Royal Caribbean's Grandeur of the Seas

Caribbean Repositioning Cruise
 

St. Maarten/St. Martin Friday, November 24, 2006

2923-E Olney-Sandy Spring Road Olney, MD  20832 Phone: 301-774-4646 Fax: 301-774-3610		Send Me An Email To Comment Or Book A Vacation   mailto:lynx@lynx-travel.com   http://www.lynx-travel.com

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We had a whole day at St. Maarten/St. Martin from 7:00 AM until 6:30 PM so I got up late.  I went to get mom and dad for breakfast at about 10:30 AM and had my usual omelet with shrimp, salmon and cheese.  Mom and dad decided to stay on the ship again so I ended up leaving at about noon to explore the island.  I went to the pool deck for awhile to take some pictures and ran into Alex and Maricel.  I talked to them for a while before heading of for the day.  They are a really nice couple from Leonardstown, MD.  We got real lucky with our dinner table with Alex, Maricel, John, Carol, Alison and Eric joining us.

St. Maarten has a very nice port area with room for at least the four ships that were in port today.  The Adventure of the Seas was berthed behind us and it’s amazing to see how much bigger it is than our ship.  I decided the best thing to do was to just rent a car for the afternoon when I saw the rental car area right at the port.  I opted for a little van like vehicle from Reynolds Rental Car.  They charged me $75 + tax for the day.  They gave me a map and I was off to explore.  There is really just one road around the island and it was supposed to be a 1.5 hour drive around the island. 

I stopped real quick to take a picture in Phillipsburg of a bar that was made out of an airplane’s fuselage and painted like a Heineken Beer Can.  The traffic in town and really around the island was pretty heavy.  The road is pretty narrow and mostly through commercial areas.  The biggest problem is the lack of signs so you can know where you are.  I wanted to stop at Marigot Bay and blew right by it.  The only reason I knew this was that I saw a sign pointing to where I had just been being the direction to Marigot Bay.  I got the car with about 1/8 a tank of gas so I stopped and got a coke and put 15 Euros of gas in the tank which gave me 1/2 a tank now.  That was plenty to replenish what I used and I wouldn’t have to worry about in Phillipsburg when I was dropping the car off.

 I drove down the road to Grand Case Beach and it was pretty dumpy looking.  The beach didn’t look like much either so I headed down to Orient Bay.  This was the nicest area I’ve seen on St. Martin.  I parked and headed to the beach.  The beach is beautiful in a crescent moon shape around this huge bay.  They have lots of beach bars and beach activities all up and down the beach.  They had parasailing, jet skis, moon bounces on the water for example.  They also had a bunch of massage huts set up.

 I walked up and down the beach for about an hour or so which is fairly interesting since it’s a topless and even nude beach in areas.  The only really disturbing sight I saw was a grandmother topless walking down the beach with her husband and teenage grandson.

Since it’s the Caribbean and not a German beach on the Baltic Sea on a cold day which is the only other topless/nude beach I’ve on I guess you get better looking people going topless.  In Warnemunde we only saw shall I say more healthy older women going naked. 

 I decided to go native and get over one of my biggest nightmares, going naked in public.  Of course I did it very quickly on the most secluded portion of the beach and waited until there was nobody walking near me.  I dropped my bathing suit and headed for the water as fast as possible.  I did some skinny dipping for about 15 minutes then waited for two sets of people pass and have there back to me before heading back to my stuff and throw on my bathing suit again.  It was my equivalent to a prison movie where while trying to escape the prisoners wait for the guards to pass each other before making a break for freedom.  So my nude beach experience was quick and I was mostly in the water but I did it.

 I packed my stuff up and realized I had everything accept the car keys.  I emptied my backpack completely, twice, and couldn’t find them.  It was about 3:00 PM and I had to get the car back by about 5:00 PM.  I was really worried at this point when I noticed a piece of plastic in the sand.  It was the key chain thank God.  I walked back up the beach towards the van and stopped at the Kakao Beach Bar and had a couple of beers before heading back. 

I had no problems getting back to the cruise port and dropped off the car at about 4:30 PM.  I stopped at Sharky’s Bar within 100 yards of the ship and settled in to enjoy the rest of the day. It was really more like an outdoor shack more than bar.  I met a cool couple Chip & Shelly from Reading, PA while taking some pictures for them.  We hung out at the bar until we had to get on the ship at 6:30 PM.  There was a steel drum band which amazingly played the same song the entire time we were at the bar.  It’s Christmas Morning On St. Maarten’s which is now stamped on my brain forever.  Shelly said she would pay them to play something else.

 I had missed dinner so I chilled out in my room for awhile then dad called at 7:30 PM asking when dinner was. I got a call from Shelly before I left saying they had a great time hanging out and to look for them at the pool tomorrow.  It’s amazing mom and dad can’t read the daily bulletin to get this and I can’t figure why they keep thinking it changes.  If our 6:00 PM time changes then the late people would be eating at 9:00 PM or later.     They are not going to change the dinner time.  I met them up in the Windjammer Café and had dinner of lamb, seafood pasta and roasted chicken.

 There was an art auction party at 10:00 PM that we thought about going to but I was worn out from being in the sun all day and ended up just going to bed.

Continue To Day At Sea November 25, 2006

Back To Tortola, British Virgin Islands November 23, 2006