"Renting a car in 2007" Sint Maarten Travelogue by grandmaR

Stingray towel animal with one eye

Bob got up and left this morning before I was out of bed. I went up to the dining room, but the line was so long that I decided to turn the tipping sheet authorization in at the purser's desk first. They said that if I turned in the sheet, the people would get their tips regardless of what we did. I also complained about the lack of a bow camera. By the time I was finished, the dining room service was finished for the day (9:05) so I went on up to the Windjammer and got a glass of water, a donut and a fried potato thing.

Bob had gone up and walked around deck 5 until he had done a mile, and then he sat and read a book. I went up and did trivia with a pick-up team, and we got 14 correct, but two other teams had 17 right and had a sudden death face-off. One of the questions which I knew was what ROM meant, and I also got correct the name of the oldest Beetle (Ringo) but the team decided that it was John Lennon.

We met up at lunch and I had a wrap and a banana carnel split. We sat with a couple from California who said they liked lighthouses. She also said that her husband had been sick with a cold for four days in Baltimore, and now she had it.

Dinner was surf and turf (lobster) which we got. I had cream of potato soup and Bob had Manhatten clam chowder. We couldn't decide on dessert, so I had sugar-free rice pudding and strawberries and ice cream- they were supposed to be Grand Mariner marinated strawberries, but I didn't notice any difference from regular strawberries. Bob had the Boston cream pie and the strawberries.

After dinner, I stayed in the internet cafe and also went to part of the show in the theatre until after 10 pm before I came back to the room. I looked up the size of the Crown, the Maasdam and this ship, and this ship carries about 1000 more passengers, which is IMHO too many. The steward had made a sting ray towel animal, and Bob had eaten one of his eyes (the chocolates that they put on our pillow each night).

They had the Dallas/Green Bay game on the TV so we watched (well I watched and Bob went to sleep) until the last 2 minutes or the fourth quarter with the score 34 Dallas to 27 Green Bay, and then the satellite cut off and never came on again.

Security guy from St. Martin on the pier

We got up earlier and went up to the Windjammer Cafe which I still don't like, but it wasn't so crowded that I couldn't get something to eat. There was a silly sign which said "In the interest of Public Health, the frilling of water bottles is not permitted" Apparently some people are very sick with an intestinal bug and they've started handing out alcohol wipes at the entrance to the dining rooms and wiping everything down with bleach.

I went down to the 5th deck where I could watch the docking in the shade. Adventure of the Seas (a much bigger ship) was on the other side of the dock. Someone was carried off from AOTS in an ambulance while we watched.

ENCORE - CSY PIlothouse

I had rented a car from Alamo, but they didn't have an office in the dock area. So we took a water taxi ($5@) over to the town and then tried to find out some information there, but everything was closed (except the stores of course). So I finally tried to call and had to pay to have my phone activated for the day. When I got in touch with them, they picked us up. It was raining a little bit off and on, but very hot in the sun.

I wanted to go out to see where I thought I had seen a lighthouse, so we drove over a mountain into Marigot on the French side. I saw a dockyard and said - why don't we go in there. And we found ENCORE, a CSY pilot house. We talked to the folks there for awhile. On the way out of the yard we saw their lift which was like a giant trailer.

Folks who on CONJOE

Bob had seen a 37 CSY from the deck of ENCORE in the next boatyard, so we went there and found a French couple living on CONJOE, which I told them had been sunk in Hurricane Georges - they hadn't known that. There was another one over a little way from them, but there was no name on it, and I couldn't see the hull number either.

Canal and bridge near boatyard

Then we went over a bridge to another boatyard and found a WalkThrough which had been named Angie by the original owner, and this one had lost the mast because of corroded chain plates. The new name is SHENANIGAN. After we talked to those people awhile, we again tried to get from where we were to Grand Case, but all the roads in that direction were closed, and Bob was getting very annoyed and said we'd have to turn the car in as it was now close to 3 pm.

Entrance gate to cruise ship dock

We drove back to the Dutch side, and went to the Texaco station I had seen, but it was still being built and wasn't open. Eventually we found a Shell station, and got 7 litres of gas for 17 guilders, which was $10.00. They drove us back to the port which took a half an hour because of traffic (which was basically horrible all over the island) and closed roads - every time you'd come to a place to turn, the road would be one way coming toward you, or else closed.

The guards at the gate wouldn't let the driver in, so he had to drop us off at the gate.

Shrimp Salad croissant

Bob prefers to eat breakfast at the Windjammer where he can pick his own stuff, and I like to be waited on, plus I can get cranberry juice in the dining room without asking for it. So we ate breakfast today separately. The dining room menu though is not as good as it was on the Maasdam. On the way back to the room I walked through the casino and saw that they had pastries and drinks there ready for the gamblers to come in later in the morning. They also have been having the art auction stuff set up on deck 4 in the atrium.

Bob went up to deck 5 in the atrium to read after he walked a mile around the deck. We met up for lunch - the lunch menu is always the same except for the specials. For the first time I realized that we could get pasta made to order if we had lunch in the main dining room, but we both got the shrimp salad croissant and the sugar free pineapple upsidedown cake. Bob hated the upside down cake because he likes the brown sugar on the pineapple, but I thought it was pretty good.

On the way back to the room, I passed the Ben and Jerry stand and was shocked to see that they charged for the ice cream and goodies. Didn't get any. We went to trivia but didn't do that well

I had the mussels and scallop appetizer and vichyssoise that night. Bob (and many others at the table) had shrimp cocktail. One of the ladies at the table just loves shrimp cocktail and has it every night, so the waiter gets about four of them so everyone that wants one can have one. I had Coq au Vin (which was very salty) and Bob had the baked perch for the entre, and I had cream catalan (orange custard with a sugar crust on top like a creme brulee) for dessert. Bob had ice cream with chocolate sauce. The towel animal tonight was an anteater.

I have been taking the computer to dinner and taking it up to the internet cafe afterwards, and logging on until about 9 and then coming back to the room.

Next port Curacao