1993 · St. Martin · Saba · Caribbean
St. Martin
(Written during the Great Shutdown of 2020. Memory isn't this good — internet searches filled in a lot of holes.)
The honeymoon in 1993 — still the only time in the Caribbean and one of only two times a proper resort vacation happened. Heineken cheaper than Coke, a timeshare presentation traded for a free sailboat, a high school friend turning up on a deserted gallery, and Saba's world-shortest runway.
Sharon and I went to St. Martin for our honeymoon in 1993 — still our only time in the Caribbean and one of only two times we did have done the resort vacation where we stayed in one place for a week. Pretty relaxing week, did the standard parasailing, jet ski, and hanging out on the beach. We did the timeshare sales presentation to get a free sailboat cruise to go snorkeling.
St. Martin has two discrete jurisdictions — the French side (Saint-Martin) and the Dutch side (Sint Maarten) and each are territories of their respective countries. We stayed on the Dutch side near Cole Bay and the main Dutch city of Philipsburg. Very touristy as this is where the cruise ships come in — so a lot of people to help you. I remember Heineken was cheaper than Coke, so truly a Dutch influence and no import taxes. On the French side, the main city of Marigot was much more laid back with good French restaurants.
We were wanting to purchase a painting and we heard about an impressionist art gallery by Alexandre Minguet which was located in a rural area on the French side of the island. It was a very nice gallery and real paintings were too expensive for us, so we bought some prints. But the main reason that it was memorable is that we ran into a friend of mine from high school, who was there filming a mini-series. She and a friend were the only people there when we arrived…small world.
We did the timeshare sales presentation to get a free sailboat cruise to go snorkeling. This is a transaction that has happened many thousands of times across the Caribbean and always ends the same way: you sit through the presentation, decline everything, collect the sailboat voucher, and have a great afternoon snorkeling. The Heineken being cheaper than Coke on the Dutch side is a genuine Dutch colonial legacy — the island has been duty-free since 1945 and alcohol prices reflect that. It remains one of the most relaxed pricing environments in the Caribbean for beer.
We went to Saba, which is a volcanic island and was a 15-minute flight from St. Martin on the recommendation of one of Sharon's friends. In addition to being very different terrain than St. Martin, it had the world's shortest runway (and still does!). Taxis are waiting at the airport to provide tours around the island. On the day we went, most of the mountains were covered in clouds and our taxi driver was pretty entertaining. As you can imagine — it is a pretty small gene pool and he was either friends or related to everyone we passed (or both).
The Juancho E. Yrausquin Airport on Saba has the shortest commercial runway in the world at just 400 metres (1,312 feet) — compared to a typical commercial runway of 2,400–3,600 metres. The runway ends on both sides with sheer cliffs dropping into the sea, which means the approach and departure require specialised aircraft and certified pilots. Only STOL (Short Take-Off and Landing) aircraft such as the Twin Otter can use it. Saba itself is a single volcanic peak rising 877 metres from the Caribbean Sea, with a population of about 2,000 people. The island has no beaches and was the last Dutch Caribbean island to build a road — the Road, as it is simply called, was completed in 1958 and locals were told it was impossible to build it by engineers who proved to be wrong.