You’re going to be living here!

We learned a while ago that, when checking in to a new island, we should always ask the Immigration Officer for more time than we really intend to stay, at least when there are no or only minor fees associated with our doing so. We do this because leaving early is never a problem whereas it can be a PITA to have our time extended. In some places though, we get very strange looks from the Customs and Immigration people when we do so. Apparently there are some islands that people just do not stay very long.

For example, when we cleared in to Statia, the Officer there was all ready to complete our outgoing clearance at the same time as the incoming clearance, a perk typically reserved only for those who plan to stay 24-48 hours (the time they allow depends on the island). When we told him that we were planning on staying 4-5 days to do some hiking, he said “Oh, you’ll be staying a long time.” Long time? We didn’t think so.

When we checked into St. Kitts we got an equally strange reaction when we told them we wanted to stay 3 weeks. The Port Captain joked and said “You’re going to be living here!” Really? Again, we didn’t consider 3 weeks to be a long amount of time for an island as big as St. Kitts, especially as it includes our time to travel to Nevis, the island south of here.

In both of the above cases, we were granted the time that we requested, without any issue. We did find the reaction of the Officers to be a bit strange.

It was raining for a good part of the day yesterday but that didn’t stop us from getting out for a stroll.

We connected with the St. Kitts Hash House Harriers and plan to run with them tomorrow.
We can’t wait!