Exploring St. Maarten with Scotty
Through our hotel Oyster Bay Beach Resort and Spa we arranged for a private taxi and our driver was Scotty- a cheerful, burly guy with a big sense of humor. He entertained us with the history of the island and pointed out the winter homes of the rich and famous. Apart from the gossip and juicy news, he elaborated on the subtle nuances of the Dutch and the French living side by side. It was interesting to get his point of view because he had dabbled in politics until just recently and had strong opinions on the government and its policies.
On the way we saw a few cars and vans pulled over and a cluster of people staring into the bushes. We decided to explore and share their focus of interest. On the vines and deep into the thickets we first saw about four iguanas trying to stay still and blend in with the background. Upon looking more closely, more and even more iguanas were visible as we slowly saw their shapes identify themselves out from the backdrops. It was pretty cool to see so many iguanas, some small and insignificant looking and many large ones with impressive markings and fascinatingly ugly faces. One of the tour guides from another group brought scraps of lettuce to lure the iguanas to him and he wanted to ‘catch’ one of the bigger ones to show it around to the group. I guess the big ones were ‘old and wise’ and were on to him, and stayed a safe distance away but the guide managed to grab at a small green iguana that promptly pretended to play dead to avoid any trouble. Clutched in the guide’s hands, the iguana was subjected to all our pets and strokes and it didn’t look too happy and was ultimately released and it set off into the bushes in a swift scramble.
As we drove along the quiet townships, there weren’t too many people around as it was Christmas day and they were probably still at church. Going over a particularly rough patch of road, a sharp metal chip pierced the wheel of our van and the air exhaled out in an angry hiss of resignation.
We all trooped out of the van and wandered around while the adventurous in our group helped Scotty figure out the best way to change the tire of the large van. Within 5 minutes a car pulled over and a cheerful man came over to hug Scotty and promptly lay down alongside the tilted van to help assess the damage. He chattered away happily with Scotty while he attempted to do his bit in helping with the flat tire. Scotty humored him for a while but then shooed him off because the ‘friend’ was more distracting than helpful. As he walked away amiably, Scotty muttered to us under his breath that the helpful ‘friend’ was merry and drunk and therefore of not much use to him/us. A little more than 5 minutes later, another ‘friend’ pulled over and walked over to help us in high spirits. Pretty soon we realized that this helpful man was happily inebriated as well so he too was sent packing off. Scotty told us after he left that he used to be a local pastor and quite a favorite amongst the locals until he got friendlier with the bottle and lost his reputation since then. A few minutes later, right on clockwork another guy stopped to help. Since he did help change the tire successfully, we can only presume he was sober. All along this incident, cars would honk as drivers recognized Scotty and his van in distress- other drivers would call out to Scotty and offer help or suggestions their voices fading out as they drove away before their sentence could be finished- passersby paused to see if they could be of assistance and went along their merry ways with a cheerful Merry Christmas when Scotty politely declined their help. It was very entertaining to see this side of people coexisting in a society and this level of kinship. Perhaps the generous Christmas drinking had a lot to do with the friendly attitude of the locals, but it was diverting and delightful.
Our first stop was Orient Beach. It was crowded and busy with locals and tourists alike. Unfortunately, in the last couple of months the beaches of St. Maarten had been invaded by an influx of Sargasso seaweed that cascaded on the shoreline and coated the sandy beaches. It was not the most ideal situation to swim in so we waded in the shallow water. One part of Orient beach was clothing optional and it was amusing to see a few attention-seekers strut their nudity as they ‘purposefully’ sauntered towards our side of the beach.
Leaving here we drove to Cul-de-Sac and hopped on to the crowded ferry carrying happy tourists over to Pinel Island.
It was a short boat ride and felt good to have the salty spray in our faces and the frisky wind whisk our hair about in a happy turmoil.
The island beach was sandy but crowded, the shoreline dotted with countless umbrellas and happily sunbathing people. It seemed to be the popular destination for the locals on Christmas day. The water was shallow and not too choppy. It wasn’t the clearest or bluest waters we had seen but at least there was no seaweed and so it was nice to finally get into the water.
We made reservations at one of the two restaurants on the island – Karabuni (which means ‘welcome’ in Kenyan).
Understandably the restaurant was crowded as well. Almost every table was receiving an order of ouassous- large crayfish looking big river prawns grilled to perfection and we did too.
We also also ordered the grilled lobster, fish burgers and house Creole rice. The food was very tasty and the setting on the beach was lovely.
After a satisfying meal, we took the ferry back to the mainland where Scotty was waiting to take us back to the hotel with more stories and interesting tidbits.
