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Paris Hilton is my neighbour this week Dr Phil SXM 4 hours ago For several days, Paris Hilton has been on the island or around the island. Her plane is parked next to my place.I suppose she tried to visit, but I wasn’t home 😃

Drphilsxm

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Trip Report Day 4 shieneehead 8 hours ago Day 4
We decided to head over to Mullet for the day. I forgot to mention it before but I was pleased to see the speed bumps between Hope Estates and Grand Case have been removed. They never did anything to slow people down as they were pretty short. More of a nuisance that anything.

We drove through Marigot, Sandy Ground, Terres Basses and Cupecoy. It was so nice to see Marigot busy. The vendor village was full and there was plenty of remodeling on some hotel whose name/history I know nothing.

I simply love driving around this island. When there is no traffic, it makes me happy. It's got so much charm and diversity. Someday, we'll stay for an extended period...

I may have misunderstood someone posting that work was being done on the road through the golf course near Mullet. There was no sign of any coming from the Cupecoy side.

We got a couple front row seats at Rosie’s for $30. I love this beach. Deep and crystal clear. It was calm and very pleasant. There were lots of families enjoying the water and each other. At one point there were about 6 boats anchored in the bay. None of them were blasting music or being idiots. One catamaran had several Seabob out in the water. My wife and I have spoken a number of times about the lack of these on this island. We've rented them in Aruba and thought they were just fantastic. It would be a good business renting them out. If you aren't familiar, they are James Bond type of personal propulsion. You kind of put it under you and control the speed that you move along. You can dive deep or stay on top of the water. Pretty neat.

For lunch, my wife had a cheeseburger and fries and I had ribs, rice and salad. Both were good. We had coconut mojito’s to wash them down which were better.
It is curious that being around so long, Rosie’s hasn’t developed a more efficient order system. Many people (several extremely rude) were scrambling around not knowing where to order. I got drinks from the bar side while my wife patiently waited aside the crush of people trying to bark orders at Rosie. She looked at my wife and told her to come around the side where she took our food order.

Our food came out in a timely fashion. Rosie gave me our order and the bill and as I was trying to hand her payment she was pulled away. It was 5 minutes before she got back to me. No biggie, it just seemed like some sort of system would make it easier on her. God Bless her as she doesn’t get around easily.

We hung out until 3:30 or so and made our way back. We stopped at Super U to pick up some salad fixings and I grabbed some pork chops. No pharmacie visit today.

We were too tired to make said pork chops and just had a salad and leftovers. Flipped some channels and went to bed early. We want to be on the road early tomorrow to be sure we aren’t late for our excursion on the Enigma. We hit tons of traffic last year and it took over an hour to get to the dock behind Nowhere Special. They almost left without us. I suspect it will be light, if any, as it is Saturday but we don’t like to be “those” people.

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Missing Cruise ship lady found but 🤔 Kennys Yesterday at 11:33 PM She went out looking for action lol 😂 but placed our loving Island 🏝️ under unnecessary scrutiny 🧐

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FYI Saint-Martin scheduled power outages during December erb923 Yesterday at 08:25 PM Is on Facebook but seems pretty crappy all around.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/edfsxm/

EDF Archipelago Guadeloupe informs the people of Saint-Martin that, in the context of tension on the electrical system, blackouts are likely to occur starting this Monday, December 01.
Since September 2024 the territory has faced a fragile energy situation due to the partial unavailability of certain production facilities, coupled with continuous growth in electricity consumption. Despite the exceptional mobilization of emergency power groups, the electrical system remains heavily constrained.
In order to preserve network stability, rotating outages could be operated in various areas of the territory between Monday, December 01 and Wednesday, December 31st.
Each outage is scheduled for a maximum of 4 hours and concerns specific perimeters (cf. Schedule in the annex - see in the comments).
⏱ Despite all the efforts made, it can be difficult to keep to the minute the indicated times. A slight lag is sometimes seen, usually a few minutes, and can last up to 30 minutes in case of difficulty.
Every little bit counts.

At least they have added a spreadsheet of locations/hours of power loss.

https://issuu.com/with-you/docs/pla...mNT05OiPDSmpJ_aem_ZqKlUOPLJWNwCQ84z9sorQ

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Grand Case road closure CYOWDave Yesterday at 06:45 PM FYI, The stretch of RN7 just south of the GC airport will be closed at least some times today and tomorrow (29, 30 Nov) for racing in the street (cue Springsteen...). Just saw the barriers going up.
Dave
Edited to add: road closed from ~5:30am - 4:00pm Sunday 30th.

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This time next week lcote Yesterday at 03:47 PM God willing, we will be just about to land on SXM. I can't wait!!!

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Trip Report Days 2,3 shieneehead Yesterday at 02:05 AM Day 2
We got up, had some coffee and headed over to Good Morning Café to get a baquette, croissants and a slice of carrot cake. We also popped into On Dirait Le Sud where the roasted chickens had just come out of the oven. We got one which included potatoes roasted with the chickens for our dinner.

On the beach at La Playa by 11am. Another spectacular day. The breeze was a bit stronger but not too much. The water was fabulous and we noted that we hadn’t seen this many people frolicking in the waves in years. I enjoyed a refreshing mojito while my wife’s “margarita” was off somehow. It tasted and looked like they substituted Orgeat for Agave. She drank it regardless.

We took a stroll to toward the south side of the beach. We got down as far as Chez Leandra. The beach was substantially eroded with a sharp 1-2 ft drop off just in front of the chairs. It was too precarious for my wife who had a hip replacement just over a year ago.

