A Sheltered Life Tour 2010

After several years of conquering the inventories of beer in Tulum, Mexico our group of 8 looked east to St. Martin and its cases of Presidente, Carib, and Coors Light. Four of us were last in St. Martin in 2004 and were blown away how much the island had changed.

After a 5 hour weather delay and $220 bar tab, we flew from Jackson, MS to Atlanta on Friday night. We arrived at the Airport Hilton (a very worn hotel) at 12am with a wakeup call coming at 4:15am. We arrived at airport at 5:30. We printed our boarding passes at the hotel. They had a kiosk set up for just this. (Nice touch) We dropped our check bags at the curb and missed the lines at the counter.

Half of our group used SkyMiles for free tickets. We booked them in Feb. The others bought tickets at the same time and paid about $550 per ticket. Delta performed fine on this trip for us. We had no airline related problems other than weather. Flight down was great. Newer 737 had individual entertainment systems and that made flights feel much quicker.

Arrived SXM on time, customs went fine for most of us. One couple got held up because custom agent wanted specific address of villa. Meet at exit door by driver from villa and by Marius with St. Louis Car Rental. We arranged for an 8 passenger Hyundai H1. Marius let me know that his van was still out and that Dollar/Thrifty agent would make us the same deal. $416 for everything for 5 days.

We booked the Villa Belle De Nuit in Happy Bay through Annemarike at Gobeach.com. We used her in 2004 without a problem so we went back to her again. We were greeted at the house by a busy French girl from Pierres Caraibes., the on island management company.

Villa Belle De Nuit is beautiful and has amazing views. A 15min walk gets you down to Happy Bay or you can walk or drive down to Friars Bay. The house was set up well for 4 couples. 3 king beds and 2 queen beds. One bedroom�s bath is across a hall. Nice flat screen tv with US channels, wifi, great kitchen. AC worked great in bedrooms.

BUT�

I had read that it was a new villa. It is a newly remodeled villa. I had read that it had some electrical issues and that they had been resolved. NOPE! Breakers throughout house would go off at all times and every day we had to go out to street and reset the main breaker. NOT COOL.
And because of electrical issues the alarm system went off and not the best times. We called Pierres Caaibes and someone came to kill the alarm.
But the view and the pool kept our unhappiness at bay.

Saturday afternoon we went down to Buccaneer�s Beach Bar for $2 beers and burgers. We ordered our burgers med well but they were nowhere near that. This was the first of many undercooked very pink cheeseburgers we found this week. Some ordered fish and it was good.

We then went to Le Grand Marche for groceries in Cole Bay. Great grocery!

Sunday morning we woke to rain. We didn�t know it yet but Bonnie was getting cranked up to our east and we were going to see her effects for most of our trip.
After a morning of drinking games, we lunched at Talk of the Town. The ribs and fish were great and the stuffed crab backs were the Bomb!

If you want Orient Beach to yourself, just go in the rain. We had a blast swimming and playing in the rain.

On the way home our van started making a bad noise. After investigating our driveshaft had come loose at the center where it bolts up to van, there was just one bolt holding it up. Yikes! The hill going up to our villa was bad enough at 100% it was more difficult in chitti chitti bang bang mode.
Emailed Marius and within an hour a replacement was delivered and our van was back to us within 24 hours. That is great service! That could have ruined the trip but it didn�t.

We ate supper that night at Pizza Galley at Simpson Bay. Food and service were good.

Monday raining again! We went to Sarafina�s in Marigot for breakfast! THIS IS A MUST! Everything there is good.
Back to Orient in the rain and lunched at Kakao. The burgers were undercooked, fish good, pizza good. Service was �French�
Supper at Talk of the Town again because it was so good the day before.

Tuesday breakfast at Sarafina one more time, then back to Orient. We camped out at Orange Fever (OF). Nice spot and the sun was out and everybody was on Orient. Service was great at OF. We had pizza nd burgers. Orange Fever pizza was fantastic. Just as lunch was served it started raining again and this time it didn�t stop.

For dinner, we wanted to try Peg Leg. The threads haven�t been kind to Peg Leg but we had enjoyed so much 6 years ago we had to give it a shot. Shawn met us at the door like we had been there last week. Drinks were ordered and then we waited. 15 min later Shawn brought drinks and took our orders. Eric, the new owner, came over and talked with us. Nice guy. Food arrived about 45 minutes later. As a whole our group ordered steaks, lobster and shrimp. We thought most of steaks were good. My NY strip was fine but as a hole we wished we had gone somewhere else. The four that had been there 6 years ago all agreed the old location was much better. One person in our good has been in the food service 20 year. She said that Shawn was a greeter not a waiter. �He is a talker not a listener� Peg leg needs a couple of top shelf waiters and leave Shawn at the steps to talk and get you to a table. I would love to see the new owner make it but if he is not careful its gonna be up hill. We went over to casino and made a small deposit and left a much worn and slow casino.

Wednesday morning we woke to sunshine. We drove down to ZeeBest at Princess Resort. The 8 of us overwhelmed the French waitress and the cook in the back. 50 min later we had a great breakfast.

We then spent the rest of the day at Friars Bay. We had lunch at Friars Beach Caf�. More under cooked cheeseburgers but great fries, beer was $5 each.

That night we went into Grand Case and ate at Bristot Caraibes in Grand Case. Yummy! Grilled Lobster, scallops, pasta all were great and service was fantastic.

Thursday was load out day. We decided to go back thru the Quarter and over to Dawn Beach to see where we stayed 6 years ago. Wow! The area has grown but the road between Dawn Beach and the Westin is still the worst road in the world.

That�s about the time we had trouble. Our van had struggled with 8 of us on hills throughout the week, now with 400 pounds of luggage it would not budge back up the hill. 7 of us had to get out of the van and start walking up the hills as the van puttered back to the top. An electrician in a pickup pulled over and let our crew pile in the back and take them up the hill. THANKS DUDE!!!!!

Into Philipsburg, for some quick shopping and some of our group took a cab over to Sunset Beach Bar for some plane watching and finally a properly grilled burger. We got to see the Air France and Corsair fly in from Paris and made our way back to airport for the ride home.

Delta got us home on time with our entire sets of luggage.

After 6 months of planning, our trip is done. Our house had some quirks but the view and space was great. Marius at St. Louis delivered. We had some great meals and some not so great meals. We had rain and rain and some moments of sun. We also had a great time with friends and spouses.

Thanks to TTOL for all your information. I couldn�t pull this off without you.