Land Ahoy (St Barts) 5/26/2017

After two sea days, we made it to our first port of call on the lovely island of St. Barthelemy; named for the brother of Christopher Columbus.  This island is a volcanic island fully encircled by shallow reefs and is VERY small and VERY pricey.  We did the brief island tour by taxi which lasted only about 45 minutes with highlights including several views of the island's airport and an appreciation for fully functioning brakes on the taxi.  The island has very narrow streets that wind up and down fairly steep mountainous roads.  Being part of France, French is the primary language on the island, but we found everyone we encountered spoke English.  However, during it's history, St Barts was also owned by Sweden, which influenced the naming of the capital Gustavia.

After our tour, we walked the main drag window shopping (every VERY high-end store can be found on the main street) until we found an open air local restaurant for lunch.  We returned to the pier area and changed into our swimsuits in preparation for our afternoon tour.  This tour, aboard a catamaran, sailed up the east coast of St Barts to a cove on the north end of the island for an hour of beach time.  A few brief rain showers did not dampen the enjoyment of anyone.  Being an extremely arid island with little fresh water, the rain was welcomed by local vegetation, including the cactus.   The lack of fresh water has restricted St Barts' tourism on a large scale. . .instead they choose to cater to the rich and famous especially over the winter holidays.  During the high season, the population of the island grows from 10,000 to almost 20,000.

The evening was spent sharing a dining table with the onboard Smithsonian lecturer Michael Scott.  Not only did we learn more about our cruise location, but learned about the northern lights, living in Scotland and the remote island of Tristan Da Cunha (you might want to google it!)


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St. Barts photos