Visiting Tintamarre - Cruise and Healing Mud Bath

On Saturday I returned home from our vacation to the Caribbean with my husband. Our preferred island is St. Martin. This trip was our fourth time there. I previously wrote about our first visit to St. Martin in 1997 during the Summer Solstice. On that visit we took a ferry and visited the island of Anguilla. This year we decided to take a day cruise to Tintamarre.

Tintamarre, AKA, the Flat Island, is located in the Ocean Bay a short distance from St. Martin of the French West Indies. Chartered excursions take tourists for day outings to this small (80 acre island) tropical retreat. Tintamarre is best known for its healing mud. A mixture of mud, sand, and ocean water creates a special mud bath that exfoliates the skin and draws out impurities from the body. Guests we met the first night after we arrived at our resort, who had previously experienced the Tintamarre mud baths, urged us to take the cruise. They told us about the silky soft feel of their skin afterwards.

Nude Cruise on the Tiko Tiko

My husband and I took advantage of the summer special luncheon Pik-Nic cruise on the Tiko Tiko catamaran to Tintamarre for a delightful afternoon of swimming and snorkeling. The cost was a mere $75 (US dollars) per person, which included the cruise, plenty of beverages, a delightful club sandwich on French bread for lunch, and the mud bath. One warning though, the Tiko Tiko excursion to Tintamarre is advertised as a "Nude Cruise." Although, wearing clothing is optional, if you are more comfortable being more modest among your nude cruisemates, it is entirely up to you how you dress (or not dress!).
What to Wear On a Nude Cruise

I don't snorkel but a cruisemate pointed out a stingray swimming in the water where I was floating near the beach. Cool!

Mud Baths

After lunch Capitaine Philippe, owner of the Tiko Tiko, filled up a bucket with the mixed concoction of mud, sand, and ocean water for our mud treatment. Ellen, one of our cruisemates from New Jersey, informed everyone of the high cost of mud bath treatments in spas. I already knew this, but my husband was very surprised to learn this. We dipped our hands into the bucket and applied the cleansing goop to our bodies. Getting muddy from head to toe was fun! We allowed the sun to bake the mud dry as we laughed at our muddy selves. Getting into the ocean afterwards to rinse off the dried mud was especially invigorating. Yes, our skin was SILKY to the touch. My Tintamarre mud bath was indeed a very healing experience!

_{photos (c) Joe Desy}

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