New Fees French St. Martin

[Harriet]

The French finally figured out why so many cruising boats were avoiding the Dutch side - it was practically free.
The new fees for entering the country and anchoring (either in Simpson Bay Lagoon or in any French anchorage) are as follows:
5 euro upon arrival
20 euro upon departure
.35 euro/meter/day for the boat

Keep in mind that a euro = 2.67 US dollars.

Ouch!

[skipmac]

Euro exchange rate today is USD $1.362 per Euro. Maybe you were adding a second correction factor for converting from US to metric units?

[TaoJones]

Originally Posted by skipmac

Euro exchange rate today is USD $1.362 per Euro. Maybe you were adding a second correction factor for converting from US to metric units?

You're right, skipmac, but perhaps Harriet is being prescient. Odds are, the $US price of a single Euro will be closer to her $2.67 by the end of 2009 than today's $1.36+. (Gulp!)

TaoJones

[SVAspen]

Our friends who are on the French side right now just told me these same fees are now in place. However, they said that it was .35 euro/foot/day (instead of meters). Meters makes more sense!

They also said that a lot of sailboats have pulled up their anchors and are heading out. That is sad.

[Rangiroo]

wow....I was just there for Christmas for a week...cost me $8.00 to stay as long as I wanted....

[Harriet]

Thanks, skipmac, for bringing that to my attention. I've always been somewhat mathematically impaired. My bad.

[MarkJ]

Everyone will just go to the Dutch side where it is $10 per week.
It was funny when we were anchored in the lagoon. The boarder runs straight through it - and someone forgot to paint the line on the water - so on one side there was NO boats, On the other side HEAPS. And some very careful chart plotting to ensure which side was which LOLOL.

Fees like these do affect the economy as its a psychological barrier to staying. $10 per day is nothing compare to what a cruiser puts into the economy per day.


Mark

[Hud3]

Harriet,

Thanks for the update. The bureaucrats are capitalists after all, and have figured out what the market will bear. Last time I cleared in in Marigot, the fee was $US 7, up from nothing the time before that.

p.s. I suspect you were thinking of the Eastern Caribbean Dollar exchange rate when you quoted $2.67 per USD.

[TaoJones]

One Euro is currently (05 Jan '09) equal to 3.55432 XCD (East Caribbean Dollar).

TaoJones

[bstreep]

All public servents should be required to take Economics 101 before serving. They look out at a harbor with 100 boats, and think "at $1 per day per foot, that's $5000 a day we could be making!". And then they wonder why it doesn't work!

Here in Texas, they put an additional tax of $1. per pack of cigarettes a year ago. Tax revenues actually went DOWN. Hmm. Maybe it's because there are other places/ways to buy cigs! The border states sure are happy about their increased revenues!

[harryrezz]

that exchange rate is definitely EC (Eastern Caribbean) dollars to US - which is 2.67 to 1.
Huh - seems one more set of bureaucrats have shot themselves in the foot. The Greedy-Greedy Puppy gets no dinner - and those goofs in Fr, St. Maartin will most certainy not see me!!!

[TaoJones]

Originally Posted by harryrezz

that exchange rate is definitely EC (Eastern Caribbean) dollars to US - which is 2.67 to 1.

No, the exchange posted above was correct at 21:57 UTC:

Live rates at 2009.01.05 21:57:35 UTC 1.00 EUR=3.55432 XCD

Euro East Caribbean Dollars 1 EUR = 3.55432 XCD 1 XCD = 0.281348 EUR

The rate at this moment is 3.61394:

Live rates at 2009.01.06 04:28:35 UTC 1.00 EUR=3.61394 XCD

Euro East Caribbean Dollars 1 EUR = 3.61394 XCD 1 XCD = 0.276706 EUR

Harriet was talking about Euros.

TaoJones