Saint Maarten
St. Maarten is an amazing and beautiful place, but I still couldn’t resist posting this picture. There are two bars that sit right next to the beginning of the airport runway (Maho Beach). They land directly over your head and the big ones can literally knock you down. It’s awesome.
This island being French and Dutch means you get two vacations in one! Ha! Not really, but it’s still cool to check out the different styles on the island. I’ve been many times and still find cool places to explore. My favorite place to chill is probably Gran Case on the French side. Great beach side food and cool shops and style. Philipsburg is much more developed and casinos can always be cool if the mood strikes.
I took a boat to Anguilla last time. Totally secluded and awesome. If you are with someone where you can take advantage of this…I would. Maybe not once in a lifetime, but pretty damn secluded beaches…ha. There is also a pretty sweet beach side lunch shack that I can’t remember the name of but it’s famous as hell. When I went they were “out” of food. I must of looked like an asshole or something cause everyone else was eating just fine
On our most recent trip we moved around a lot!
Anguilla – it was way too quite for us. Visiting is one thing, but staying was an exercise in patience. Cabs are not easy, and we even got picked up by a random resident because she could tell we were stuck in the middle of nowhere and were totally fucked. She was remarkably nice.
The ferry back to St. Maarten stops on the north side so we stayed in Orient for a night. Then we went to Maho in the south for some fun. Do the Rhino boats! This was so much fun. So much. Those little boats go really fast, and the snorkeling was great, the guides were great. This was an awesome choice for an excursion.
***You always think you like Marigot but you don’t. You like Gran Case. Marigot is the one where the cruise ships let off and everything is that crappy made for tourists shit. Gran Case is the authentic one with the real food and beach side restaurants and the sweet street lined with shops.
Orient Beach is the one with all the bars (we had a good time in Orient but our hotel sucked and we weren’t feeling the bars at the time…).
Even more recent update…
The hurricane was not kind to St. Maarten, but the island is coming along nicely. The worst hit places as far as reconstruction goes is the Dawn/Oyster area and the Grand Case area (it’s super sad, but the rad Corral Bay Beach Club, below, was completely annihilated, at least I got to experience it). Grand Case has the Lolo’s open and the beach resort is open but overall it’s going to be a long long time before it’s splendor is returned. Marigot is actually much more charming now. Without spending all of one’s time in Grand Case, Marigot really started to shine, with all kinds of cool areas away from the cruise ship farmers market section. Simpson Bay was also a big hit as many of their places have returned or new cool things have popped up in their place. Mary’s Boon is about a perfect a lunch afternoon as one can have.
Orient Beach is changed forever. The rows of beach bars are gone and are not going to be replaced. Instead you find Miami like beach clubs, a far worse death to the area than I could’ve imagined.
Philipsburg has a crazy boardwalk now…not sure if that’s always been there but somehow I have been here a million times and never done it. It was as you’d expect for a boardwalk, maybe even less than you’d expect, but still interesting and fun.
We stayed in Terres Basse for 2 weeks at 2 different villas. This area is great for security and for amaze balls houses. It is not a great location as you have to drive for every single thing you could ever want (we drove to the french bakery in Marigot almost daily). It is close to Cupecoy with its market and the beach bar at Cupecoy was fun (the bar is small but it’s cute and local…salty maybe more than cute, also the beach here can be rough as shit, which can be fun, it can be calm and wonderful as well), as was Mullet bay just down the road (they open these bars on weekends only I think, but that might be a hurricane thing, the girls giving massages are plentiful and the beach is long and wide). As a side bar we also hit up Friars beach which had nice beach bars and a very mellow beach (there are only a few bars but they all seem to be restaurants too).
We also went to Loterie Farm on this last trip. Pretty cool outdoor area that they’ve added a modern pool and lounge area to. The pool was ice cold as shit but we got a bungalow and it was pretty rad. The hike up the mountain is brutal but you will literally be surrounded by monkeys much of the way so they make it easier to handle.
Notes to self:
-This island is one of the kings of private pools and villas…so find one for god’s sake
St. Maarten Villas - Jan 2019
Villa Encore
Amazeballs, looking west at the sunset. But the view is just of the ocean in the distance. Perfect layout with one room even disconnected completely if that’s your thing.
Having a heated pool was actually a pretty big deal and made a big difference.
Luna Del Sol
Faces east at the sunrise. View overall was much better as the skyline was more interesting (planes at Maho, Simpson bay, lights at night far below). Not a heated pool but a great one.
The mosquito machines seem to work pretty well but that doesn’t mean zero mosquitos, just far far fewer.
Sonesta Ocean Point - Jan 2019
This is the "better" side of the sonesto maho resort complex...when you stay there you don't get to go here but when you stay here you get to go to both. All inclusives can give me the willies but this was a fine break from the family for a night.
Still doing renovations at the time but the general idea is there.
Restaurants are as you’d expect. Bars are as you’d expect but there is one nice area overlooking all of Maho (on top of the cool places cliff side restaurant).
The swim up room was great, but all of them are less private than they should of gone for. The pools themselves are actually well done.
The room was good size but the bathroom and shower could’ve been bigger.
