They say that the island is the
smallest area of land which is split between 2 nationalities, French and
Dutch. The split between the land is slightly
odd and runs at a funny angle across the island and where we were staying,
Oyster Pond was on the boarder, walk out one side of the marina to a French
shop and the other to a Dutch.
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| Where there photo is taken is French and Magnum is on pontoon in French side but building on otherside of water are on Dutch side |
The split means different
languages, different currency and in lots of ways a different culture. The Dutch side has been very built up, the
capital Phillipsburg was popular with the US
tourists and cruiseships with their designer shops, casinos and KFC/McDonlads. The French capital Marigot was a lots less
developed. In Marigot we walked to Fort Luis
to admire the view and you can see the marina in Marigot (French), the lagoon
in the middle which is split both French and Dutch and the spit of land in the
distance is Simpsons bay, Dutch.
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| Marigot bay, the lagoon and Simpsons Bay |
We did enjoy visiting a number of
the French resorts, Marigot was quite pretty, Grand Case was a nice village
with a few touristy shops and a beautiful little beach. Orient
Bay is a gated complex
with lots of hotels/apartments, not our sort of place as super busy but the
beach is long white sandy with lots going on and loads of beach bars. We also visited Galion beach which was definitely
the local beach and on a Sunday is was great for people watching and listening
to the local music – shame no photos as couldn’t risk leaving camera on the
beach! We did also manage to visit the beach nearest to the marina, Dawn beach (walking
distance from Oyster Pond) although backed by hotels/timeshare you could find a
spot to lay you towel.
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| Amanda at Grand Case beach |
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| Amanda at Dawn Beach with St Barts in the background |
One of our best days out was to
the Zoo! Yep only small and mainly birds but we love our birds so it suited us.
Shame it is a little run down but they obviously get limited visitors and
little outside funding but most of the animals look very happy.
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| Green winged macaw - very pretty birdy |
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| Mark and his friend the tortoise |
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| Iguana lounging in the tree |
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| Mark and another friend |
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| Mark waiting to get his finger bitten |
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| Amanda making friends with the Scarlett macaw |
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| Could have taken him back to the boat |
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| He looks very pleased to be sat on Marks shoulder |
It was also really nice being in
Oyster Pond for the week whilst our friends Penny and Peter were also there, we
original met the P’s when we were in Madeira in September last year, we then
saw them in Tenerife very briefly but they crossed the Atlantic a month earlier
than us, we bumped into them again in
Antigua in Jolly harbour. Since then we
have seen each other in Nevis where we had a
nice sundowner on their boat, St Kitts, Statia and now here, they had friends
visiting but we did manage to have a really nice evening together, it was shame
to say goodbye as we headed in opposite directions.
Also the main reason for visiting
Oyster Pond was Magnum had been based here before being shipped to the UK and bought
by us, funny that so many people recognised Magnum when it must have been at
least 7 years since she had been here!
It is a funny marina as it is 90% full of charter boats, lots of Sunsail
and Mooring boats, almost like being at Port Solent (home),
St Martin did grow on us but definitely not our favourite place
which was also topped off by having to pay $500 for our Fridge to be fixed,
having problems with our engine which delayed our departure, Mark being ill and
some sleepless nights through partying charter boats.
Sorry so photos of the disasters!
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