Very nice last day on SXM. Lunch at Talk of the Town with a repeat of my $8 ribs and curry rice. Very iffy weather with a HUGE downpour around 9am...impressive rain. Sun/clouds after that.

Wandered around Porto Cupecoy which is a great place just to check out the ships in the port. Noticed the big Asian restaurant on the left as you walk in has departed. Black clouds coming in (again) so we decided to move on and as soon as we got back in the car WHOOSH! the sky opened up...short lived though.

Meandered back to TripleA to return the car. Office locked but a worker washing cars found our agreement, check the car, and drove us to PJIA..took all of 10 minutes.

JB desk at PJIA was quite and we checked our bags and got our boarding passes in no time. Mine had the dreaded "SSSS" on it so I was prepared for a special gate check of my bag.

Boarding pass scan was fine...took 5 seconds. Up the escalator to meet a line waiting for passport control. Two machines down so four in service. Some confusion but not that bad. Good thing is that it slows down the travelers getting to security screening so we had one couple in front of us...two scanners working. Not a problem at all.

So with no line at the JB deck...maybe 10 people at the boarding pass machines..MANY people waiting for passport control..it took 40 minutes to complete the process

Unfortunately we had B1 for a gate (actually ended up as B4) and went down into the den of humanity. Sunwing flight to Toronto was delayed 4 hours so that crowd (B5) added to the congestion...and the fact that 3 flights were basically boarding in rapid (for SXM) succession. Please, next time, I will pay extra for a jetway....please

The inevitable special security check happened...the two uninterested agents spent at least 10 minutes (slight exaggeration) arguing which SIDE of the table to inspect my bag,,,really..back and forth...kinda made the JB "early boarding" pointless...one tennis bag..took 15 seconds to examine but forever to start the process... then to the bus for our trip.

The flight was fine. No TV or wifi of course because of the "out of range" thing but one decent movie to watch. No issues. WIFI came on around 45 minutes out of BOS and it worked great. Answered some emails and sent some pics from the phone before landing.

Overall a fantastic visit with no real issues. Last pics will be a departing view of SXM and a kinda lame video from the room of one monsoon rain storm before we checked out. I wouldn't want to use the bus to get to the plane during that event.

View of Royal Palm/bridge and lagoon



View of SXM in it's entirety. Always amazed about the actual size of the lagoon



..and for all of you who have never experienced rain...

A slight mist in the air

Another nice trip under your belt.....even being on the island with you at least a small part of your stay, I truly appreciated your notes and photos. Good job, Boucharda and TY! <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/handshake.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/handshake.gif" alt="" />

Thanks for your reports and glad you had a good trip.

Seems I am always lucky enough to depart from downstairs and it is usually a zoo of people and warm. If lucky enough to be selected for a "security check" just prior to boarding, it usually goes just as you described.

Simpson Bay Lagoon is one of the largest inland bodies of water in the Caribbean. Great shots!

Thanks for taking us along!! Regarding the B gates, I'm pretty sure it's a function of what airline you're on. On AA, we're never in the B area, last time we were there I think was Jet Blue..

The last three times we've departed the island we've been at the B gates. On AA. So much for that theory, lol.

Not sure, but could the gates be assigned on a 'first come - first served' basis or perhaps the first flights in get the bridges?

It almost seems as though there's competition for JB and AA to see who can nail the earliest JFK departure times lately. We departed JFK last week at 6:59 and arrived early due to good flying weather and we did have a jetway. The JB plane we went home on also arrived early and had a jetway. Last April we were scheduled for an upstairs departure to NY but the flight down was late leaving ergo arriving at SXM and they reassigned us to a downstairs gate after we had checked in. Like most others, I hate the downstairs departures, too.

To my knowledge, KLM and Air France, and I think AA, are always upstairs.. Anyone here ever been on AA and left from downstairs?

GaKaye just said two posts up from yours that they have.

Sorry, I missed that. Although that would have been probably the traditional US Air route, not the traditional AA routes?

Carol,

We have arrived on AA from JFK - usually a 757 - and we've experienced both jetway and downstairs arrivals and take offs. And one of our last AA trips we arrived downstairs and had to use their buses. Why? Who knows! We could easily have walked in the time it took us to board the bus since we were really just short footsteps away......... <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/duh.gif" alt="" />

We always fly AA to Charlotte and have left from both places. The pictures from the air are fabulous.

My guess is they use the busses for safety and to also keep them moving since they have them. With 200 people exiting a plane they want to keep them grouped/corralled as possible until inside.

OK, as usual, I don't know what I'm talking about! <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/Laugh.gif" alt="" />

"slight mist..." video sure beats snow! Welcome back.

AA to CLT was gate B1, Forgot Gate 2, Gate 3 and 4 were JB, gate 5 was the poor Sunwing group

Delta was upstairs at A1 and A2, AA was gate A3

I think gate assignment has more to do with time of day and when the biggies come in. When we arrived on JB at 1p we got a jetway 'cuz AF and KLM and Transat were not due for a while. 4pm departure almost guarantees a visit to the pit.

Yes, we were US Airways fliers before the merger, so perhaps that's the answer. However, we have departed from upstairs on US Airways in the past, although not often.