You asked us to "rate" St Barths with a Bon Jour or a Boo Jour....that is a very difficult assignment, as it is sort of both....
We are really enjoying Colombier (a natural park on the north side of St. Barths)...free, high quality mooring, great beach, clean water, and lots of turtles around the boat. And, the "day trippers" all leave by late afternoon. It is rimmed with high mountains on two sides, so the winds are abated and the scenery is ruggedly beautiful So, this gets a big thumbs up.
We actually took the dinghy down to Gustavia (the main town) to check in this morning (late morning); we left the boat at the mooring. It is a couple miles down the coast...no big deal. I was too lazy to move the big boat, and we liked where we were moored. (Again taking advantage of the go-fast dinghy) Lori mentioned to get lots of forms as they are all the same in the French Islands.... The current procedure is to check yourself in....there is a bank of computers at each immigration office, and you type your info in, and it is stored in the French data base; so if you return to the island, you don't have to reenter the infor. Once you type in your data, you print the form, and hand it to the official, who holds his hand out for the fee. That's it....10 minutes and you are all done; both inbound and outbound clearance is done in one shot. Very nice, easy, and all done in an air conditioned office...another thumbs up.
We wandered around town after clearing customs...The town is just too upscale for us. The shops are basically the same as in St. Martin...Gucci, Cartier, Prada, DK, Louis V, etc. Simply, nothing we could afford, or are interested in buying. A leather Gucci bag is not going to stand up very well in the saltwater environment of the dinghy, or Persephone for that matter...(my "wallet" is a Glad sandwich bag....can you see me pulling that out in one of these stores !!)
After watching the beautiful people, we stopped at an outside "snack bar" and had a couple of burgers and washed them down with a coldie. You can put THE CREW "in France", but you can't
make us French...guess we are still "ugly Americans" with burgers and a beer....viva la differance !!
We returned to Persephone, and hit the beach for the remainder of the afternoon.
Sundowners with cheese and a baguette only seemed appropriate on French St Barths...while planning our next hop.
THE CREW
PS: T has TWO yes TWO "pet" SHARKS (you read right...JAWS and JAWS Jr) living under Persephone. Any biodegradable scraps that go overboard are quickly scoffed up by her "pets". (Last nite a chicken bone created a feeding frenzy. We forgot about the chicken bone today, while we both dangled our feet off the swim platform)....T's friends are back again now as I type...think I will pass on that evening swim....(Jaws music fading in the background...)
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