Just got back from a short 4 day trip to St Maarten. Our first trip, and yes, I know, 4 days is too short to appreciate everything the island has to offer, but with 3 small kids back home (being watched by the wife's sister) it's hard to be gone longer than that...

So for the great..

Bayside Riding ... great horseback ride, excellent guide, and well run. Would recommend it to everyone. Bayside is located at Le Gallion beach and is only 5 minutes from Orient Beach.

Philipsburg shopping, great fantastic, and we found some bargains. Jewellery stores line front street (I think I heard over 100 stores).

Orient and Maho beaches.

The water, so blue and so crystal clear... and warm.

The weather... perfect everyday. A quick rainshower that lasted all but 5 minutes while we were on Orient Beach

Our rental car experience... we rented thru Lucky's and rented a Jeep Wrangler. All of their vehicles are French plated which is a bonus (Dutch plated rentals all start with an "R" and are easy targets for thiefs). We'd rent from them again and they have a website.

Our hotel room... we got upgraded (after complaining to manager as I'll explain in the ugly part) to a 1BR apartment efficiency.

Security... a lot of people on the forums had concerns about crime and their safety... causing some paranoia for me... however, we never felt unsafe, but never put ourselves in a position to feel unsafe.


The OK...

The hotel itself... the Sonesta shows its age, and although they completed renovations recently, it is hard to tell what was renovated.

The hotel buffet... again mediocre food at best, but convenient, especially for breakfast. We went AI (if we went AI again, it would only be for the drinks), so we were compelled to eat there.

The beach at Great Bay... .if you haven't read yet, the beach at Great Bay is very coarse sand and is not like the sand at Orient.


Now for the attrociously ugly...

Our first room... I booked an "ocean view deluxe" room.. Our room.. must smelling, second floor (the lobby is located on 3rd floor where you enter the hotel), and a view of the wave runners and cinderblock brick wall of the outdoor pool... not much of a view. We asked if there was anything more available and were told "no", after the front desk "looked" to see if anything was available... Personally I think he went thru the motions, but he probably needed more "incentive".

Our first dining experience.... this was our anniversary (16 years) and decided that our first dining experience was not going to be the buffet, but the ala carte restaraunt, La Cucina (Italian). We made 7pm resv's and went, dressed in casual resort wear... me cargo shorts (nice) and a button down "hawaiian" shirt. I was not allowed in, why... I needed long pants. We complained to the manager.. I didn't see a dress code on their website (not to say it isn't there), and why would we bring long pants to a tropical island in the middle of summer? Anyway after arguing, we went on with dinner at the buffet.. remember we were AI so we already had paid for our meals. During our dinner, the hostess came to me and said the front desk wanted to see me, that is when we were advised that they upgraded us to a much nicer room.

Our last dining experience... believe it or not , we purchased some "track" pants (sort of like sweats but nylon material) for me to wear so we could go to dinner at the Molasses restraraunt (there are two ala cartes restraraunt, but only one is open at any given time).. we were told these would be acceptable, but not nice shorts??? We ordered dinner, appetizers, salads, and main entrees. Our appetizers came out the "guests", six-legged ones at that. Crawling on our plates..... if I wasn't AI and already paying for a meal I hadn't eaten yet, we'd had gotten up and left right then and there. As it was, we sucked it up. Our waitress took back our appetizers, and returned with what we were told were "fresh" ones. Only she really knows. The next morning my wife found another "friend" at the buffet.

Would we return to the Sonesta Great Bay, not sure. It's location to P'burg and the shopping makes it a very attractive spot. But I'm sure there are better places, and P'burg is not that far a drive from Maho or even Orient Bay.