'Tis the season December 15 has come and gone which means that St Barth has once again moved into what is known around here as "the season." Sort of the island's own unique hunting season, I guess. And this season the hunters are plentiful. Plane load after plane load. Coming in from cold clime...
Making life a little sweeter The mission statement of the local service clubs in St. Barth, the not-for-profit volunteer groups that represent local chapters of worldwide associations, is to improve the quality of community life. It's work that both the Lion's Club and the Rotary Club take ser...
Local politics heats up If there is one area in which St. Barthélemy does not differentiate itself from the mainland, it is that of political scandals. For the second time in the space of one month, the justice system has made its presence felt within the local municipal council by way of tw...
Controlling development Managing land development has been one of the principal concerns of local government for the past two decades. Understandably, on an island as small as St. Barth, land has become a precious commodity. The quality of life here, appreciated by visitors and residents ali...
Another season underway A few years ago Islands magazine asked me to write a few hundred words describing the perfect day in St Barth. After about 30 seconds of soul searching I realized that most perfect days in this particular paradise revolve around food. And as I said at the time, even thou...
Local taxes are for everyone! The post 9/11 tourism industry has learned one thing over the past year: whatever marketing efforts seemed adequate just yesterday no longer meet the standard. As a favorite Caribbean up-market travel destination, St. Barths still enjoys some immunity. Neverthele...
St Barths and the Big Apple Every year thousands of New Yorkers pack their bathing suits, straw hats, lip gloss, and best sellers into their Hermes and Louis Vuitton bags and head toward St Barths. There are even a few days between Christmas and New Year's when one might think that St Barths is...
Sweet September Tropical heat, cloudless skies, and not a ripple in the sea. Beaches are practically deserted, and most of St. Barth's hotels, restaurants and boutiques are boarded up. With the exceptional of school hours, there is no traffic to speak of. Natural catastrophe? Hardly. It's Sep...
AND THE WINNER IS . . . There they were. Six lovely young ladies competing to become Miss St. Barthelemy circa 2002. The event took place on August 24 at the town fair celebrating good old St Barth, the patron saint of the island. Of course the islanders had already celebrated pretty hard with ...
A forceful speech The island's top ranking public servant, Bruno Magras, delivered the mayoral address, part and parcel of the fare that is served every August 24, which in these parts, is St. Barthélemy Day. Though the speech was expected (traditionally, the mayor uses the occasion to transm...
The Cradle of Champions One of the cultural peculiarities of the West Indies, for some time now, has been the arresting presence of The Australian Sailor. Most are deckhands on top-of-the-line racing sailboats, and their services are prized for their physical prowess and for their unhesitati...
KEEP ON SMILIN' . . . There have been a lot of meetings in town lately. One of them was called by the local Lion's Club, a well-intentioned group ready to launch a new campaign to get everybody to start smiling a little more around here. The idea is that people aren't always too civil towards o...
The French West Indian sense of time Taking time, living at a leisurely pace, these could be the mottoes that govern life in the French West Indies. The island's tourists are pleased to find the lazy Caribbean pace that still presides here, to revel in the relaxing, soothing, safe atmosphere. ...
HAPPY BASTILLE DAY! Last weekend as France was celebrating Bastille Day, St Barth held its tropical version of the French national holiday. There was a lovely fireworks display over the harbor in Gustavia and a crowd dancing on the dock to the sounds of S? Control, a band made up of local guys ...
Summer vacation is for kids Like everywhere, St. Barth school kids have shed the recent school year like an old skin and turned their full attention to the what summer is really about : vacation. For the lucky, that includes travel and may mean a trip to France or to the USA to show doting gra...
A promising summer The weakest link in St. Barths travel industry is its local airport, notably, its inability to accommodate major air carriers. Because of the airports unusual disposition, its lack of lighting, and its limited size, inbound travelers are confined to a forced dependency on...
HAPPY BASTILLE DAY! Last weekend as France was celebrating Bastille Day, St Barth held its tropical version of the French national holiday. There was a lovely fireworks display over the harbor in Gustavia and a crowd dancing on the dock to the sounds of S? Control, a band made up of local guys ...
