Palarran - Thanks for the thumbs-up on the site (I hope that comment was addressed to me). It makes sense that since the two (St. Barths/St. Martin) are both French department there should be no need for checkin/checkout. OTOH, I have stayed in St. Barths both anchored in Gustavia and Columbier and Ile Forchue and always declared my locations correctly and never had to pay more than 10-15 Euros; I think I saw my receipt for the last trip and it was 5€ but I only anchored in Columbier that time. I think if you enter the harbour they make you fork out the megayacht $$$ but it would be worth it for me to med-moor along the Promenade between the 200+ footer megayachts with the painted
women aboard
(maybe I'll do that next time around, but med-mooring my boat inglehanded is beyond my
current skills.
Back to the thread - If I haven't recommend Grand Case for dining out at least 4 times in this thread I haven't done it often enough. I have walked the main drag in early dinner hours several times just to read the menus and have often had the
chef come to the door and talked
meals and wines with him/her - once they realize that their audience is interested they tend to wax poetic about their "art". Even Marigot and the Dutch side have excellent restaurants and St. Martin remains my favorite dining
destination.
As an aside - When I got my last boat in the
BVI I spent about 2 months sailing around those islands getting to learn my
new boat and exploring that wonderful
destination. At the time I didn't know about the "D'best Cup" coffee shop and couldn't find an espresso anywhere in the BVI. So strong was my urge for a coffee and camembert baguette that, despite a nasty
weather report, I set out for St. Martin in heavy seas and average winds at 25 knots dead on the nose. I was too stupid to use the
engine to motorsail and that crossing took about 24 hours but
WOW the
food and drink was worth the trip (once I regained my appetite)!