch blizzard. Our initial flight was cancelled after being postponed for two hours and a half. So was the next flight. We were told we could get hotel vouchers for $45 toward the cost of a room, but we had to go to the customer service desk. All customer service desks were shut down except for one, which had a line that seemingly had no end. Estimated time of wait approximately 3 hours according to Delta. The promise was to get us home the next day (yeah, sure like they could double the number of passengers on each flight the next day). So we decided to get a one way car and drive home (475 miles). We went to the rental car booths and they either had signs saying they had no more cars or an hour + length line. Making an executive decision, I called National’s Emerald Club number, made a reservation and got on the bus. In about 15 minutes we were scraping ice off a Chevrolet Prism and were on our way. The first 60 miles were on ice and accidents were all over the road. Atlanta doesn’t know how to drive on ice. We finally arrived home at 9:00 AM the next morning! That was three days faster than most of our fellow ATL – CVG passengers according to the TV news. And our luggage finally did arrive. Delta would not give any luggage back the night they cancelled the flights because “it was too much trouble based on the high number of cancellations. They also wouldn’t deliver it because of the total number bags that were mis-directed. We were told that we had to hunt through the 100s of bags from Atlanta. There were piles of unattended bags in the airport, only two were ours. I thought that was supposed to be a security risk. What a wonderful airline. <br><br>Summary: the vacation was great, but getting there and returning were not half the fun or even fun at all thanks to Delta Airlines. <br><br><br>