Travel with Lira 🌎🌍🌏 ST MAARTEN

HI EVERYONE! MY NAME IS LIRA and THIS IS MY TRAVEL BLOG ON ST MAARTEN !!

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TORONTO to ST MAARTEN / ST MARTIN !♥

There is always something special about visiting a place for the first time especially when its the smallest island in the world divided between two counties (France and Netherlands). So the Top half of the island is owned by FRANCE hence spelled ST MARTIN OR SAINT MARTIN and the lower bottom of the island is owned by Netherlands hence spelled as ST MAARTEN. This trip was definitely one for the books!

Me and my Boyfriend (Matthew) stayed at the SONESTA GREAT BAY for 7nights 8Days in September 2016. We did a lot of research and decided to stay on the Dutch side because we heard it was more LIVE and it definitely was. The French side is more classy and quite compared to the Dutch side. This resort was Minutes away from Downtown, PHILIPSBURG.

Honestly let me just tell you when we were landing I was literally about to crap my pants! The airport is insane, I was sitting by the window and all I saw was the plane getting lower and lower and SUPER close to the water like so close. KOODOS to the pilots that land planes in that airport, Its INSANE!

We got to the hotel a little later at night probably around 10pm and got settled in. We had refreshments and the lady had all of our stuff already in place with our keys , we just gave our name and that was it. Quick and easy! We walked around jus to see where everything was. They served Coors light and Hienekien as their beer. The hotel was a great size not to big and not to small and everything was centred in the middle and it also had 2 nice pools, 1 of them was an infinity pool with a bar. The views from the resort was actually breathtaking. It was just AMAZING!!!!

The food was SPECTACULAR literally EVERYTHING WAS DELICIOUS! I'm not even over exaggerating we actually loved everything at our resort it was amazing. We even had a restaurant on the beach apart of the resort which served fresh salads, oven baked pizza, fries and sandwiches. We even ate outside of the resort at a restaurant that looked like a barn and the food there was amazing too! Attached pics below. Honestly I think the whole island had AMAZING food because everywhere we ate it was EXQUISITE.

These Jerk chicken wraps are everything, had them every single day.

Best thin crust pizza I've ever tasted!

This food was from SONESTA MAHO BEACH, the sister hotel. FOOD was GREAT!

If you like that Authentic carribean food, this plate was the BOMB DOT COM lol

But the REAL MVP of all FOOD goes to this dish right here...Also had this about 6 times. FANTASTIC, best fish dish!!!!!

Honestly all the food tasted so good, high end food I'm telling you!!!

Does anyone get hungry looking at food Posts? because I know i do lol !

This is the restaurant we came down while we were driving around...it looks like a barn no?!

and this is what I ordered..... JUICY TENDER MEAT for my meat lovers! For my vegan and vegetarian steemians there are plenty of food to choose from don't worry.

Aside from all the food.....
The beach was absolutely AMAZING! the sand was soft and nice to walk on. I loved where our resort was located. You could walk down the beach until you see the board walk (which we did) and it's so nice. The board walk is where the Downtown PHILIPSBURG is located. I loved the location. The beach was really great all throughout. The ocean was also very beautiful and it was warm, clear and crystal blue.

So when we go away me and matt like to do some adventurous stuff but also love to just relax and take in the culture and vibe. We went jet skiing one day and what a ride it was! The OCEAN WAS WICKED SUPER BLUE! We took it out for about 35$. We were riding and we ended up going by the Marine, maybe a little too close to the boats and we had the Police on boats stop us and tell us we couldn't be there, I was so nervous. Thank god we didn't get in trouble got off with a warning.

The great thing about being at this resort is that it has a sister resort at MAHO BEACH. The famous beach were planes land insanely low off the beach onto the airport. The airport is so small. Even when the planes take off, you got make sure they do it right or else they go right into the hills. But aside from that, we decided to take the bus to Sonesta Maho beach. In Philipsburg there are two streets (front street and back street), you got to take the back street to catch the bus (1$ only some people might ask for more but its only 1$ so just give the 1$ and call it a day, lol). Front is very touristy where the price are jacked up if you want to go shopping. Back street is WHERE YOU SHOP, much cheaper.

We ended up hanging out on MAHO BEACH and it was so COOL! The planes really feel like they are coming right at your face. The great thing was we got to also hang out at the Sonesta sister hotel too. The food there was really amazing also. I am telling you...The food was on point on this island. There are also bars and restaurants on the side of the Maho beach which you can also go to. The Beach itself is not that big so it was walking distance to everywhere.

The other excursion we did was renting a car for a while 24 hours and we literally drove around the whole island in like a few hours making pit stops and hot spots along the way. We even got lost and drove by the sea it was beyond beautiful ill never forget that view. We stopped by Simpon's bay, Maho Beach, Marigot Which was the CAPITAL of the French side, then to Orient Bay, Grand Case Beach, you name it we been there. We got to see so much from driving around the whole island. I definitely recommend it. Different cars have different prices so go with something thats affordable. Also when you rent the car the tank is Full so when you return the car the tank should be Full. Makes ure to check any dents and scratches on the car and notify the person you were renting the car from because if you get into accident and stuff you have to pay for it. Also recommend getting an insurance just in case something does happen. We already had our travel insurance and matts a really great driver so we didn't end up getting the car insurance. The gas stations sells BEER!! I couldn't believe it.

Me and Matthew at Grand Case

A beach we happen to drive by on our way to Orient Bay Beach , picture perfect!

The other excursion we did was a day trip to ANGUILLA! when in ST MAARTEN YOU GOTTA ISLAND HOP. I will be posting a blog on Anguilla soon. ONE WORD: MAGICAL

We did end up going out one night to the club downtown, It was pretty wicked. The club doors was closed and wasn't taking anymore people so I noticed people were coming out from the back having a smoke. I decided to walk up the stairs and talk to the bouncer to let us in since it was our 2nd lat night and BAM! we got in. It was wicked. The club had great music, The layout was good and the vibe was great. Make sure you take your I.D just in case because Im sure you'll be needing in if you get in the regular way lol. We actually became friends with the bartenders there and we ended up hanging out with KALUA the most. He's the one that took us to the Club. He literally made our trip, such a cool calm genuine guy. One night we stayed out all night with him just cruising and hanging and drinking until sunrise on a hillside, that view was everything!!!. If you go, be sure to say your friends of MATT (MATTHEW) and LIRA from TORONTO.
This is him !!

Overall, I would go back to this place in a heart beat. I loved everything about this place, like everything. It had such diversity everywhere and the food was FANTASTIC. I usually prefer the Riu's when I travel to places because of their services and I just know its going to be a great time but I am so happy we decided to come to this resort. When we were booking this trip, honestly the resort pictures do not do justice to how nice and pleasant this place was. And because the pictures sucked, I decided to take some better ones to show you how nice this resort was. It was so enjoyable and memorable, I loved ST MAARTEN!!

Hope you enjoyed this post!

HOTEL: 5/5
FOOD: 5/5
SERVICE: 4-4.5/5
VIBE: 10/10

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Also, if anyone has any suggestions on how my blog please feel free to comment. And if anyone knows how to upload videos..can you please tell me how. I have some amazing videos from my trips that I want to post really badly and I can't seem to do it.

Thank you
xoxo