First 18 Hours in St. Barts

Saturday started out to what most people may describe as a bit of a disaster, but Suzanne and I seem to have found quite a bit of humor in it. We arrived at Princess Julianna Airport at 10:15 a.m., an hour before our inter-island flight to St. Barts, and were immediately informed upon check-in of Winn-Air's new luggage policy of one checked bag (max 21kg) and one carry on (max 3kg). As we scrambled to figure out which unread periodicals (e.g., People, Us, Life & Style) would make the trip, we were informed that we could check a bag standby for $40. Whew! We not so quickly prioritized our items into 2 categories and repacked our bags on the floor near the check in desk, while getting very many dirty looks. In the process, we observed a very angry Frenchman who was informed of the same policy and who insisted that his rollaboard only weighed 3kg. When he was proven wrong, he screamed “FAAAK” and started pacing in a panic. “Bot I am onlvy goving to Sant Baats” (French accent) “I vill pay vatever, I yust need to go”. It was quite the spectacle.

We then checked in with a smile and ventured to the security line only to hear our names being paged to proceed to our gate immediately. We asked if we could skip ahead of everyone but the security chick wasn’t buying it given that another (very snobby) woman did the same thing at the same time and tried to even skip in front of us. Thus the security chick asked if we asked every single person in line if they approved, so I turned around and shouted out “hey everyone, is it OK that we skipped you?” and got a resounding “YES” from the crowd. Another “whew” from our side. We then ran to the gate (after Suzanne got held up again at the second security checkpoint by snobby woman) where the Winn-air staff was waiting for us. They escorted us via bus to our plane, and we were a bit surprised to see our pilot standing outside waiting for us with the door open. Remember when I said I only like to travel to destinations that are a little hard to get to? This is the kind of transportation you must be prepared for:

Suzanne and I immediately both fell madly in love with our pilot, whom we shall call Andy, looking somewhat dapper in his pilot uniform and aviators, asking us if we would like a nice view for our flight. He opened the door for us and as we climbed in to the teeny plane, we turned around to find 3 other passengers, one of which was the angry frenchman. We actually had quite a pleasant 15-minute flight to St. Barts without incident, even with the scary landing strip that I had heard so much about. We arrived to 2 little girls at the end of the runway on the beach waving at us. So cute.

Andy, before takeoff and after a fab landing:


a selection of nice views from the plane:




After a quick stop at Match right across from the airport for some snacking essentials, we found our way to Villa Finestere in Flamands, literally a stone’s throw from Hotel St. Barth Isle de France. Fi, the housekeeper was there to greet us with a smile and she had made us some snacks (including a wonderfully seasoned whole chicken!) and supplied some beverages for us. This is my fourth experience with an online villa/apartment rental and this one surely did not disappoint. I have yet to have a bad experience with this kind of vacation accommodation and this is the ONLY way to go, trust me. The villa has everything we need and more, including a private pool and a guest house, and is stocked with every pool and beach toy one could possibly need.

We ventured to Isle de France for lunch and some beach time. I’m sure I will say this over and over but the food was excellent (chicken salad – but not the American fatty kind swimming in mayo, the fresh French kind, with fresh thinly sliced chicken among tons of fresh fruit and vegetables), although not cheap. Lunch for the 2 of us with a glass of wine was about $100 US. I know it could be worse but for those of you reading this who want real numbers about cost there it is. The perk, however is that if you have lunch there, you can use their beach chairs and beach service. We took advantage and treated ourselves to some pina coladas on the beach, each of which was almost as much as our lunch entrees…. but so so good!

The right side of the beach, more beautiful pictures of the hotel to come:


One would think by now that after our day of travel, lunch and beach time, we would be ready for some R&R. We at this point we thought we would just run out for a casual dinner and come home and crash. We opted for LeSelect in Gustavia, home of the famed “Cheeseburger in Paradise”. Given that we were going to a pretty casual spot I opted for a cute outfit from my new favorite UK mail order catalog, Boden. This is relevant later, just so you know.
Le Select has a great, super casual (the only plastic chairs I have seen on the island thus far) outdoor patio with no waitstaff, part of the charm is that you order your food and drink from the grill and the bar directly and pick it up when it is ready. The bacon cheeseburger was out of this world, I could have actually had 2 of them…

Yes, the story continues:

We chatted it up with one of the semi-locals who told us we should go to Le Strand for an after dinner drink . We were both kinda tired but I said to Suzanne “come on, we are in St. Bart, lets just check it out.” So we did, only to find that it was very much on the opposite end of the spectrum from LeSelect, with everything from dim lighting, velvet curtains and chandeliers to sexy house music and couchside bottle service. I immediately regretted my outfit choice, knowing there was no way to pull of hip and chic in that “cute” ensemble. Lucky for me Suzanne was wearing a colorful strapless number from Old Navy that managed to attract some local talent. This is where the evening took an unexpected turn. After having an unproductive conversation with the young Frenchman sitting next to me, an American who is working down here came over to talk to us, we shall refer to him from here on out as “The Ambassador”.

Although his southern accent was somewhat painful at times (as a Midwestern gal I do not like southern accents on men, even if its Matthew McConneghey - or however you spell it - sorry, but its true) he was quite entertaining and suggested after buying us some more wine that we head down to Casa Nikki, which is right underneath Le Strand and has a great club atmosphere. I believe it was there that the champagne bottles began to flow tableside, only to continue later at the Yacht Club. I am not quite sure how or when the evening ended but I do know that The Ambassador made sure we made it home safely, probably due to his ulterior motive to spend some more time with Suzanne…………..

We gave The Ambassador a tour of the villa and could not find the lights to the pool area, but walked out there anyway – you know where this is going, right? Yea, I fell in the pool in my stupid outfit. It turned into a bit of a teenage pool party for a while until we gave up and went to sleep around 5-ish. If the rest of the trip is going to be like this I don’t think I am going to make it!