Tuesday, June 22

Needing a day with no appointments, I started at the Infinity Pool, where I was joined for a time by RM5 LI. It was lovely meeting another TTOL member. After she left, I read for awhile, keeping my eye on the dark clouds circling above. At some point, I felt rain was imminent and headed back to my room. While the rain did not materialize, I took the opportunity of free time to do a load of laundry. The rest of the afternoon was spent being lazy on my deck.

One of the newer restaurants on my list was Astra, next door to Skipjacks. I arrived early enough to get a table on the lagoon.



I am partial to sweet white wines, which many places on the island don’t have so I asked for a Kiwi Martini, which was pretty tasty.



After a garden salad, I was looking forward to roast duck with hoisin sauce. It looked better than it tasted and was somewhat tough.



Astra is open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I would like to go back for breakfast to see what that’s like.

Wednesday, June 23

A first for me: a day at Loterie Farm by the pool. The only question is, why haven’t I done this sooner? It was a wonderfully relaxing day with good service and friendly servers.





All three of us had different tuna entrees for lunch; mine was the tuna poke bowl.



For dinner I joined friends at Bar Code where I had yet more tuna, this time their tuna tartare. I was pleasantly surprised to see the three horn players from Sunday afternoon performing with Bar Code’s owner, Ivan, on guitar. More jazz.



Thursday, June 24

After breakfast at Chesterfield’s, I drove to Parotte Ville. George remembered that I had been there before (he is the one who took the picture that became my avatar). A couple of the birds were pretty aggressive about pecking at shiny objects, and at one point I saw my Omega chain and slider falling to the ground. I just plopped it into my purse and continued with taking pictures.













Back in the car, I attempted to put my necklace back on, only to discover that the pesky parrot had chewed off a portion of the clasp, making it inoperable. Made an unscheduled stop at DKGems, where they will replace the clasp for me.

For dinner, I met a local friend at Balls and Wine; it’s in the Paradise Mall above IZI. What a fun experience! This is a tapas restaurant, and sharing is encouraged; you can find their menu on their web site. We shared several items, and all were delicious. This is a place I hope to return to before leaving.



Time goes so quickly when on the island. I have one full day left at Divi before moving to Horny Toad for ten days.

A friend wrote to tell me the police are on strike on the Dutch side.

Anybody booked airtransat from Toronto they have switched flights from Saturday to Sunday. This has just happened. Likely due to the influx of people going for cruise. I found out when I checked to see if the price went up after we booked & it was now Sunday . I've been assured I will receive email where I can accept the change. No big deal for us. Some it may be.We arrive at noon which we love.
When does super u close on Sundays?

Official rules

Please note that these are the requirements for the Dutch side, where 99% of people here enter by air. If you are entering by AIR directly to the French side, the rules are different. If you are on island, you can travel back and forth freely to the French side without any problem.

If you are STAYING on the French side, you need to check to make sure whether you need to do anything additional.

Information on testing on island to return to the US

In case you have problems with getting a EHAS approval, try this number in SXM. 721-542-1570

I am delighted with my new map which just arrived from Madrid ! I did not think they could improve the prior map, but they did ! I will keep my old, scotch-taped map as well. Very pleased.

Sargassum is leaving it’s ugly mark on the Riviera Maya this season…

https://mexiconewsdaily.com/news/sargassum-piling-up-quintana-roo-beaches/

Facebook Sargassum Monitoring group
https://www.facebook.com/RedSargazo/

Daily Herald story Dutch side seems to be doing pretty well as far as vaccination rate. I wonder how the French side is doing, as I know their numbers were extremely low.

Hey there fellow sailing charterers,

We are ending a weeklong charter on Sat. July 3 at the Moorings base in Charlotte Amalie. It is very likely we will have leftover pantry items and maybe even swimming toys/floats.

Reply if you'd like to have our stuff. We can private message and find a way to meet.

After years of chartering we always wind up with too much of something leftover. In fact, in 2019 a nice family gave us their leftover floaty ring toy -- AND WE STILL have it.

Sail on,
Steve

Day 4 (Tuesday) - Met up with Jazzgal by the pool for some wonderful conversation. Such a lovely lady! Then Bill and I drove over to Dany’s again. This time we ordered the ribs besides the Caribs. It took awhile but they were worth the wait. After we drove to Plum Bay. Dinner was at the Gingerbread Cafe. Pasta primavera for me and penne chicken Alfredo for Bill. Ordered a slice of chocolate cake to bring back to have with some red wine.

Day 5 (Wednesday) - Up and out early. Picked up breakfast at Carl & Son’s Unique Bakery then headed over towards Orient Beach area. We choose Orange Fever to park our butts for a few hours. We got rained on at least three times but no biggie. The sargassum is horrible. The food was decent, chicken Cesar salad for me and Bill had a burger. No fries, asked for grilled veggies instead which was no problem. Making good time coming back until we get up the hill by the old Sonesta Great Bay. A car accident, didn’t look like anybody was hurt. We were waiting but everybody started to turn around. Looked like they closed the road for investigation. So close but yet so far to Divi. We had to turn around and come in the other way. What a PITA that was! But we made it back and of course the rains came again. LOL!!! It was still a great day! .

When we were there in November 2020, there was still a lot of work needed on the airport.
Has there been a lot of work on the airport over the last 7 months and have there been any improvements on the arrival and departure areas?
Any word or progress on clearing US customs in SXM rather than in the US?