ST. BARTHELEMY,
French West Indies
‘‘This is not a place for the
frugal,” said the headline
on an article in Conde Nast
Traveler describing this ex-
otic and little-known Car-
ibbean island.

Nichae!

DOLLARS AND SENSE

1 immediately took that as a
challenge as our family celebrates
a special year: my wife Mandy’s
50th birthday, our 25th wedding
anniversary and son Matt’s 21st
birthday.

Frequent flyer points started us
off frugally as we headed for this
tiny (25-square kilometre) French
island with 22 beaches and 72 res-
taurants.

The ‘island bungalow’? we'd
booked on Flamands Beach lacked
the privacy we’d requested. So
Brook Lacour, co-owner of
Sibarth Real Estate, the largest
holiday rental agency on St. Bar-
ths, as it’s commonly called,
found a secluded villa on Lorient
Beach.

Wednesday, April 22, 1992 - North Shore News - 49

Getaway worth every non-frugal dollar

I really had to remind myself,
“You always tell people to spend
and enjoy money, too,’” as I saw
our accommodation bill jump by
almost one-third to $3,250 (Ca-
nadian) a week — and Sibarth
was giving us a break because of
our booking problems. (Thank
goodness the $14,500-a-week villa
was unavailable!)

Still, for a once-in-a-lifetime
holiday, the place was worth it.
We had three separate bedroom-
bathroom-kitchen bungalows
(Matt and girlfriend Gaby came
down for a week), one with a liv-
ing area (including TV) plus dish-
washer and microwave in the
kitchen.

We had our own swimming
pool, and the whole place was
right on the island's best surfing
beach.

Sure, if we’d wanted to scrimp

we could have managed at Terre
Neuve, a kilometre above Fla-
mands Beach, for far less.

A basic bungalow would have
cost $810 a week — including a
car (normal car rental rate, $365 a
week). Or we could have chosen
the eight-room La Normandie
hotel for as little as $600 a week
for a double room,

And we could have eaten all our
meals at home, although even that
was hardly inexpensive.

The first time we went shopp-
ing, Mandy picked up a lettuce.

“IT haven't worked out the ex-
change so | don’t know what the
price is,’* she said.

! worked out the exchange. The
price was $8. We agreed to put
back the lettuce.

Food is typically flown in,
much of it from France. French
wines in the store are half of what

Treg

they cost in Canada, but that’s
about the only bargain.

By the time we hit our first res-
taurant, Le Rivage, I'd almost
given up my ‘‘not for the frugal’’
challenge. The best I could do was
choose the Menu d’Enfant (1
pretended it meant ‘‘smaller’’
rather than ‘‘child’s'’ menu) for
$22: juice or soda, fish or
chicken, warm chocolate cake or
ice cream.

Mandy
challenge.

“Till have the warm goat cheese
salad, T-bone steak with chips
and an espresso,"’ she said. The
bill — for lunch — came to $72.

But the food was delicious and
the setting ideal. Our table, shad-
ed from the 30-degree sunshine by
a palm, was practically on the
sand at Grand Cul-de-Sac beach.

For two hours we ate and wat-

had not taken the

WE DO ALL
THE SERVICE

ched prehistoric-looking frigate
birds soaring, pelicans plunging
into the turquoise water for fish
and windsurfers skimming by.
Then we stripped off and went
swimming ourselves in the 28-
degree water.

By the time we had our going-
away dinner with Matt and Gaby
at Citronellc, & hardly (well,
almost hardly) flinched at the
$303 bill (we'd had only one me-
dium-priced — that’s $33 — bot-
tle of wine).

For the record, we have manag-
ed some smalf economies. The .
beaches are topless which
minimizes bathing suit deprecia-
tion costs. And the island is so
smali we'll use barely half a tank
of gas during the two weeks we're
here — most of that through

See Forget page 20

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