Today is the day that if anyone offers a lift, we will accept! Unfortunately this is St Barthelemy (St Barths) and white folk don’t offer lifts.
Earlier, we tender from our parking space seemingly miles out from the island, mostly because there are so many mega-yatchs anchored in the waters surrounding Gustavia, including Roman Abramovich’s Eclipse. Just as we arrive the rain starts, some very big drops indeed, and for a while we stand under the terminal building waiting for a sign things will get better. Eventually we don waterproofs and head out, it’s not quite so bad now. We climb out of town towards the airport, and scary runway sandwiched between a four-lane crossroads and a bay only a few hundred yards away. We watch as a plane taxis to the end of the runway, breaks hard and then opens the throttle to screaming before letting go of the brakes and it leaps forwards into take-off - the aviation equivalent of burning tyres!
The walk so far is horrible - we’re wet, it’s still raining hard, there’s no pavement, the cars and small trucks are manic - and we’re not really liking St Barths, but as we descend the hill by the airport (yes, the runway is also slightly inclined to add to it’s challenges!) the rain stops. The first beach at St Jean is supposedly beautiful but we’ve seen so many without shopping centres and traffic nearby, it’s hard to appreciate why. As we progress there are several, and they all look like beaches too!
We are heading to the far side of the island, which is like any Caribbean island, a big lump of young volcanic rock, extremely hilly. One road we climb is so hard several cars are failing to maintain grip after the rain, quite alarming! Rounding one summit the view down to the far side is lovely with more bays, beaches and a trapped sea-water lake. We descend on yet another beach, but have to blag our way though a posh hotel which has seemly consumed the pathway, it’s easy, just pretend we’ve every every right to be there!
Our return is intended to be back along the same route, but I decide to re-route to the South, entailing a more adventurous climb but it’s worth it eventually, here’s where that lift would have been appreciated as we struggle in the heat and humidity to scale exceedingly steep inclines.
After numerous “this will be the last uphill, I promise” which turned out to be premature, we finally are heading back down to the port town of Gustavia and our waiting tender, except there’s none to be seen. The very long sail from the ship’s berth to the port means there a bit of a delay before we’re back, and only just make the 15:30 deadline for ordering a burger. It’s the best Napa Burger ever so worth the disruption.
After our lunch it’s a segue down to five aft for a bit of late afternoon jacuzzi, catch up with some of the young Americans from yesterday’s volcano climb, and watch the sun set. We shower and change for the evening, heading as always to the Patio Grill for our aperitifs and then remain on eight to make our last visit to Thomas Keller Grill on this cruise.
The menu is very limited, but several items are good so it’s never a problem, and if not a turnaround day there’s also a special. Tonight it is Smoked Salmon Tartare, which of course is a tortology, but we’ll let that slip for now. Firstly it’s chilled crudities with a lovely garlic and herb dip, plus various versions of bread including a brioche-like loaf which would be dangerous if consumed in large quantities!
We move on to the aforementioned tartare which is seems to be just minced smoked salmon - so not raw at all but cured which is quite different - pleasant enough but pretty boring, whereas Hubby has the Aubergine Parmigiano from the mains as a starter, it’s a great success. Moving on he has lobster again, which is always a fabulous dish (and I get the claws!) whilst I have the eye of rib served with béarnaise sauce, which is fine but not as good as the one we get from our local farm.
Our desert of choice is lemon meringue, now served on a bed of raspberry coulis which we’re not convinced brings much to the party, but it’s still a great pudding.
As always the MD David and his team are fabulously professional and it’s not hyperbole to suggest that service is simply the best available to mankind.
It’s deck party tonight so so we beat a hasty retreat to our cabin lest we get dragged into the dance floor!
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