Amazon & Carnival Explorer Cruise - Day 48: Philipsburg, Sint Maarten Island

Saturday, March 23

Today is our last port of the cruise before returning to Fort Lauderdale.  We are docked in the city of Philipsburg on the island of Sint Maarten.  Sint Maarten is a country on the island of St. Martin which it shares with the French Collectivity of St. Martin.  Sint Maarten is part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands and is on the southern part of the island.  The size of Sint Maarten is 37 square miles which is about 40% of the island.  The population is around 40,000 and the capital is Philipsburg where we are docked.

Sint Maarten takes up the bottom part of the island and Philipsburg where we are docked is located in the lower center.

Val is continuing to get over her cold and is feeling better, but she still isn’t feeling normal and her energy level is down so we didn’t have anything planned for the day.

We didn’t do much this morning until around 11:00 when we decided to get off the ship and walk around a little.  There were a lot of shops around the dock area, but they were even less interesting than yesterday so we didn’t spend much time ashore.

The area of shops and restaurants near the ship.

 

 

We did count three other ships docked, but none of them were big ships and one of them was a large passenger schooner like ship.  There was also a smaller schooner docked that looked like it was undergoing repairs and a very large and impressive looking yacht name the Alfa Nero.  I was interested in finding out more about this yacht so when I wrote the blog I did a little research and it is very impressive.  The yacht was built in 2007 and when it was put up for sale in 2011 the asking price $115 million.  It is 270 feet long, can sleep 12 with a crew of 28 and has a cruising range of over 6,000 miles.  The owner is a Russian billionaire, but there does seem to be a little confusion over that.  Here is a link to some pictures to the Alfa Nero and if you look at them you can see this is truly a luxury yacht.  If you decide you want to charter this yacht this summer it only cost $812,000 per week or you could wait until next winter where the price drops to $728,000 per week.

The Alfa Nero

 

After returning to the ship, we went up to the Lido and had lunch and then spent the afternoon relaxing.  It was another beautiful day so I spent a lot of time on the balcony reading and watching the ship being refueled.  After a while, Val left for trivia and for some reason I became fascinated watching how they were going to tow the fuel barge away, so I spent quite a bit of time watching that.

The ship is being refueled from this barge.

I spent way to much time watching the fueling operation, but I was curious how they would tow it away.

When Val returned, we spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing until it was time for us to leave Sint Maarten.  I went out on deck for the sail away and took some pictures of us leaving and then returned to the room to get ready for our evening routine.

We spent the evening doing our usual routine, but spent a little extra time in the casino as we both won enough to play longer than usual.  By the time we got back to our room, it was time for bed and we called it a day.  Tomorrow is a sea day and the second to last day of the cruise.