St Maarten/St Martin 21 February 2016 Newsletter Other newsletters Contests | Restaurants | Bargains and Happenings ISLAND NEWS

Weather: Sunday was extremely hazy at best and at worst it was a total whiteout with squalls racing across Cupecoy The photo on the right was taken from our Caribbean balcony. Porto Cupecoy, about a half mile away, was barely visible. Monday was more of the same humid haze with no islands visible, but at least no rain. It rained on Tuesday, but for the most part it was clear. The photo below left is the sunset with a lot of haze on the horizon. Wednesday was fine, hazy and humid with no rain, but the photo lower center shows a pretty good sunset. Thursday was cloudy and hazy with a quick tropical storm in the afternoon - at least in Cole Bay. Friday's forecast said scattered clouds, but the early afternoon was totally overcast with a few drizzles. Saturday morning was the first day I have seen Saba in a week. We went out to Kakao on Orient Beach. Unfortunately it rained all through lunch, cleared a bit in the afternoon and rained on into the evening. The sunset pano below was taken from our Caribbean balcony on Thursday evening. There was no green flash as the sun dropped into haze and clouds at the horizon.

The next ten days show seven clear days and three days with a chance of rain reaching 65% today, 40% on a couple other days and totaling 0.14 inches over the ten days. The high temperature will be 82 with one day at 81F and another at 83F and the overnight low will have a similar pattern, eight days at 74F and one at 75F, another at 73F. Here's the detailed forecast from Weather Underground and here's one from the Weather Channel. Sunset tonight will be at 6:13 PM. That provides 11 hours and 27 minutes of sunshine. That's one minute more than last week. We are about halfway between the solstice and the equinox, heading for 33 more minutes of sunshine on the vernal equinox (20 March). The full moons for 2016 will be 22 Feb, 23 Mar, 22 Apr, 21 May, 20 Jun, 19 Jul, 18 Aug, 16 Sep, 16 Oct, 14 Nov, and 13 Dec.

SXM-Beaches: The Herald published its article on the battle between Tropical Wave and the French government. In the last week Pat has received over 400 signatures. Please add yours. Help save Galion Beach! Please sign this petition. On Friday, Wendy K said "The sand has come back to the southeast side of Shore Pointe beach and there is dry sand at baby beach this morning. The waves seem to have calmed down, as well." On Saturday she added "Between 8:30 this morning, when I did my beach run, and 11:00, when I returned to Shore Pointe for my beach day, the waves had increased significantly. A few people went in to play in the waves, but not I. After several light sprinkle-showers, and no sun, I headed home at 2:00PM. REALLY windy here. Tony is napping under our down comforter!" Below left is a shot over the blue umbrellas at Kakao on Orient Beach looking off toward Pinel in the distance. The other two photos were taken at the new construction. There's not much happening here. A few clothing stores are open as they do not need electricity, gas, water, or waste water connections. Some of the previous restaurants are renting chairs and serving drinks, but it's unlikely that any full service restaurant will be in operation during high season.

We went to Mario Bistrot with friends from the Horny Toad Guesthouse. It turns out that their next vacation is on a cruise ship relocation from the Caribbean to the Mediterranean. Since the crossing requires about six days, a cabin sells for less than usual. That reminded me of some people we met at a wine tasting who were on a freighter cruise and then a container ship came past our Caribbean balcony (see below) and that reminded me of our friend Richard Pollak's book: The Colombo Bay by Richard Pollak - Amazon.com says: Container ships lack the literary appeal of other, more romantic vessels, such as pirate ships and sail boats, and as a result their stories aren't often told. But as Richard Pollak demonstrates in The Colombo Bay, there's plenty to talk about. After all, a quick glance around your living room probably reveals numerous items imported from overseas and container ships are how they got to you. In 2001, after securing passage as an observer aboard a massive container ship bound from Hong Kong to New York via the Suez Canal, Pollak was just about to begin his journey when the 9/11 attacks struck, throwing the world into tremendous uncertainty. Pollak chose to go ahead with the trip but his trepidation serves as an appropriate undercurrent to the uncertainty that the crews of these ships face every day. Though the ships are enormous and strong, they live under a constant cloud of potential disaster. Piracy, far from being the stuff of old movies, is very much alive in the modern world, often with container ships being the victims.

Storms, the threat of running aground, stowaways, and the possibility of being an unwitting accomplice to global terrorism are always top of mind for the people operating these massive, and massively important, pieces of machinery. Pollak approaches his journey with a dogged curiosity and a refreshing dash of naivité that, combined with his skilled storytelling, make for a compelling read. He finds the accommodations more civilized than one might expect from such a utilitarian craft and a crew that, while they are used to the hardships of nautical life, are real people trying to cope with a profession that keeps them from their families for months at a time. Aside from a near miss with Hurricane Karen off the North American coast, nothing much dramatic happens during Pollak's ride on the Colombo Bay. But that inactivity, coupled with the constant possibility of palpable danger, provides an accurate depiction of life aboard a container ship. --John Moe

Our unit will not be available in early April when we leave as we have signed a lease with our previous med school tenant. He will be here through the end of the year. Next door, studio unit 254, will be available for a couple weeks in mid-April. Check out the website and send Jim an email if you are interested.

With the Euro being so weak against the dollar it behooves those of us with dollars to check the exchange rate offered by restaurants again. For several years French side restaurants have been offering better than market exchange rates, especially for cash. If a French side restaurant offers a bad exchange rate, ask for your credit card to be charged in Euros. Assuming you followed my advice below and got a card that has no charge for foreign transactions you will get the wholesale rate on the exchange.

You should not be paying a currency transaction charge as there are many credit cards that don't have this onerous charge. My United Mileage Plus Explorer/Chase card no longer charges it and gets my first bag checked free for all United tickets purchased on the card.

We had a Capital One Signature Visa Venture card. It's true that frequent flier benefits could be used on any airline and there are no blackouts, but that is because you accumulate 1 cent worth of ticket for every dollar you spend on the card. Then you use that to buy a ticket. To buy our round trip from Albany to SXM costs about $700 meaning we would have to spend $70,000 in order to get the ticket. Frequently we can get flights on United for 37,500 frequent flyer miles, ie the frequent flyer miles on United are worth about 2 cents, about twice as much. In the Spring of 2014, Martha was offered a Capital One Quicksilver Visa Signature Card that gives us 1.5% cash back - no fooling around with miles. They do not charge an exchange fee on foreign transactions and they do provide rental car insurance. This has been our primary card as airline miles are not as valuable or as easy to use as they used to be. Consequently, we canceled the Capital One Venture card with a $30,000 credit limit. The newer Quicksilver card only had $18,000 limit. I asked if they could bump up the credit limit on the Quicksilver card. Seems logical, they were on the hook for $48,000 before I canceled, why not keep the total the same. They said it doesn't work that way. My reply was that when the Quicksilver card runs out of credit limit, I'll use my United card. Your loss.

We always notify our card companies of our travel. Chase and Quicksilver actually accept this info on-line, making it much easier than working through the hell of telephone answering systems.

There are discussions on Credit card Forum and Daily Markets that may help you decide what card is best for you. The first one has a review of the new Chase Sapphire Preferred Card. It gives you 2 points for travel related purchases and then allows you to take 20% off when purchasing your rewards through their Ultimate Rewards portal. It's tempting.