TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin The REAL FACTs about Orient Beach REBUILD

OK .. it's the Dumb [censored] who ran by all the construction and assumed he knew all .... and posted this morning

Today after posting ..I did the investigative CNN trip down O Beach ... not the Fake News trip

SO here's the REAL NEWS ... ( I apologize for not investigating closely but as a runner .... I tend to race by )

Yes the area from ex-Pedro's north for the next 200 yards (I paced it out .... all the way to Kontiki):
1) all fenced off with orange fence ...further back from the beach than before
2) lot's of dug out by huge cat ... they're going down into foundations this time
3) pipes for water and sewer ... and probably other necessities are being laid and sticking up (not just a pipe DREAM, Scuba man!!! LOL)
4) reinforcing rod is there in part.... no concrete. ... it's a BIG SITE .... lots to do BUT DOING!

AND further down the beach ..COCOA.... to the left of the big rocks as you look at it from the beach
5) the site has been prepared by huge cat .... it again is much further back than before ..setting up apparently as a restaurant
6) and rather than going down as with the nine or so sites near ex-Pedro's .... they seem to be building UP ... so as you approach the site there is a climb of approx. 5 feet higher than the original.... they've piled earth to a higher platform
7) again site is all fenced off and they have lots of building supplies on site. way further on than the other site .. concrete in ..guys working .....looks as if they start building UP soon.

Took photos but can't seem to get them to load on this simple travel notebook! Will continue to try!

Hoping the photos are now here???????

Jeez , it's good to be here!

Ok, if you mean that the second site, further down the beach, is that they are building Kakao there, no that is not correct. Kakao is already built and open. I don't doubt you that they are building something there, but it's not Kakao.

Sorry Carol ..asked one of the beach dudes ..and that was his reply .... I'm an idiot when it comes to place names on the beach !
As my pseudonym says, I'm a RUNNER (and don't eat beach food!)... and I dash by places .... BUT as you look from the beach ..it's left of the Giant rocks and in front of Alamanda!

Hope that helps!
G

I believe that's where Coco used to be?? Not sure from your description, as I thought the giant rocks were right by Esmeralda, not Alamanda. Next time you're running the whole beach, look for the signs for KKO. That's Kakao now.

We will be there in two weeks, staying at Esmeralda. The OP's note (thank you!) sounds like it is Coco at Esmeralda. We can happily confirm when we arrive! Can't wait!

I saw a Facebook post that showed excavation started for Coco next to the little mountain.

Hi. Thanks for the correction and for the pictures!! Enjoy!

Thanks so much for the pictures. Can anyone guess on the time frame for completion? Several months? A year?

Great info, much appreciated. But let's keep the CNN, fake news, political nonsense out of these forums, please.

Kamehameha--While I agree that politics don't belong here, I think that was all in jest, just a good natured post.

Amen to that. Definatly a slanted reference by the op. Not neccessary or good natured. Great post otherwise.

Again, I really think folks are just reading too much into it. Just a lighthearted reference to current events..

Really. All of us just need to lighten up a bit. To much bickering goes on here. Whether over a comment, spelling etc.

Yep, certainly no negativity or mean spirited intent, right. Just sarcasm I didn't appreciate. I simply stated my opinion without any pejoratives, as I thought was allowed. My misunderstanding.

Regarding Coco, when I was staying at Esmeralda in November, the desk manager said the entity that operates Coco was moving it further down the beach (toward the village), and that a new entity was taking over the former Coco site. He did not know anything about the beach bar that was going there. At that time, construction in front of Es was supposed to start in February, so current activity is consistent with that statement.