St. Maarten is one of many islands in the Caribbean, but it stands out in one particular way: Travelling from the beach to the airport is accomplished in a matter of seconds. Here you can experience the beach while huge aircrafts fly right above you.

At the harbour in Philipsburg, the capital of St. Maarten, we disembark to explore one of the weirdest beaches in the world, at least the weirdest we have ever seen. A taxi takes us westwards from Philipsburg for around 20 minutes.The destination is Maho Beach, but it could just as well have been Princess Juliana International Airport. We pass the airport and drive on a small road; the airport on the left and the beach on the right. Between them is only ourselves and around a meter of asphalt. Exiting the taxi we see a small bar and a sign informing us about when aircrafts are taking off and landing. Then our attention is drawn to a sign you rarely see at a beach:

Very comforting… Despite this we quickly forgot about the warning when seeing the beach and when realising that the beer is only a dollar per bottle.

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Last time we visited Maho Beach the ocean was calm like the images above. However, the first time we visited the place the waves were over a meter tall and very unsuitable for swimming. On a calm day it is very nice, with the exception of the aircrafts taking off and landing every now and then. After some time in the water we started to see an aircraft on the horizon and picked up the camera. The aircraft was slowly approaching until it looked like it was about to crash right into us. Finally it flew right above our heads and landed on the other side of the road.

Every now and then a jumbo jet actually lands here. Unfortunately none landed while we were filming, but YouTube has of course captured it already:

In addition to the landings it is also exciting to see the take-offs. The aircrafts themselves are not too exciting, but the people standing behind them on the beach is a very special sight. Some try to hold on (to anything), but most end up being blown away towards the ocean. So much for the warning sign…

In addition to Maho Beach, St. Maarten has lots of other things to offer. The place is known as a tax free paradise where one can buy watches, sunglasses and jewellery far cheaper than most other places. The shops are thoroughly controlled and you can feel confident that you are buying real merchandise.

St. Maarten is a part of the Netherlands, therefore most street names are in Dutch. However, if you travel to the northern part of the island you will be in St. Martin, being a part of France. Due to this, most street names are in French here.

Philipsburg also hosts a nice beach along the waterfront with a large boardwalk in the background, which again is in front of numerous stores.

In the evening we had to leave St. Maarten again, but we still haven’t seen Maho Beach from the air. Therefore we definitively have to return later, by air instead of ship…