No PPV but satellite TV. Mini bar was fine but they could’ve stocked more beer instead of the stupid liquor “cabinets” these types of places always do.
Bed was very comfortable.
Room service was 24 hours and could’ve used more selections, breakfast was fine to maybe a little less than fine (not to even mention the bagel with cream cheese came without cream cheese and they forgot napkins, and forks, and knives, and salt, and pepper, and butter, and anything else you’d expect for breakfast in bed). Great otherwise :)
Zemi Beach Anguilla - Feb 2016
This hotel is very, very expensive. But almost everything worth a damn in Anguilla is. Outside of location issues, which I think exist everywhere in anguilla, it was pretty damn nice. They had just opened so some things were meh, but you could tell it will easily be one of the best hotels anywhere around.
It is very separated from things (except gwens which was very close).
They bought us a drink at the beach restaurant while we were having lunch because the room wasn’t ready yet, and the ops manager was super nice and personally handled it. The room was absolutely fantastic!!! once we got in it.
Spa was not completely ready and they really didn’t have their shit together (no pool mud and the showers are a little misleading, as they are just showers and not the magical rainfall experience they describe). The hammam was super meh (the only hammam in the Caribbean they say, but they designer has never seen a real hammam apparently! It was bright and clear in that silly room) and the spa staff was hardly informed.
The pool service was terrible but the pool itself was great. Beach bar service was pretty terrible as well. There was a secondary pool below our room that was pretty sweet as well, but we didn’t use it.
I would say that every single person was super nice walking around, they just weren’t trained yet.
Room service pizza came with no water, silverware, or anything else. Room service pasta was the wrong pasta type and it was super small and super expensive (and only one silverware roll this time and with no bread). On that room service we ordered and got a bottle of wine but got charged for a single glass…so we won one that time.
Taxis were $26 to go anywhere, anywhere.
The hotel restaurants weren’t fully open (and Valentine’s dinner was 144 a person and utterly ridiculous looking).
Rooms were 600 a night. Room service was 24 hours, mini bar was weak, and there is no pay per view.
Despite this poo poo review, this place is gonna be bad ass once everything is open and everyone knows their shit. We stayed there like a week after opening, and got a bit screwed because of it.
Notes
-We did order a different room service bottle of wine that we never even got.
-I was also quite disappointed that the room was on the first floor even though the hotel was empty.
Sonesto Maho Beach Resort - Feb 2016
Fuck these people and this place.
The first night we were in a jammin deluxe suite! Very nice! The second and third nights we were in a premier room on 7th floor (one step below deluxe suite) and it may as well have been a motel room. This debacle happened because of a reservation snafu and the front desk totally lying to us. I went through so many variations of what room we could get for those second couple of nights. You screwed me girl, and you knew it.
There is no pay per view, the mini fridges were lame but beer and water came in handy, and there was no room service.
View is fine but it’s definitely blocked by another hotel.
The pizza was great (it was an all inclusive spot)! Other food was meh. We didn’t do the reservation only restaurant.
Notes
-Location is very hard to beat as Maho beach (if that’s your thing, and it should be everyone’s thing at least for an afternoon) was literally right next to it. There is also a small little town there with a huge casino and a strip club that we sadly missed.
-One of the restaurants/pubs in that “town” was part of the all inclusive action. I’ve never seen that before and we actually had a pretty fun time there for karaoke
-The “events” the hotel had were very very very family friendly…but we had no family that day
Esmerelda Resort St. Maarten - Feb 2016
Holy shit does this place suck. And I’m pretty sure they stole our money upon checkout.
That ain’t no private pool in that picture. And the rooms aren’t even accidentally quaint. Kind of like an old campground room.
The resort restaurant dinner was actually a nice night, but their menu is a joke. Breakfast was much much better.
Notes
-Location…maybe…maybe. But suck city.
-They were super nice when we promptly locked our passports in the safe without a code
Coral Beach Club St. Maarten - Mar 2010
I am not sure there is a picture of this place that can actually do it justice. For St. Maarten, I’d be surprised if there is a better “private” resort. I say private because this club is all about seclusion. It doesn’t have a bar, or a restaurant, though you can rent a private chef during your stay. It doesn’t have great access to cabs and is not very close to most places you will want to go…although, having traveled all over the island and visiting most of the towns, I’m not sure anything is technically close to anything else. All of this being said, this place is outstanding. I stayed in a two bedroom bungalow on the second level. The entire resort is right on the beach so access is a few steps away. Every room has a private plunge pool and most have seating areas inside the pools. Every place has a giant outdoor balcony or patio space. Every room has huge floor to ceiling accordion doors so the entire apartment can be open to the outdoors. The amenities were top of the line, especially for what you usually find in the Caribbean. There was an amazing market right across the street that had fresh baguettes, eggs, breakfast shit like that. I absolutely loved walking there in the morning to pick up what we would make to start our day. Bottom line, naked swimming in your front deck private plunge pool is pretty baller.
Notes
– There is a seafood restaurant across the street as well, and a private boat charter location. Just down the beach there is a bar at a hotel that gets pretty hopping at night.
-The hurricane leveled this place unfortunately. It has been rebuilt now, but under a different brand. Looks about the same, meaning amazing.