The Severed Cortex

Happy Anniversary to us! Today Nancy and I have been married for six years and we get to spend the day in Sint Martin/Saint Maarten. Or is it Sint Maarten/Saint Martin?

We wanted to spend a fair amount of time here so we got up extra early in order to be off the ship at 8:00. We start with the obligatory power breakfast and we skip cleaning ourselves up. We'll be walking around all day anyway so there's no need to be fresh as a freakin' daisy.

We don't quite make the 8:00 time we planned, but we are off the ship at 8:30. We head up to the taxi stand to go to the French side first. Immediately, we are packed into an old Toyota van with approximately ten other people. It was a bit like a clown car but it wasn't too bad. After a short thirty minute ride we are dropped off in downtown Marigot. The downtown itself is a little rough but not all that bad. We wander around a bit and eventually we weave our way over to the open air market. The first place we wind up at Nancy buys a colorful dress. We wander around some more looking at jewelry and clothes. After several passes we buy some t-shirts and Nancy buys me a sterling silver necklace. Happy Anniversary to me. Nancy also buys herself some earrings and a necklace. We wander down farther to the fish market where we watched them clean and sell fish. We also scoped out the produce sellers.

After a bit of walking we rested on the pier where all the sailboats were docked. Some small children were fishing but they weren't catching anything. By this time it's almost 11:30 and we need to find a place to eat. We decide on a little French place tucked into the side of the hill that overlooked the open air market and a street corner that seemed like there would be a wreck every fifteen seconds. The wreck never occurred although there were tons of near misses. The food was the best we've had all trip. Nancy had a sea bass souffle that was presented so well that she had to take a picture of it. I had some of the best lobster bisque I've ever eaten. It had chunks of lobster meat in it. I also had a dozen escargot swimming in garlic parsley butter. We washed it all down with a couple of large bottles of Evian. It was expensive, but well worth it. (They even prepared a filet of kangaroo ... yes that's hop-hop kangaroo, not a name for some exotic fish. I wasn't bold enough to try it)

After the delightful lunch we headed to the taxi stand to get a ride back to Phillipsburg on the Dutch side. This time it was just Nancy and I in the back of a Dodge Stratus. We arrive on Front Street in Phillipsburg and duck down an alley to the boardwalk. The boardwalk is very touristy so we decide to walk in the surf instead. Once we make it down to the end, we brush the sand off and walk back up Front Street.

Front Street is pretty touristy too, but we walk the length of it anyway. Nancy finds the Delft store and I pay for her wares. Happy Anniversary. I also find the cigar store where I buy a 5-pack of Cuban Cohiba's. I assure Nancy that I'll smoke all of them before we go home.

The weatherman said it was going to be thunderstorm like today, but the weather was perfect. Too perfect, as Nancy got a little sunburned. The sun is so hot that we had to stop for a Presidente at a bar on the boardwalk. Some whacked out islander smoked something across from us on the beach and proceeded to live in a cartoon world while we sipped beer. Eventually we decided to make the ten minute walk back to the ship.

Dinner was good, but it didn't measure up to our lunch. I had:
Citus Cured Salmon
House Salad
Lobster Tail and Shrimp Scampi
A trio of desserts although I traded my chocolate cake for the sponge cake
My folks bought us a lovely bottle of Coppola Diamond Series Chardonnay.

After dinner Nancy and I had a drink in the Schooner bar and spent a little time sitting in lounge chairs on Deck 4 enjoying the Caribbean breeze. We had an absolutely perfect anniversary day and we both loved Sint Maarten/Saint Martin. Over lunch we plotted how we would spend a week or a month here catching and preparing our own fish meals every day while we worked on our novels.