FOS - St. Maarten Excusions

[gtaylor]

If you read through you'll see the $300 or perhaps $350 mentioned as the cost for a small group, up to four or six.

 

gary

[janbie]

Thanks for having this thread! St. Maarten is the only place where we haven't a clear idea about what to do yet. And we are leaving next week (yeah, a little late to the Cruise Critic party here, but better late than never...)!

 

The only thing that's certain is that we're renting a Jeep, doing snorkeling and going to Maho Beach. My 8 and 10 year old girls really want to see those planes land. We'd love to do horseback riding, but are having trouble with making a reservation (I've already posted about this elsewhere)

 

My in-laws are going on Bernard's $40 tour. I really wish we were doing the private tour with him, but my cheap-o DH didn't want to shell out the $350 for the private tour.

 

I guess if anyone here can give us some good advice as to where to go for snorkeling on the island, that would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks!

Janice

[GTO-Girl]

Thanks for having this thread! St. Maarten is the only place where we haven't a clear idea about what to do yet. And we are leaving next week (yeah, a little late to the Cruise Critic party here, but better late than never...)!

 

The only thing that's certain is that we're renting a Jeep, doing snorkeling and going to Maho Beach. My 8 and 10 year old girls really want to see those planes land. We'd love to do horseback riding, but are having trouble with making a reservation (I've already posted about this elsewhere)

 

My in-laws are going on Bernard's $40 tour. I really wish we were doing the private tour with him, but my cheap-o DH didn't want to shell out the $350 for the private tour.

 

I guess if anyone here can give us some good advice as to where to go for snorkeling on the island, that would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks!

Janice

 

Janice most of the big planes come in the afternoon but as others have said be SURE you do not get caught up in heavy traffic on your return.

 

To us is was worth the $40 pp not to have to worry about getting back to the ship on time. We didn't do the private tour, we just joined others in a 12 passenger van. We met some new friends and had a great time!!!

 

With Bernard it was "no worries at all"......:D

[Karysa]

Thanks for having this thread! St. Maarten is the only place where we haven't a clear idea about what to do yet. And we are leaving next week (yeah, a little late to the Cruise Critic party here, but better late than never...)!

 

The only thing that's certain is that we're renting a Jeep, doing snorkeling and going to Maho Beach. My 8 and 10 year old girls really want to see those planes land. We'd love to do horseback riding, but are having trouble with making a reservation (I've already posted about this elsewhere)

 

My in-laws are going on Bernard's $40 tour. I really wish we were doing the private tour with him, but my cheap-o DH didn't want to shell out the $350 for the private tour.

 

I guess if anyone here can give us some good advice as to where to go for snorkeling on the island, that would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks!

Janice

 

Honestly, the snorkeling from the beaches has been rather disappointing to me. Petite Plage in Grand Case is perhaps the best beach snorkeling that I have done and it is an easy place to snorkel. Since you will have a jeep it may be worth the trip. For excursions I would try creole rock watersports in Grand Case. They have trips out to Creole Rock but it may be too difficult for children of your DD's ages.

[janbie]

Karysa and GTO-Girl, thanks for your replies! I think we'll be alright going on our own with the Jeep. DH and I drove in Mexico and Jamaica - St. Maarten can't be worse than those places. :)

 

The other thing about DH is that a formal "tour" is not his style, even though I tried to tell him that Bernard's sounds different from that. Oh well...my in-laws can tell us all about it when we meet up with them later.

 

That's kind of disappointing to hear about the snorkeling. I thought about doing Creole Rock, but if the current's a little strong, my kids would probably freak out.

 

If the horseback riding thing doesn't pan out, we might try to drive over to the Pinel Island ferry, then stop in Marigot on the way back, then catch the planes at Maho.

[hotpink]

You should try the Boardwalk Segway tour in Philipsburg-GREAT FUN and really easy to learn! Their website is http://www.stmaartensegway.com

[leflerpet]

Thanks for having this thread! St. Maarten is the only place where we haven't a clear idea about what to do yet. And we are leaving next week (yeah, a little late to the Cruise Critic party here, but better late than never...)!

 

The only thing that's certain is that we're renting a Jeep, doing snorkeling and going to Maho Beach. My 8 and 10 year old girls really want to see those planes land. We'd love to do horseback riding, but are having trouble with making a reservation (I've already posted about this elsewhere)

 

My in-laws are going on Bernard's $40 tour. I really wish we were doing the private tour with him, but my cheap-o DH didn't want to shell out the $350 for the private tour.

