Island Review Caribbean Island: St. Martin-St. Maarten Onboard the ship: Nantucket Clipper December 31, 2000 By Wayne & Karen Brown

Nantucket Clipper is still docked at Marigot, St. Martin. Today our young explorers – Bethany, Matthew and Frederick – are leaving with their parents to go back to their schools at the end of Christmas vacation. But first we asked them to tell us what they liked about each island they visited. They rated each island from 1-10, 1 meaning they didn’t like it at all and 10 meaning they liked it a lot.

Bethany (age 10):
Island	Rating	Comments
Antigua	8	I thought this island was interesting. It looked different than some of the other islands.
St. Kitts	10	This was my favorite island. It had beautiful beaches and calm seas. I liked getting my hair braided by a lady on the beach.
Saba	10	This volcanic island was cool. It was the most beautiful of all the islands we visited.
Statia	7	The volcano was cool, but I didn't see much of the island.
St. Barts	8	We found great shopping here.
Anguilla	9	I liked the big waves at Shoal Beach.
St. Martin-St. Maarten	10	Great shopping here! I also liked the big waves at the beach.

Matthew (age 13):
Island	Rating	Comments
Antigua	7	The people were nice and the island was not too crowded.
St. Kitts	9	There were even nicer people here! The jeep ride to the rainforest was fun. It was fun to explore the rainforest, too.
Saba	8	I loved the winding roads along volcano. I thought the shopping was good.
Statia	10	Statia was my favorite island. The Quill volcano hike was perfect and it was a good way to meet people.
St. Barts	9	This island had good snorkeling and shopping .
Anguilla	9	I loved Shoal Beach with all the gigantic waves. The shopping was only okay. The roads here were too narrow.
St. Martin-St. Maarten	8	The best shopping was here! But the beaches were crowded and there were too many cars here.

Fred (age 10):
Island	Rating	Comments
Antigua	8	I saw the coolest ships here.
St. Kitts	10	This was my favorite island. It had the best snorkeling. I also liked the big fort - it was very historical.
Saba	6	Saba had good snorkeling. I liked the big underwater boulders.
Statia	9	The Quill volcano hike was fun. I liked the rolling hermit crabs I saw while hiking.
St. Barts	9	This island had cool ships, cool cars and cool scooters. And the beaches here were nice.
Anguilla	5	I liked the big waves at Shoal Beach.
St. Martin-St. Maarten	10	This island had nice beaches. I liked the big, humungo waves. They had cool boats. The shops were fun.

Even though our young explorers are leaving us, our expedition continues. We will be returning to the islands and investigating some of the things our explorers did with their parents – like the Quill volcano hike on Statia and the rainforest hike on St. Kitts. When you read our journals, you can see if you think these islands are as cool as Bethany, Matthew and Fred did!

Our team of young of explorers (left to right) Matthew, Bethany, Frederick told us what they liked about each island they explored.

Bethany liked St. Kitts’ beaches and getting her hair braided here. From St. Kitts you can see Statia in the distance.

On Statia, the rim of the volcanic crater called "The Quill" is over 2,000 feet above sea level. Matthew and as his teammates liked the hike up the Quill through the rainforest.

Frederick liked exploring and learning about the old Brimstone Hill fort on St. Kitts.

Everyone enjoyed the shopping on St. Martin-St. Maarten. Here’s the view, looking from Fort St. Louis down on Marigot, St. Martin, on the French side of the island. The furthest hills are in St. Maarten, on the Dutch side.