The Marine Reserve: a selling point for St. Barths Because of the development of tourism and the increase in the resident population, environmental protection has progressively edged its way to priority status in St. Barths. Concrete steps have been taken not only to keep the island clean, not...
The season ends in fanfare Once every 2 years, the ag2r transatlantic race infects the island with sailing fever, and islanders scan the horizon, waiting for the first boats to announce the conclusion of the race that has linked two distant ports - Lorient in Brittany and Gustavia in St. Barth...
Local Heroes What a week! It seems as if the entire island was waiting with baited breath for the boats in the Transat Ag2r to arrive on the weekend of May 11 and 12.. And they were not disappointed as the first one came into sight just as the sun was about to disappear behind the Friday night ...
Specific fiscal regime petition signed by 3040 The petition prepared by the St. Barths Association of the Friends of Sweden (ASBAS) and co-sponsored by the island's elected leaders and various associations proved an outstanding success. The number of signatures, 3040, represents nearly half of...
Transat: St-Barth is in the race We never seem to tire of the Lorient/St. Barth transatlantic race. Its a sailing competition that has all the right ingredients for attracting public attention. The vehicle, identical for all teams, is a 30-foot Beneteau Figaro monohull. Each team is composed...
Weather Report Special bulletin from Saint Barth: Heavy rains and heavy winds due to a convergence of who knows what from who knows where. With a juxtaposition of dark clouds, brief periods of intense sun and a weekend where everything seemed inside out. It all started on Saturday evening (April...
The Caribbean Film festival On April 2, the 2002 St. Barths Caribbean Film Festival hosted its traditional opening cocktail party among familiar faces this year, though the setting was the spacious new town hall building in Gustavia Pointe. Ellen Lampert-Greaux and Josh Harrison, festival coor...
See You At The Movies Sometimes I wish my friends had told me I was just plain nuts. Or to cease and desist before it was too late. But for some reason they all encouraged me, and here it is just weeks, days, or minutes, before the seventh annual St Barth Film Festival. It's really my friend J...
Ladies and Gentlemen, the treaty Ah. The Franco-Swedish treaty. Weve been talking about it for decades now. Interpretations of the document are hardly lacking; there is one for just about any taste. For some, it is THE key document, the clincher, because it alone can provide the justificat...
A new landscape The island's municipal budget for 2002 was approved last Friday, revealing much about where community investments will be made this year. After a flurry of building projects (the new incineration plant, the airport renovation and the new town hall building, or little Versailles,...
Manna, ABC In the minds of locals, especially those with hotels and restaurants to fill, cars to rent, merchandise to sell, and services to render, the 15-minute editorial piece about St. Barthelemy that ran on the ABC network's popular morning show, "Good Morning America", came like manna f...
Harsh Reality The acceptance of the Euro as legal tender seems to be proceeding gracefully here, as elsewhere, though local folk are still inclined to judge the worth of things in French Francs. But the introduction of the Euro has opened a can of worms for visiting Americans. For more tha...
Something Fishy Every time I buy seafood around here I seem to find myself in a fine kettle of fish. They are staring you right in the eye, knowing you have no idea what they are called in French. Or even what to do with them. The first, and last, time I bought fish at a supermarket was over te...
Hope floats, even in dismal times The tourist season in St. Barth has gotten off, predictably, to a gloomy start. It is no secret that this island depends almost exclusively, whether directly or indirectly on tourism, and that the US, notably the northeast, accounts for most of that tourism. W...
Off And Running Whew! The New Year is barely a week old and its already been quite something. I was sitting on the terrace of a friend's house looking out at the night sky on New Year's Eve, and realized something was wrong. St. Martin looked awfully dark. Turns out that no sooner did the la...
St. Barths Music Festival opens its 18th edition If Christmas has December with its roasted chestnuts and sleigh bells, January in St. Barths has the St. Barths Music Festival. It is as ever, a marvelous time, much anticipated and ushered in by the particular sensory signature that befits this...
