Here is our experience on Friday afternoon/evening re St. Martin Blockages:

On Friday afternoon/evening we tried three routes to get to our rental which was at Yellow Sub near Bikini Beach Bar on Orient Bay.


1. The west side route to Marigot was blocked but we could not observe the blockage directly. We just saw vehicles backing up. We had to turn around. Shortly afterwards the St. Maarten police came and closed the road.

2. On the east side, the main route was blocked just north of McDonald’s (corner of Illidge and Bishop Hill roads). There was a barricade at the border, and we could see that the road on the French side - St. Martin Road up the hill - was covered with boulders for about 100 meters. There were a few people milling around the barricade, no threatening behavior. We talked to some of them, who told us there was no way to get to Orient Bay.

3. We then tried to use Coralita Road to bypass that blockage. There was a blockade of burned cars near the border, but it was not manned. We, and several other vehicles, drove around it, so we actually got onto French territory for a brief time. However, near where Coralita Road enters the built-up area of Orleans in the French Quarter, the road was blocked by burned vehicles. At that point we were surrounded by yelling children, banging on our car windows and demanding money to let us through. There were adults watching from a distance. It was clear that there was no way to get a vehicle past that barricade, so we turned around and found lodging at Simpson Bay.