I got up on deck in time to watch the ship come in to Phillipsburg, St. Maarten. This is another two-nation island, because part belongs to the Netherlands and the rest to France. These people have peaceful co-existance down to a a science. There are no check points on the border. In fact, you can wander back and forth across the line all day without stopping. You might not even notice when you cross. We noticed that on the French side, bathing suits were sometimes incomplete. People on the Dutch side were more modest. Most people on the island speak three or more languages with equal ease.

I can't help but compare St. Martin with Maui. Both islands began a long time ago as two volcanic islands, one large, one small. Then they gardually filled in the channel between them and became one island. In the case of Maui, the action that joined them was volcanic, but St. Martin was joined by coral reefs that gradually filled in to become land. It is two high islands joined by an atoll. There is even an enormous lagoon on the west end of the island. It connects to the sea only through a man-made channel. The Dutch side is on the south the French side is on the north. The lagoon is part of the boundry. There is a friendliness in St.Martin that reminds me of Maui. Naturally, the climate and much of the topography are similar.

We took a bus from Phillipsburg over a mountain to Simpson Bay. With the bay on the left and the lagoon on the right, we stopped at a pier and boarded a boat to explore the lagoon. There was a brief stop at Marigot, a beautiful French village that faces the Lagoon on one side and the ocean on the other. We were there long enough to know that we were coming back sometime soon for a longer stay. We awarded St. Martin "best island so far" award.

We sailed at sunset.
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