Our goal for this trip to St. Martin is relaxation. I thought, however, that we would post a partial trip report while we can still remember the first half of our five week trip.

We retired this year and spent the month of May on a 6,778 mile driving trip through Canada to Alaska and back down to Washington state via the Alaska Marine Highway (State Ferry System). After that intense trip, we just wanted to lean back, relax and chill out for a few weeks to recover. We've spent most of our first three weeks on St. Martin doing just that with few meals out and fewer of those at the higher end restaurants.

We've met many old friends and many new ones on the beach and during a couple of visits to the casino.

Kissing Fish

We enjoyed the TTOL party on 6/25 at the Kissing Fish. The Kissing Fish will not be the same without Chloe and Thiery. After a great evening at the Kissing Fish coordinated by Nick (NCGuy) and Debbie (Scuba1deb) several of us went over to the Princes Casino to visit Peg Leg Pub where we enjoyed drinks and appetizers. Some of the folks also had dinner. We really enjoyed the new location and the warm "Welcome back" from Shawn. If you look around, you can find all of the features from the old location stuffed in different nooks and crannies.

July Fourth

July 4th was one of the nicest days since we have been here and definitely the sunniest day in the last week. We hit the beach by 8:30 to get ready for the day and we beat the umbrellas by about an hour. The July Fourth crew already had US flags on the beach in front of the beach chairs and came around early with Jello Shots for everyone on the beach...Thanks! As a result of beating the umbrellas to the beach, We over did the sun a bit and Gretchen ended up with a case of sun rash and I got some minor sunburn. That has prompted us to take a couple of days off from the beach on Saturday and Sunday. We are also moving between units at the Pelican today (Sunday) and plan to do the sunset cruise tonight.

Andy, Cheryl, Ross, Adrian and the crew did the usual great job on the Fourth of July bash at Baywatch with party favors from Bruce and Sheila. The ante changed slightly this year with the price increasing from $15 to $20 for all you could eat of hamburgers, hotdogs, corn-on-on-the-cob and Watermelon. The higher price did include one free drink which had not been the case in the past. This year, Andy had a DJ to run the music and we all enjoyed dancing in the aisles and on the tables along with many creative July Fourth body decorations provided in part by the Club O Fourth of July gang. Perhaps we should have a contest in the future for most creative and most humorous adornment. While there wasn't much we could do with the license plate holder favors, the Baywatch Bottle openers were sighted dangling from various places.

Dining

We had a few lunches at Baywatch and really enjoyed Andy's Manhatten Clam Chowder, Grouper Reuben and Garlic Scallop Caesar.

We did visit Kissing Fish one morning for Thiery's famous Banana Pancakes and "Omelette with everything".

Debbie and friends introduced us to the Dinghy Dock restaurant in Oyster Pond. We'd never tried it before but found it to be a great location for economically priced food that was also good. We enjoyed the Calamari, Seafood Pasta ($10) and a Salmon dinner special. The location on the dock provided a great view of the sunset.

We also visited Captain Oliver's restaurant for lunch one day. It was very quiet there and we walked in declaring that we were hungry. The friendly crew responded, "You've come to the wrong place...we're on strike." They weren't really but were pulling our chains. We enjoyed a nice lunch of Select Seafood Salad and Salmon Salad, while watching the Turtle swim by in the pen below.

We also enjoyed the new Bakery at the Pelican, Au Pain du Sucre. They have a full breakfast in the morning along with pastries. They also offer roast chickens and sandwiches ($4.80) during the day. We did find their Chicken Salad to be a bit spicy. From 5 untl 8, they offer Pizza. The Pizza is a thin crust pie with crisp flakey crust. Gretchden really liked it.

We like to pick up a sandwich at the Peli Deli before going to the beach ($4.50) or to indulge in the Lemon Chicken Sandwich, Ribs or Shrimp Kabob at the Perch ($14 or 10 Euros each).

One of our useful discoveries was at CostULess where they had a sale on an "iced" drink coozy for 99 cents. The can holder has a built in insulater of cooler ice so that you can freeze it ahead and hit keeps your drink cans even colder for a few hours.

Shopping

After several years of thinking about it but not acting, Gretchen decicded to see about getting a swim suit ensemble from Luiz at Marlyndy.

She picked out the fabric and went back the next day to get the suit with Tankini, Skirt and dress cover up. The fabric was a nice light blue color with a dark blue and yellow pattern. I would really have liked a darker base color, but then I'm just a male with lousy fashion sense. When we came back the next day to pick up the suit, Luiz pulled out a second suit in a darker blue that he did not have the day before. Gretchen, the conservative one, said "No thanks." Larry, the softy and former salesman said "How much?". We left with two suits and we both liked the second color better, though the dresses went back to the shop for some minor adjustments in fit. Luiz is a true salesman. I am reminded of the Nordstrom rule for shoe salesmen..."when you go to the back room to bring a customer a pair of shoes to try on, never bring back less than four pairs."

Pelican Internet Service:

Last year, Pelican resort had limited WIFI service and I could only get a connection at the pool or by putting the computer in the window in the bedroom. As a result, I brought along an extension cable and a directional high gain WIFI antenna. I have not needed it. Pelican has installed WIFI antennas on the light posts in the parking lots and at the pool so that good reception is available in most rooms. The WIFI service is secured, however, and has been extremely frustrating. Access requires logging on to a web page which is supposed to redirect from the initial logon. I had a terrible time getting that screen to appear and then suffered lousy web performance after the logon, though non-web connections worked well. Several calls to the front desk offered no relief. Calls to the IT department went unanswered.

I finally dug into windows and McAfee and found that the culprit was the McAfee proxy redirector. I disabled that and performance has been very reliable and good ever since.

Keeping in touch:

In the past, we have rented a cell phone while on St. Martin and invariably used it only to call home and check with relatives. This year, we brought our cell phone from home but have yet to use it. If someone needs to contact us, they can and have the phone number at our resort and our email. We've made several calls home using SKYPE with a three month package of unlimited calls to US numbers for $7.95. Between SKYPE, email and IM, we have kept in good contact with our family and never used our cell phones.

We're having a great time and are happy to see that Bertha is apparently taking a path well north of here, though we hope it does not punish our friends who live on the east coast.