Christmas in St. Maarten

Christmas in foreign lands are always interesting. We slept in and then wished one another a merry day. We looked outside to the view shown below and knew it would be a great day because 1. we were together and 2. we were in a tropical location.

Christmas with a view

We had a quick breakfast and then decided to explore our neighborhood and get some exercise hiking up the hills all around us. We thought we might be able to get a better view of the whole island and we were correct.

WOW! 

A busy boating day!

Exploring St. Maarten!

It was VERY warm during our hike. We loved it! We decided to get changed and head to the beach. We stopped for a quick lunch at the French bakery on our way and enjoyed sandwiches and macaroon. Seriously, the world's best little cookies!

Car picnic on the way to the beach!

We stopped off at Cupecoy Beach again thinking that perhaps being Christmas Day perhaps the nudes would have stayed home. NOPE. They were out in full force and this prude just couldn't take it so we moved on.

Gorgeous day at Cupecoy

We drove down the road to the French side of the island and went to a secluded beach there. You have to go to a guard stand and swear not to take photos of the mansions on the drive down to the beach. Clearly security is a large concern for wealthy landowners. We didn't take a single photo (I wanted to, though. It is like being told not to touch a hot stove! All you want to do is see how hot it is!) like good little Americans.

Baie Longue (Long Bay Beach)

We had the beach almost to ourselves for a bit. It got a little busier as the day went on and people finished with their family time, but it was still quiet and lovely.

Jackson getting ready to snorkel! 

My view as I finished listening to a book

Jackson is out there somewhere exploring

There he is!

Found something!

Pano of the beach

Jackson finished snorkeling and my book ended so we decided to head back to our place to catch the sunset. We are so fortunate that we left the beach when we did because a storm rolled in not 5 minutes after we left and everyone was just soaked. Whew. Dodged that one!

Note: The book I read was called Redeployment. It was a fascinating look at what it is like for soldiers to come back from war and try to adjust to regular, civilian life. If you're into learning about a different culture (because that is what the military is to me) and can deal with some crude humor and language, I'd highly recommend it.

Being that it was Christmas we didn't think many restaurants would be open so we dined at the condo. We bought pasta and sauce (since we have burners and no stove our options are rather limited) and dined out on our balcony. Jackson found candles and our landlord left us a bottle of champagne. Jackson drank the entire bottle! (I'm not a champagne fan. I don't see how drinking that nasty crap is a celebration!) 

Christmas dinner

We watched the cruise ships all lit up go out to sea for the evening. It was a quiet dinner with the man I love- what could be better?! As you can see, I blogged a bit and he played on his phone until the mosquitos came out in full force and we retreated inside. We watched "Maid in Manhattan" and then called it a night. It wasn't our busiest day ever but we had a great day together and that's all I wanted for Christmas!