lightning round...

is that the same Blanchards that opened a fabulous restaurant on Anguilla?
Amy a stretch to remember the name Blanchard at all ! Don't know, never stayed on AXA, just a WM flight en route to SXM stopped there 1st. But will be at Anguilla in Dec. for a day, before SBH ! Dinner ?
 
Nancy, the restaurant that you are thinking of was probably La Frégate at the Hotel Baie des Flamands. It was just up the beach from the Cheval Blanc site.
 
Tiffany, bought the book on the Isle of Long and on our next visit the entire staff, front and kitchen, signed our copy!
 
1996 for us for our 10th wedding anniversary. Honeymooned in ‘86 on Oahu and Maui for 2 weeks. After that, we had been all over the Caribbean: St. Thomas, St John, the Bahamas multiple times, Barbados, Aruba, etc. We initially were going to go to a hotel on the French side of St. Maarten but due to a hurricane in ‘95 (Luis I think) the hotel was badly damaged as was a good bit of the island. A co-worker had asked if we’d ever been to St. Barth...I said where’s that!!? LOL! The rest is history. A friend of mine was a travel agent and arranged our trip, stayed at the old Manapany for one week. We were hooked! We had one of the 3 or 4 individual beach cottages...it was splendid! While dining at the hotel restaurant, there was the photographer “Alain”, who approached our table and asked if we’d like our picture taken...we felt like rock stars! Picture is in our living room to this very day. Great memories! Gary and I both decided our search for our “happy place” has officially ended and haven’t looked back. Splendid dinners at Le Sapotillier (sp?), Newborn for Lobster, La Mandala, La Marine for moules frites, On the Rocks at Eden Roc, etc. The only other hotel we ever stayed at was Christopher in ‘98, and are villa people now. Our son and daughter were ages 4 and 2 when we took that original trip and Gary’s parents kindly watched them for us at that time to give us a break. A year or two later was our first trip as a family and rented what was then called Villa Le Suite Maison up on the hillside of St Jean directly across from airport. Fun watching the planes take off and land, and killer sunsets. Kids loved it and we continued coming back with them after that. Fast forward to 2016: 30th wedding anniversary trip for us with our now grown kids, plus son’s girlfriend (NJIT graduation gift for her). Unbeknownst to us, Ryan had planned to propose to Virginia on that trip...very special place for them now as well. And so it goes! When traveling to a Caribbean destination, this is it for us...no need to look elsewhere - ever! St Barth is deep in all of our hearts and souls...our very special happy place. Many wonderful memories have been made, and many more to come. Can’t wait!!! Enjoying reading everyone’s history and memories...keep it up!

Gayle
:heart1:
 
Tiffany, bought the book on the Isle of Long and on our next visit the entire staff, front and kitchen, signed our copy!
That’s wonderful! It was a neat little story about how it came to be. Would love to go there, but can’t pry ourselves away from St. Barts.
 
1991 BC (before children!) - we read a travel article about SBH, that it was a blend of Europe and Caribbean, and it sounded like exactly where we'd love. And we did! Stayed at El Sereno Beach Hotel, rented a Moke for part of the week, but walked around quite a bit. Didn't come back until husband's 40th in 2000 to Le Toiny, and then came at least once a year 2001-2014 with the three kids. First few years in that stretch, stayed at Sofitel Christopher-->Christopher Hotel (various incarnations) and then a villa in Gustavia. Taking a little break now, but we'll be back some day.
 
