Are you a Champion of your Choices? St Barths, A Finalist & a Groovy Cycle!

No recession please…this is St Barths darling!

On top of the island

A couple of years ago I cut out a couple of pictures of St Barths (short for St Barthelemy) in the French Caribbean and placed them onto my visionboard at the time (Visionboard is a visual representation of goals or things you would like to accomplish or experience in life) Here are the details of our outing so it will inspire you to think about where YOU would like to go and WHAT YOU would like to experience with your loved one, by yourself or with your family! This was a gift from my husband for our wedding anniversary, thanks Franck!

As you may already know, writing down a trip like this IN ADVANCE also gets your subconscious going and working on how to bring it to you faster. This also works across business goals as well as personal goals like this one. My husband also combined it with potential business – so anything is possible if you envisage it so.

Back to St Barths, it’s one of the multimillionaire playground islands situated forty minutes flight east of Puerto Rico and north of Guadaloupe. One of the most famous residents who stops in regularly is Roman Abramovich, who bought the Governor beach estate for $90 Million in 2009, plus numerous other stars and royalty that own property there.

St Barth’s compared to other neighbouring islands, is a relatively unspoiled tropical paradise with an abundance of beautiful beaches, mouthwatering restaurants, breathtaking vistas, a quaint capital Gustavia (more like a village) wrapped around a picturesque harbor.
Finally after many months of thinking about it, our feet finally touched St Barth’s soil and we were whisked away by our car rental company from the port. I love being met at your destination, don’t you? Our driver was the last person to be born on the island. All other births now take place on the next island, St Martin.

Luckily we found excellent accommodation near Saline Beach (everything is about 10-20 minutes drive from the capital – so don’t worry that you’ll be too far from anything if you are booking hotels here).

Our home for a few days

Saying that, it’s highly recommended to hire a car as there are NO public buses and taxies are expensive. The roads are very narrow so take it easy! There were no signs of recession that I could see. The place was busy but not crowded. Just the way we like it. I can see why it’s a popular honeymoon destination.

The first day we arrived and got some supplies in the main supermarket next to the airport. Not as extortionate as we were expecting which was fab. We got to our hotel and Maryse welcomed us. She gave us a great recommendation for a couple of restaurants in Grand Cul de Sac so we headed there and had a delicious lunch of fish, steak and fresh baguette in front of a beautifully layered azur and aqua marine blue lagoon. Gorgeous.

Lunch in Grand Cul de Sac at le Corail

Then we had an afternoon nap and headed out again to Gustavia for dinner. We couldn’t find anywhere appropriately child friendly so opted for a ‘local’ hang out in the town centre, le Select, a bit basic but we were hungry, tired and didn’t want to keep walking around! You know the feeling?!

Gustavia at sunset with the girls

We were a little sleepy the next day but eventually got to groovy resort St Jean around the corner for a swim and to check out the local restaurants. My daughter managed to bump her head on one of the marble tables so we went home to repair her (bless)and get changed. Our host Maryse, told us to go to Andy’s Hideaway in St Jean for dinner. She also kindly placed an ‘apero’ (aperitif) a glass of Planters Punch in my hand before our dinner very thoughtful!) Andy’s Hideaway Restaurant is run by a 6 foot 4 English chap called ‘Andy’ funnily enough! He’s been on the island 25 years since leaving Wimbledon and has a very successful establishment. I’ll be back. Very welcoming great food, 1980’s music and we had confit de duck and fish. Yum!

As we have a young family we didn’t make it to the sexy night clubs, but we did hear they are pretty funky, exclusive and appropriately priced for multimillionaires and their entourage…ext time we may have a night or two without the babies! LOL We did spot a rather large mega yacht though..tempting.

Gustavia Mega Yacht Anyone?

Sunday was rounded off with a mini-island tour in our 4×4 a swim and lunch at St Jean Beach.

St Jean view from Restaurant

It was Tahiti day when we arrived! Presentation and service above average, main course prices appropriate for the view and company. However they did charge us $12 for one corn on the cob for our toddler and $12 for a bottle of water, which we thought was a little exorbitant even with an abundance mentality! They weren’t particularly child friendly either so I am not sure we’ll be going back for a while!

My husband’s lunch ; )

I shot some video blogs in Gustavia just before we left, however when I was editing it later I realized I was wearing a strapless dress so it looks like I’m topless ( I wasn’t honest, although many ladies on the beach WERE). Not sure its appropriate for the Connect to Success Brand..we will see!

Bye for now St Barths..we’ll be back. Sunset from the St Barths Boat…

The fact that we finally made it to St Barths, proves again that if you imagine something, you put it out there, you take action towards making it happen (getting the time off, getting the appropriate finances to one side, researching the travel and accommodations, reserving the cottage, car and so forth) Dreams do come true (I’m looking forward to going back already!) so WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO PLAN TODAY?

I would like to dedicate this particular blog to my husband, who is a legend and organized the St Barth’s trip, also Andy Murray, the Scottish Tennis Professional who made it to the Wimbledon final this year. He is a fantastic example of determination, guts, persistence, positivity, humanity and heart. I am naturally disappointed he did not claim the championship this year (I really thought he’d do it this year and with the UK Olympics it would have been fantastic) I know the whole of the UK were behind him when he ceded defeat to Roger Federer. One can only trust that perhaps next year will definitely be his year. Congratulations for getting to where you are Andy, being in the final itself is a huge achievement. Here’s to your Wimbledon Dream for 2013!

Even if you don’t plan on being a Wimbledon champion I am sure there are other outcomes you would love to realize. Whatever they are, know that you are a winner already and be grateful for everything you have achieved to date. Make success something you can enjoy on a regular basis (I never used to, I used to make it like this really big thing, I’ll be happy when I’ve published the book, got the big house, my body is back to its former weight. Don’t wait….choose to be happy when..you’ve spent an hour with your son, your wife, you finished a never ending project, you did one gym session, you ate a fab meal, you got around to organising that massage. We cannot only be champions of our future but even more importantly our CHOICES in the ‘PRESENT MOMENT’.

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The Logo on this cycle in St Barth’s summed it up quite nicely…LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL x