St Maarten/St Martin 10 March 2019 Newsletter Other newsletters ISLAND NEWS

Weather: The weather has been fairly stable, much like the prediction for the next 10 days. The high temperature will vary from 80 to 82F and the low will move between 73 and 75. As for sunshine, there are two partly cloudy days and the rest are sunny or mostly sunny with at most 25% of precipitation. We have bumped into a few sprinkles, but nothing longer than ten minutes. On the right is Lambada on her sunset cruise. The setting sun is illuminating her sails. The center photo shows the local coast guard and nothing else. If you click on it, Saba will be visible in the larger version, giving you an idea as to how thick the marine haze has been. Today's sun rose at 6:24AM and will set at 6:20PM for 11 hours and 55 minutes of sun. The remaining full moons for 2019 are 20 Mar, 11 Apr, 18 May, 17 Jun, 16 Jul, 15 Aug, 13 Sep, 13 Oct, 12 Nov, and 12 Dec.

Beaches: Friar's Bay I've been told by visitors at the Toad ( Horny Toad Guesthouse) that the beach is in good shape and both Kali's and Friar's Bay Beach Bar are in operation. (photo on right) Cupecoy: There is no beach behind Sapphire and the workers have been repairing the access under unit 5, so there is no access to the non-beach. There are people (mostly naked) on the beach behind the parking lot and Ocean Club. WendyK tells me that there is actual sand at ShorePointe.

Sapphire Beach Club A chat with housekeeping revealed that building 1 is full, the lower half of building 2 is full, and the lower third building 3 is full. Renovations have quickened given that the elevators are working. Below left is the Ocean Club high rise. The villas and the low-rise units around the pool were in place in 1993 when the five story high rise was marketed. That is plywood showing on most of the building. It was once covered by a skim coat of stucco. The center photo is the westernmost villas, one of which appears to be in good shape, although I have heard that some work was done on it. The photo on the right shows the easternmost units. The metal roof support is being put on building on the left. If you are wondering, I can attest to the fact that they start about 7AM. Cutting steel and hammer-drilling concrete are very noisy operations.

Activities: On the right is the new Random Wind. She does day sails and more. For more information and reservations visit her complete website. Take $10 off per person with the code SXMACT. Below are three more Regatta photos taken by WendyK as she spent the day on Cupecoy Beach. The leg along Cupecoy brings out the spinnakers and that makes for some colorful photos. Note the sand on the rightmost photo!.

	Nightlife: On the left is Ronnie Santana and Bob Jagger playing at the Hole in the Wall (below) in Maho. As you can see, the crowd flows out onto the sidewalk when these two get together. On the right is JoJo playing at Pineapple Pete. We stopped in for a bit after our early dinner at Wasabi Charlie.

Gasoline and Rental Cars: Michael at Unity Car Rental sponsors this section. The Cadisco on the lagoon between the French Bridge and Marigot is selling gas at 1.01 per liter. they do 1 to 1 on the dollar so the price on the pump is dollars IF you use cash. Given that there are 3.785 liters per gallon, the current price is $3.82 per gallon. There are two other Cadisco stations but they are more expensive.