Oyster Pond Vacation Rental villa

We arrived home yesterday from our visit to St. Maarten and La Brise Villa. We are missing the warm weather already. The home was very open and spacious as well as comfortable. The views from all areas inside and outside the house were gorgeous! We were told the home was multi-level, but was surprised that there were stairs into each different room in the house. By the end of the day you felt like you've been to a "step" class. Two of the four bedrooms are not in the main house...you have to go outside and either go down stairs in the front or cross over the pool and go up stairs and a hill on the backside to get to them. That is great if you have different couples wanting their privacy, but not so good and could be dangerous if you have children staying in one of those rooms. The owners are environmentally "green" and have a solar hot water heater for the master bath and kitchen. This is wonderful unless you are one of us who are accustomed to taking a hot shower or bath each day. We had a couple of mostly overcast days and went without hot water (in the master bath) our last two and a half days. The other three baths do have small electric water heaters, but when you have six people trying to get showers in the evenings the hot water doesn't last long enough for everyone. The pool and lounge area had the most beautiful views of the water and also of the garden area. The pool water was still too cold for most of us, but a couple of the kids ventured in. We all enjoyed the warm sunshine when it was out. We had never been to St. Maarten and were a little disappointed in the depressed state of most of the island, but luckily while at the villa you can't see anything but gorgeous views. There is a small beach, a couple of restaurants, and a small grocery store just down the road from the villa. We recommend renting a car if you plan to do anything other than stay at the villa and pool since this is in a secluded area and not much within walking distance. I think this would be a great place if you were going to rent a boat or were taking your own down there. There's a marina just across Oyster Pond/Bay.