 

I guess if anyone here can give us some good advice as to where to go for snorkeling on the island, that would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks!

Janice

 

Since you are renting a Jeep, you could go to Oyster Pond for your snorkeling. We've been to St. Maarten several times and the last time stayed for a week at the Oyster Bay Club - the snorkeling right there is fabulous!!! It's not the best beach on the island which, of course, makes it better for snorkeling. It's also not the easiest place to find - right on the French/Dutch border to the East of Phillipsburg.

[Karysa]

Since you are renting a Jeep, you could go to Oyster Pond for your snorkeling. We've been to St. Maarten several times and the last time stayed for a week at the Oyster Bay Club - the snorkeling right there is fabulous!!! It's not the best beach on the island which, of course, makes it better for snorkeling. It's also not the easiest place to find - right on the French/Dutch border to the East of Phillipsburg.

 

Could you be talking about Dawn beach? I am a bit of a snorkeling snob and what I like to see most is living coral, unique fish and sea life, stingrays, turtles and I am on the hunt for my first octopus. Any such sightings at this spot?

[gtaylor]

Could you be talking about Dawn beach? I am a bit of a snorkeling snob and what I like to see most is living coral, unique fish and sea life, stingrays, turtles and I am on the hunt for my first octopus. Any such sightings at this spot?

I'm certain that they're referring to Dawn Beach.

 

Oyster Pond is the name of the little 'safe harbour' here where the marina is located.

 

(click)

 

The (timeshare) resort apparently thought that Oyster Bay Beach Resort sounded better than Pond.

 

The beach is Dawn Beach.

 

We haven't snorkeled there for many years. I remember it as decent, but the exposure to the open Atlantic often makes it very rough. We like the beach and used to spend a lot of time there until our favorite beach restaurant Ms. B's closed.

 

There was live coral and lots of fish, but I don't remember any rays, turtles or octopi. (The only turtle I recall seeing here was off of Anse Marcel.)

 

For the record, our snorkel spot was off of Ms. B's, where the Dawn Beach tag is on the photo. I understand that much of the reef you can see down where the Westin has been built was basically destroyed during construction.

 

Creole Rock is still the best we've experienced on-island.

 

Best ever was Cozumel for pretty fish, and Tobago Cays for amount of sealife -- swimming through perhaps a thousand foot-long squid swimming in formation. SCUBA on The Great Barrier Reef was a total disappointment.

 

gary

 

p.s. I structured that 'thousand' sentence for fun, but truth! :)

[Karysa]

I'm certain that they're referring to Dawn Beach.

 

Oyster Pond is the name of the little 'safe harbour' here where the marina is located.

 

(click)

 

The (timeshare) resort apparently thought that Oyster Bay Beach Resort sounded better than Pond.

 

The beach is Dawn Beach.

 

We haven't snorkeled there for many years. I remember it as decent, but the exposure to the open Atlantic often makes it very rough. We like the beach and used to spend a lot of time there until our favorite beach restaurant Ms. B's closed.

 

There was live coral and lots of fish, but I don't remember any rays, turtles or octopi. (The only turtle I recall seeing here was off of Anse Marcel.)

 

For the record, our snorkel spot was off of Ms. B's, where the Dawn Beach tag is on the photo. I understand that much of the reef you can see down where the Westin has been built was basically destroyed during construction.

 

Creole Rock is still the best we've experienced on-island.

 

Best ever was Cozumel for pretty fish, and Tobago Cays for amount of sealife -- swimming through perhaps a thousand foot-long squid swimming in formation. SCUBA on The Great Barrier Reef was a total disappointment.

 

gary

 

p.s. I structured that 'thousand' sentence for fun, but truth! :)

 

Location wise it sounded like Dawn Beach but the poster said it wasn't a very good beach or something along that line. On most islands Dawn beach would be right up there with the best on the island. St. Maarten is indeed blessed when it comes to beaches but Dawn is still a very nice beach especially when the sea is calm. The swimming through the squid would have freaked me out, wow! Last year I missed the octopus by one day so maybe this year I will get lucky. That was at Creole Rock. We saw the turtles on our sail to St. Bart's they were at the nature marine park on the island. I heard there are turtles and spotted rays on the far side of Creole Rock but it was pretty rough out there last summer on my first trip out to the rock and we didn't see any but we did see thousands of small fish and 2 stick crabs and many interesting looking fish and beautiful coral. The reef was looking pretty good and we were bad and wore sunscreen and felt awful when we were told how terrible it is for the reef. I just picked up Biodegradable sunscreen for our next trip.