When I last left you I was sunburned and still had mental images of the old floppy men on Orient Beach. So much has happened since then! Mostly fabulous food 🙂 That night we went to dinner at L’Escapade, which was nice. Jason had the tiger prawns on a bed of risotto (which came to the table on fire) and I had the lobster ravioli (the frothy thing below). Both dishes were delightful.
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Instead of having dessert there, we opted for a crepe “lolo” (food truck/shack). We had nutella crepes and they were phenomenal!
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The next day, yesterday, we had breakfast at Le Croissanterie (the best croissant I’ve ever devoured) and sat in front of the bay enjoying coffee and watching the mega yachts try to make their way into slips in the marina. We’ve been drooling at boats since we got here. That afternoon we decided to visit La Samanna, which is a luxury resort on the southwest end of the island. It’s about a thousand dollars a night for the cheapest rooms and approximately $9,000 a night for the villas. We had a drink and pretended for a bit, but we left deciding two things: 1) we were having way more fun at our awesome hotel, L’Esplanade, and 2) one day if we win the lottery we’re bringing our friends here for a luxurious-ridiculous-over-the-top vacation.
That evening we visited the Sunset Bar and Grill, which is right at the end of the main runway at Princess Juliana Airport, the main airport of SXM. We sat and enjoyed rum punches while airplanes came in and landed right next to us. It was lovely–even when it started raining and everyone went running for shelter. We sat and sipped and enjoyed. We were joined by one of the local SXM dogs that randomly run around looking super happy.
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For dinner we picked up bbq from a super sketchy roadside shack. It was INCREDIBLE, even though they didn’t speak English and my French is terrible, we managed to make it happen. We brought it back to our hotel and ate on the balcony with a bottle of French champagne.
This morning we went to the market at Marigot and strolled around. We ended up having breakfast at Rosemary’s, which is allegedly the oldest lolo in Marigot. We each had an entire fried fish accompanied by a johny cake and coffee. Heaven. A weird breakfast, but so good.
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Our next adventure was a visit to Anse Marsel, a little secluded beach not too far from our hotel. The drive over the mountain to this little beach was crazy–getting there is not easy. When we got there we sat at this little shack on the beach and had a beer:
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On the way out, we passed by a school. It had this crazy sign that we have not been able to figure out. Is school dangerous here? If you show up for school, do you risk falling down a large cliff?
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A few seconds later we were driving past a house and I just happened to notice an effing donkey in front of it. Seriously, a donkey in front of the house sniffing a large planter right by the front door. Where the hell did this donkey come from?!?
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We had cocktails at Loterie Farm, which is beautiful and famous for its hiking trails and ziplines. Hiking in SXM sounded fun until we got here–in reality, it’s about a million degrees and like 99% humidity. We haven’t stopped sweating since we got here. Hiking is not in my future. But having a rum punch in the tree house is totally my thing.
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We spent the rest of the afternoon at the hotel pool, completely alone, swimming and soaking up the sun.
Tonight we had one of the best meals of our lives (comparable to Le Bernardin, Meadowood, Redd, etc.) at Le Pressoir.
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I started with the fois gras tasting menu, which was flipping fantastic. See that little dish in the bottom right-hand corner? That’s fois gras creme brulee. Yeah. Stupid good.
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Jason had the lobster ravioli in a passion fruit cream sauce. It was so good… um… I guess I demolished it before I had a chance to capture it.
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I just went upstairs to brush my teeth and a roach the size of a buick scurried across the counter like a little disgusting lightening bolt. I screamed and jumped on the bed (which is somehow safe from roach attack?) and made Jason dispatch of it. He was doing well until he hit the roach and somehow the roach started to scurry up his arm and I heard the quickest of girly screams. Eventually he got it and now we’re both disgusted. Well, as disgusted as you can be after eating fois gras creme brulee.