TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin RCC's Icon in SXM

The world's largest cruise ship, Icon, will arrive in SXM for the ship's first time on Tuesday, February 13!! Since we'll be in SXM on that date, does anybody know the best place to get a decent look at that monster? We know Front Street will be a total mess with the Icon itself bringing in over 7,000 passengers! Yikes....
Would Chesterfield's be an option? Thanks....

You're not going to get a water view of the ship from Chesterfields. Without going in to Philpsburg, I'd recommend going over to Divi and walk up to Fort Amsterdam. That'll give you an unobstructed view without crowds.

Or just sit on the boardwalk beach and watch it come in to port after you check the port website to see when it's do in.

I assumed since they said Front Street would be a mess that they had no desire to go anywhere near there. But sure Great Bay Beach would certainly be a good view.

If the boat was just arriving there wouldn't be the crowd they feared since they'd still be on the ship.

We drove up the hill in Pointe Blanche the first time the Oasis of the Seas came to St. Maarten to watch it dock.

There will be 7600 passengers on that day...just from the Icon.

I would just go to the Boardwalk. There are *only" three ships in that day. It's supposed to arrive at 8 AM. If you want to get up really early, you could go downtown and park before they arrive and then watch all the hubbub.

Thanks for the informative responses!!

I just returned from jazz cruising, and my ship passed the Icon when we were leaving port. Here are some photos of Icon of the Seas. Not my cup of tea.

Not too intimate a ship. More like a floating city. Not my cup of tea either.

Linda--thanks for the pics. Looks horrific to me, but I'm old.

I will say that our room at Divi was a great place to watch Wonder of the Seas come in and it is interesting to watch. That thing was a monster the first time I saw it. It is a very agile ship for being so big (or maybe because it is so big).
But as for going into Pburg when it was there? No thank you. And Icon is even bigger.

I’m sure if you’re a huge cruise fan this ship would be heaven but personally speaking, I can’t imagine being trapped in one place with that many people for more than about an hour let alone a week. Not my idea of fun and in fact, I consider anymore than four to six to be a crowd! We did a small ship in Hawaii and again to Bermuda but that’s it for me so definitely no monster mega ships. 🙂🙂

Basically a floating toilet for 8000 people.

Here's another image I found on Facebook. Grotesque IMO.

Looks like a fun place if traveling with children.