We left the beach around 3pm as we wanted to get salad fixings and more cheese for dinner. First, we made another visit to the Pharmacie to get Arnica oil for my aching shoulders. My wife’s idea of course. It really is like a candy store for her.

I wanted to go to the Thiriet, which is also in Hope Estates just down from the Super U. If you haven’t been in here, it is truly amazing. It is all frozen foods from entrees, aperitifs snacks, desserts, vegetables and more. It is incredible the variety of French dishes that are available frozen. We grabbed a potato, raclette and lardon pizza, prosciutto wrapped green beans, duchesse potatoes, egg and veg souffles and some opera cakes(mmmmm).

Right next door is an upscale Epicerie GRAPE WINE with an impressive selection of French wines, global spirits, meats, pates, saucisson etc. We picked up some sliced Iberico sausage and a jar of prepared white beans slow cooked with duck and stock. These were amazing. Back home, we had a wonderful dinner, sat around for a bit and crashed.

Day 3 Happy Thanksgiving! We got a little burned yesterday. The top of my right foot was poking out from under the umbrella! We decided to do a little drive by of the French side. We wanted to check out Cul de Sac, Grand Case and then drive down to Oyster Bay area. We haven’t been down that way in about a decade.

The Ferry dock to Pinel looks like it has been expanded. I am assuming that it has been built out from them covering the Sargassum with sand instead of removing it. The parking lot is much bigger and flatter. The road leading into is still treacherous though. We skipped driving into Anse Marcel. It’s not a pleasant drive down and too much of a walk from the lot to get to the beach. We were so happy to see all the development in Grand Case.

There were 3-4 major construction projects going on in properties that were damaged in 2017 or have been untouched for years. It looks very promising and will brighten up the seedier parts of the strip. We can’t wait to come back next year to see the results. The south end of the strip has come a long way in the last few years. Probably spurred on by the remodel of the Rainbow Club. We went there maybe 15 years ago and it did not impress so it completely fell off our radar. At least from the outside it looks swank.

Leaving Grand Case my wife saw the Pharmacie Grand Case and wanted to check it out. We got some water resistant 50 SPF for our faces as we have a scheduled trip on with Celine Charters on Friday. My wife also found a moisturizing baum that she wanted to try. Apparently, a baum is different than a lotion. It’s thicker and therefore better…for some reason. Never stop learning.

At this point we were both hungry and decided to go back to our villa to have lunch and forego the trip to Oyster Bay. Perhaps another day, perhaps not. It’s all good.
Back to our villa for some lunch and relaxation. We have 6:30 reservation at La Villa

We got into Grand Case about 5:30 to stroll through the shops. We bought my wife a beautiful labradorite ring at Peace & Love, which is in front of Java.
We peeked into Java. That place is gorgeous. We’ve never been but decided to stop by for a cocktail sometime this week.

Around this time, Neil from Celine Charters called to say we were the only reservations for Friday. He has a 6 person minimum so we wouldn’t be going out. He believed we would be able to go on Saturday and a later call from him confirmed this. Not a problem.

Dinner at La Villa was outstanding. My wife started with lobster bisque and had shrimp risotto as an entrée. She said her bisque was light and very flavorful. Both the risotto and shrimp were excellent. She made me try it and it was exemplary. The shrimp had a little snap to them but were tender and juicy. I had extremely garlicky escargot( a good thing for me, but my wife said garlic was still coming out of my pores in the morning) followed by coconut crusted mahi mahi with a green curry, mashed potatoes and vegetables. Wonderful. A bottle of Pouilly Fusse was a delicious choice for both of the entrees. We were too stuffed for dessert. Came straight home, brushed my teeth and called it a night.

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martinique 2.0 CrazyCanuxx 11/28/2025 09:33 PM Hello/bonjour,

I am off to Martinique for my second attempt this year. My Jan visit was wrought with issues outside of anyone's control...and so I think Martinique deserves a second chance.

Day trips booked/planned over 2 Christmas weeks incl

Catamaran to st pierre
Hike around st pierre and some of the volcano
Le carbet to visit petit bonhomme beach bar
Fdf incl grand marche, library, and ?
La savanne des esclaves
South day tour to Les Salines with many stops along the way

I doubt josephines bath is in my cards. I do hope to stop at at least one distillery but not my focus.

What am i missing re christmas events or other must dos?

As with most trips I will not rent a vehicle.

I look forward to your recommendations.

Au plaisir,

Cc

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looking for some info Iowa couple 11/28/2025 02:55 PM We are returning to islands again {land basing it} Staying in the nanny cay area. Looking for peoples opinions on Car rentals, private boat charters reasonable
and such We are planning on Jost the baths and jumping off the Willie T for starters. May mosey over to St Johns also. Any ideas folks?
we only have a week

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Trip report candj 11/27/2025 02:47 PM Arrived on the 24th and leave on the 11th. Traffic seems to be worse than I remembered at 3 to 6 in the Simpson Bay and Union Road area.. Chair/umbrella rental has increased at Club O to $30 a day or $180 per week. A in Simpson Bay. new 8 story building is being built right across the water from Royal Palm. We had a quick dinner at the Replay and the Greenhouse and both were good for the money. Went to Phillipsburg with 6 ships in port and it was busy. Bought a Christmas present at Elegant Jewels. Staying at the Simpson Bay Resort and the road repair is challenging. The Hollywood Casino was slightly remodeled inside. More to come..

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