A Beach Club Day

The clubs are not interchangeable

This is the thing worth knowing before you choose.

Orient Bay has the most of everything — a long stretch of sand with several clubs along it, each with a different character. Some are loud and social with music and a bar scene; others are quiet, family-oriented, with proper food and space between the loungers. Turning up at the wrong end of the same beach genuinely changes the day.

Tell us the group and what you are after and we will point you at the right end.

The quieter French bays — Friar's Bay, Baie Rouge — have far less: a beach bar, some loungers, and not much else. That is either the point or a disappointment depending on what you wanted.

The Dutch side has beach bars rather than clubs in the Orient Bay sense. Closer, easier, less of an event.

The drive

Orient Bay is 45 minutes each way from the Dutch side. There is no way around it and we are not going to pretend it is thirty.

What that means practically: it is a day, not a morning. Leave at ten, back at five, and it works beautifully. Try to fit it around something else and you will spend the day looking at the clock.

From a cruise ship it is 40 minutes and still workable — see cruise port to Orient Bay for the all-aboard maths.

Why a driver, for this specifically

Because the alternative is parking. Orient Bay parking in season is a genuine annoyance, and the walk from the far lots with beach gear and children is longer than it looks.

Dropped at the club, collected when you are ready. No rank, no negotiating a fare at four in the afternoon when everybody wants to leave at once, and nobody has to stay sober through lunch.

What it costs

A day block, per vehicle. See driver for a day for the four, six and eight-hour options — Orient Bay wants six.

Loungers, umbrellas and lunch are paid at the club and are yours. We will tell you roughly what to expect before you go.

When not to bother

If it is windy on the Atlantic side, Orient Bay can be rough and the sand blows. On those days the west-facing beaches are much better and we will say so rather than drive you forty-five minutes to a bad afternoon.

Ask on the morning. It is the sort of thing we actually know.