Salt lake · Sint Maarten
Great Salt Pond
Salt lake on the island of St Martin
- Area
- 1.3km²
- Average depth
- 3.8m
- Elevation
- 0m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 8.9km
- Volume
- 0.005km³
Great Salt Pond is a salt lake in Sint Maarten. It covers 1.3 km². On average it is 3.8 m deep. Its surface lies 0 m above sea level.
Plan your visit
Stay, sail and get there
Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.
The water
How warm is Great Salt Pond?
The water is warmest in September, around 29 °C at the surface, and coldest in January, around 24 °C. The surface averages 20 °C or more from January to December: comfortable for most swimmers.
It does not normally freeze in winter.
On the shore, afternoons reach 29 °C on average in September and 26 °C in February. The driest month is February (12 mm of rain), the wettest October (108 mm).
Average surface temperature measured by the Landsat 8 satellite between 2013 and 2021 at the point furthest from the shore (155 readings). Shallow bays and beaches are often warmer.
From above
The whole lake from space
Month by month
The year at the lake, month by month
Not a forecast: these are averages over many years. Water is the 2013–2021 average; air, rain, sun and wind are the 1991–2020 average.
Water: 2013–2021 averageClimate: 1991–2020 average
| Month | Water°C | Water high°C | Air high°C | Air low°C | Rainmm | Rainy daysdays | Sunh/day | Windkm/h |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January | 24 | 25 | 26 | 25 | 20 | 5 | 8.2 | 25 |
| February | 25 | 25 | 26 | 25 | 12 | 4 | 8.9 | 25 |
| March | 26 | 26 | 26 | 25 | 16 | 4 | 9.3 | 23 |
| April | 26 | 27 | 27 | 26 | 26 | 6 | 9.4 | 22 |
| May | 27 | 27 | 28 | 27 | 63 | 12 | 8.8 | 23 |
| June | 27 | 27 | 28 | 27 | 42 | 10 | 8.9 | 24 |
| July | 28 | 28 | 28 | 28 | 54 | 13 | 9.0 | 26 |
| August | 28 | 29 | 29 | 28 | 66 | 14 | 9.0 | 24 |
| September | 29 | 29 | 29 | 28 | 90 | 18 | 8.6 | 19 |
| October | 28 | 29 | 29 | 28 | 108 | 15 | 7.9 | 20 |
| November | 27 | 28 | 28 | 27 | 78 | 14 | 7.5 | 21 |
| December | 25 | 26 | 27 | 26 | 40 | 9 | 7.7 | 25 |
Water: LakeTEMP (Landsat 8, 2013–2021). Air, rain, sun and wind: NASA POWER, 1991–2020 averages. A rainy day has at least 1 mm of rain. Sunshine hours are derived from measured solar radiation.
Size & depth
How big, how deep
- On average, water stays in the lake for about 15 months before flowing out.
- Its catchment drains 8 km² of land.
- About 0.1 m³ of water flow out every second, on average.
Around the shore
What's around Great Salt Pond
Counted within 1.5 km of the shoreline in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit.
- 6beaches and swimming spots
Little Bay Beach, Great Bay Beach and 4 more
- —campsites
- 1boat hire and water-sport clubs
Out Island Charters
- 6marinas and slipways
Groot Baai Marina, Dr. A. C. Wathey Cruise Facility, Bobby's Marina and 3 more
- 3ferry piers
The Edge Ferry
- 2viewpoints
- 22hotels, B&Bs and chalets
Tamarind, Banana Springs, Horizon View Beach Hotel, Holland House Beach Hotel, Calinago Friendly Family SXM and 17 more
- —fishing spots
- 99restaurants and cafés
Towns on the shore
- Cul de Sac8,467 people
- Lower Prince’s Quarter8,000 people
- Little Bay5,581 people
- Upper Prince’s Quarter4,020 people
- Philipsburg1,400 people
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Princess Juliana International Airport (SXM), 6 km in a straight line.
Car hire at SXM airport (Sint Maarten)Discover Cars · Affiliate linkOpenStreetMap is built by volunteers: when a number is low, it may just mean nobody has mapped it yet.
Recent years
How each month compared
Afternoon high on the shore. The first row is the reference, the 1991–2020 average in °C; the years below show the difference from it: warmer in orange, cooler in blue.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1991–2020 average | 26.3 | 26.1 | 26.2 | 26.8 | 27.5 | 28.2 | 28.5 | 28.9 | 29.0 | 28.7 | 27.9 | 27.0 |
| 2020 | +0.5 | +0.5 | +0.2 | +0.8 | +0.6 | +0.6 | +0.5 | +0.3 | +0.3 | +0.2 | +0.1 | ±0.0 |
| 2021 | +0.3 | +0.4 | ±0.0 | ±0.0 | +0.1 | −0.2 | ±0.0 | +0.1 | +0.4 | +0.6 | +0.5 | +0.4 |
| 2022 | +0.3 | +0.1 | +0.2 | −0.4 | +0.1 | +0.2 | +0.1 | +0.2 | +0.2 | +0.1 | +0.2 | ±0.0 |
| 2023 | +0.1 | −0.2 | ±0.0 | +0.1 | +1.0 | +1.1 | +1.0 | +1.1 | +1.4 | +1.3 | +1.0 | +0.6 |
| 2024 | +1.0 | +0.8 | +1.1 | +1.2 | +1.6 | +1.6 | +1.3 | +1.1 | +1.3 | +1.7 | +1.2 | +1.2 |
| 2025 | +0.9 | +0.8 | +1.1 | +0.4 | +0.4 | +0.2 | +0.4 | +0.6 | +0.7 | +0.7 | +0.6 | +0.6 |
+1 warmer than usual −1 cooler than usual
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Antigua and BarbudaAbout these numbers
| Outline, area, depth, volume | HydroLAKES v1.0 (Messager et al. 2016) · CC BY 4.0 |
|---|---|
| Water temperature and ice | LakeTEMP v1 (Korver et al. 2024), Landsat 8 2013–2021 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Air, rain, sun, wind | NASA POWER, 1991–2020 · public domain |
| Names and description | Wikidata (Q14851280) · CC0 |
| Around the shore | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
Every figure is an average or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.
