Islands in the Stream

On the quiet, dear Reader. A whisper if you will.

Get this. We spent last weekend in St. Barts. No, sir, not the church across town. The island. The little island near Antigua, Montserrat and Guadeloupe. St. Barth. St. Barthelemy to be precise.

The fabled French West Indies. Turquoise waters. Gorgeous, drop-dead National Geographic sunsets. Christopher Columbus. Sir Francis Drake. Pirates! Another tot of rum, matey.

Dream-like we descend onto the little runway. A driver takes us to the end of the island where there is a high hill and atop the hill is a lovely – a very lovely villa. It looks out over a cerulean sea. The view is so wide and deep that it is nearly impossible to discern the horizon. At night tiny lights twinkle out on St. Kitts.

The architect blended the villa into the hill: low, open and airy. A lily pond separates the main house from the bedrooms. The pond is filled with tall green reeds, small floating flowers and orange and black fish – some swimming, others just lurking. The deck is surrounded by yellow buttercup whatnots.

[There is more dear Reader. Bear with me. Today’s post is not about humility].

Mon dieu! The villa comes with a French chef. Presenting… Christine. Our own gourmet magician. A light lunch? There is fresh goat cheese tart or salmon with fenel and pink berries in terrine. But please don’t overdo it as tonight we are having beef in red wine sauce provençal style. Merci, Christine.

If the storm on the first night was memorable, the one on the following evening was biblical. Prospero (nothing original here) would have called it a Tempest. Honestly. Within minutes a light breeze becomes a major gale. Booming claps of THUNDER! Bolts – indeed big bolts – of lightning just beyond the pool. Rain slashing sideways into the villa and out the back (clever architect – that’s why half the villa is open). A few lamps knocked over.

The big storm is cathartic and brings in clear air and a sunny, bright morning. That afternoon we hire a sailing boat for a few hours. Hemingway (thanks for today’s title) may have seen it this way:

From the sea, the island appeared green and fresh and majestic in the afternoon breeze. You could smell the land and see great white gulls circling overhead. The captain’s girl, tanned and with a nice chest, served rum in big cups and told us her father had fled Corsica for Paris many years ago. She tired of the Sorbonne and started sailing first from Cannes and then Amalfi and finally St. Barts-by-the-Sea. She called it that – St. Barts-by-the-Sea as though the place were some cheap resort reached by train from the big city.

Thank you, Papa. Yes, imitation, even a poor effort, is the sincerest form of flattery.

A few postcards home? There’s a good idea. To the poste centrale. Ah. What’s this? Closed on weekends, Mondays and Tuesdays. On Wednesday the postmaster is in St. Eustatius. Open for stamps on alternating Thursdays. Friday is the postmaster’s day to rest.

Old France is alive and well here. Attitude, attitude.

Why complain? This is paradise.

[With very sincere thanks to Mr. Rowdy and Joan for the kind invitation and accompanied by good friends Paul and Denise]