Two Countries, One Island — the world's most dramatic airport approach at Maho Beach, French Creole cuisine in Marigot, and the wildest nightlife in the northeastern Caribbean
Sint Maarten / Saint-Martin is the smallest landmass in the world shared by two sovereign states — the Dutch Sint Maarten (southern) and the French Saint-Martin (northern) — and the open border between them means visitors can move freely between two completely distinct food and nightlife cultures on the same afternoon. The Dutch side is party central: Maho Beach, where planes from Princess Juliana Airport fly so low over the sand that guests grab the undercarriage fence, is one of the most exhilarating (and photographed) aviation spectacles in the world. The French side, centered on Marigot,…
Sint Maarten was originally inhabited by Arawak and later Carib peoples before Columbus sighted it in 1493. The Dutch and French simultaneously colonized the island in 1631 — legend holds that a Dutchman and a Frenchman walked from the same point in opposite directions around the island's perimeter, and the boundary was drawn where they met (the French side, being flat, got slightly more land). Salt was the original economic driver, harvested from the island's Great Salt Pond. The island was devastated by Hurricane Irma in September 2017 — Category 5, one of the most intense Atlantic hurrican…