All good to hear. Initially thought we wouldn't want to be right in town as we had set out to do more of a typical Caribbean beach trip. But, we've always wanted to check out St Barth, and person after person has told us exactly what you're saying, so we feel like we'd be pretty stupid to ignore everyone's advice. I don't generally like French people or French food (I like their fashion, architecture and some aspects of their overall culture), so not really sure what the hell I'm thinking. But I'm sure I'll adjust and adapt.
Resort looks pretty great. There's no pool, but apparently we have a private plunge pool at our bungalow so that'll be fine I'm guessing. Plus Shell beach is supposedly a 3 minute walk with Shellona being part of our resort, so that all sounds pretty good.
Got a good little list of recs started. We'll get some of these into the rotation for sure.
I guess I better listen to everyone on this too. I don't love driving. We uber or get a driver or take the house car just about everywhere we go when going out and/or traveling like this, especially if we're drinking. But again, person after person says we need to get a car, so I don't want to be stupid and ignore that. I hate when people ask for all sorts of travel advice, and people tell them and they completely ignore it all then wonder why it wasn't very good. So, need to heed my own advice. I'm assuming we can valet just about everywhere?
Our actual dates are Dec 6 - 13 so hoping we are there just before it starts getting too crowded. Couple days of overlap maybe? Got a good list of restaurant recommendations going. Will make sure these are all included and try to work most/all of them in. Is it best to just have hotel concierge get us all our reservations or should we try to do them one-by-one on our own?
It's just wife and me and we are all set on this. Tradewinds from San Juan it is.
Pretty sure we're doing a day charter on a VanDutch with a captain (recommended by some other friends or ours). Feels about the right speed for our first trip. What you're describing does sound cool though. Probably need to table that for the next time we go though as I don't want to dedicate 2 of our days to boating.
Thanks, Johnny. Appreciate your time and well thought out response. I'll report back. And please give Ginny our love.