We were invited to stay with friends on SBH in February 2001 (maybe 2002?). We were travelling from London which meant the most sensible route seemed to be through Antigua since there were direct flights on BA, Virgin Atlantic and a few other European airlines.
Booking a flight from ANU to SBH meant using a travel agent in those days, and we ended up with a Winair flight leaving about 90 minutes after our BA flight landed. Of course, we landed behind the Virgin flight and at least one other very large airplane.
In those days, ANU airport was about the size of current day SBH and passport control was swamped with all of those passengers off of those 747s! My rather direct German partner (husband now) took charge and dragged me to the front of the line so that we could make it in time for the Winair flight. Phew!
But, of course, there was no Winair staff at the Winair checkin stand. We eventually tracked down someone in a Winair uniform who told us that a) the last flight left an hour ago and our flight had been cancelled several months ago, and b) we did not actually have a valid ticket as our travel agent had gone out of business without paying them. He told us to come back in the morning and someone could help us figure it all out then.
We called several hotels near the airport but were unable to get a room for one night. Someone (maybe an official airport info person, maybe a friendly local?) said they could book us a room for the night and we jumped in a taxi that took us about 2 miles to a building behind a shop at the end of the runway. They had a room. With florescent lights and a mattress on some springs. After a long flight, anything will do. Until about 11pm when a street light outside of the window came on and the rooster underneath thought it must be sunrise. He crowed his head off all night long. I slept not at all.
Winair did sell us another ticket the next day, took our bags......somewhere, and told us to wait at the gate. The gate? There were several. No signs. Winair flights weren't on posted on a screen or a board anywhere. We had no idea what was going to happen. Somehow, we saw a small group of people lining up to be taken to a plane. The guy in charge turned out to be the pilot and he casually told us to follow him. I wasn't really sure what was happening at this point.
I think I actually sat in the co-pilots seat for that flight - don't they have to have 2 pilots on flights these days? Or maybe it was the outrageous approach past Gustavia harbour and over the hill and down the runway to the sea that keeps that flight etched in my mind. We finally arrived on the island about 15 hours late.
They say that the best places are hard to get to. So true of SBH, at least for the first 3 or 4 of our trips. We have other stories! So much better these days.
We were met by a couple of our friends at the airport while the others prepared breakfast at the villa. The drive was mesmerising and we eventually wound our way to the end of a road near the top of Vitet. The villa was called Tranquil. It was fairly simple then but I think it has undergone a huge renovation since those days. But the views!
My aforementioned German husband walked out onto the balcony and took in the sight out over Marigot and Grand cul du Sac. He turned quickly and virtually stomped his foot to attention before announcing, "We stay!" Everyone melted into hysterical laughter, although, to this day, nobody really knows if he meant to be that funny.
Our friends were the best guides to introduce us to the island and they had a routine. Saline featured heavily. And Tamarin at least 3 times that week. I still love Tamarin but those first visits were magical - the tree, the garden, the parrot, the hidden spaces, the cocktails..... Pure relaxation.
We fell in love with the island and have since discovered new and equally amazing places and restaurants and people. We have fallen into a routine on our visits over the years. It's a fabulous routine and I wouldn't change a thing. We will return next year for our 11th visit and 6th year in a row.
Yes, the best places are hard to get to. But SBH is worth the trip every time.
 
A DAY AT THE BEACH or something close to it. Like Don’t Stop the Carnival..the story of their settling in and trying to build a restaurant and the locals and a hurricane etc etcBob and his wife gave up a lucrative salad dressing and jam business in Vermont to take up life on Anguilla.
 
2011 for our honeymoon/our first real vacations as adults. I wanted some place that “you can’t get to from here”. A place a little off the beaten path that was somewhat established yet, I wouldn’t have to be around a bunch of obnoxious drunk people. I happened to be watching the History Channel and a program came one Sunday afternoon called “The Worlds Most Dangerous Airports”. I saw SBH and decided to looking it up on the old “interweb”. I came across this website doing research and began seeing if it was a possibility. A few months later we were booked into Villa Do Dragan that we booked through Wimco.

The wife was very skeptical and thought I was being scammed. She thought that we were going to show up to the island and no one would be at the airport to help us. She also thought that the villa we saw online would look nothing like the pictures. She was absolutely blown away by the villa and the services Wimco provided (I still rib her about it to this day).

She now doesn’t want to go anywhere but SBH. I tell her she needs to explore a little more, but she refuses.

If it wasn’t for SBH Online and the contributors to this website that trip would not have been possible. I specifically being helped by Rosita, amyb and a few others that I can’t recall.
 
Amy, it's "A Trip to the Beach" by the Blanchards! Have it in my house. What a great story of the hurricane and their trials and tribulations of getting their restaurant up and running, etc...great restaurant btw!
 
2005 for us, Celebrating our 15th Anniversary. I was looking for a great new place, and asked some friends that travel a lot about some place I heard they went to in Mexico. She told me how great it was, but if I really wanted to go somewhere awesome to go to St. Barts. Luckily after some quick research, St. Barts won out (and I still have never been to Mexico and never plan to.) Research with Wimco, then finding this Forum, we traveled thru SXM to Winair to SBH where we met Vincent our Wimco villa rep. He escorted us to Villa SAS up above Eden Rock. I thought I was in heaven. Spent the week exploring every beach, really loved Gouvernor. Enjoyed Andy's Hideaway (where I first met Phil and Amy), The Rock at Eden Rock, Carl Gustav, so many great meals. We returned in 2006 to Villa HCH up in Gustavia and had another magical week. Somewhere along the line we met Rosita and our last trip there was in 2008 at her lovely villa Les Jardins d'Emmanuel. What a beautiful property, and an even more beautiful host. I don't know where the last 11 years went, raising kids, and making several great quick trips to other great places (Virgin Gorda, Anguilla, St. John, Turks) but always for a few days, and always wondering why did we not return to SBH.
Finally, 2019, in 9 more days we will be making our return. I cannot wait. I spend too much time reading updates on here and just picturing being back on the island. We will be staying with Rosita again and know we will have a magical time again...This time our 23 & 19 year old children will get to experience it with us.....Counting down the days to paradise.
 
1989 for us. We got married in 1988 and wanted to go on our honeymoon but I had just gotten a promotion at work and couldn't work it out.. Someone in our office raved about it. So in March 1989 we rented a little place on Marigot Bay. Rained for the first 3.5 days. had a leaky car. Had a rat running across our porch. But of course fell in love with SBH. I actually shed tears as our flight departed. And my husband promised that we would be back. And we managed another 20 trips. As we spend a lot of time in Florida now, we haven't been back for over two years... but we will return..
 
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