Tag: Caribbean
St. John: The Wild Child of the Caribbean
On my way to breakfast my first morning at St. John’s Caneel Bay resort, I pass several wide-eyed deer, an iguana basking in the sultry Caribbean sun, and a herd of donkeys, casually scratching their backsides on the trunks of palm trees. But something’s missing here. There’s not another human being in sight.
Not quite a unicorn, as he’s missing a horn, but this donkey, resting in the shade at Caneel Bay Resort on St. John, embodies the island’s laid-back spirit.
Just as a vague sense of panic sets in—have I missed the Rapture?—I near the waterfront breakfast pavilion, where I catch a reassuring whiff of bacon. So unless Noah’s menagerie has learned to use opposable thumbs and toss a skillet—or a wayward boar has spent too much time tanning in the sun–I’m relatively certain there are at least a few lost souls lingering about.
On St. John, there’s time to relax and unwind with a good book.
If a haven of such solitude seems improbable in the ever-popular Caribbean, consider this. More than half of St. John is devoted to national parklands, making it arguably the wildest and most pristine of the U.S. Virgin Islands.
St. John encompasses only two actual towns: Coral Bay, a quiet crossroads centered around a harbor where sailboats bob in sapphire-blue waters, and its brasher, bolder sister, Cruz Bay. Yet even Cruz Bay, the main port, hardly signifies as a big city, with free-range hens shepherding their chicks along a spaghetti-like labyrinth of roads.
But don’t imagine for a minute that being swaddled in the bosom of Mother Nature is boring—because this hot mama also knows how to party. I’ve visited more than half a dozen times in ten years, and I’ve always found something new to entertain me.
Read on to discover the best bars, beaches, snorkeling spots, and hotels that St. John has to offer. (more…)
A Surf and Turf Eco-Adventure Tour of St. Lucia
I’m not even halfway up Gros Piton, the taller of St. Lucia’s signature twin peaks, and I’m already starting to perspire from places where I didn’t even know I had pores. My shins. My elbows. My earlobes.
St. Lucia’s UNESCO World Heritage listed Pitons
It’s an inauspicious start to what I’ve dubbed my “Surf and Turf” tour of St. Lucia, a lush 238-square-mile isle in the West Indies’ Lesser Antilles. Over the course of a week, I plan to scale the 2,619-foot summit of Gros Piton, scuba dive along the coral reefs, and horseback ride through the waves. But at this moment, my body is screaming, “Abort! Abort!”
“Please tell me this is the steep part,” I gasp, scrambling up yet another massive pile of rocks behind my guide, Chad William, a lean, taciturn man with a sparse, bushy beard. “If not, just lie to me, man,” I implore him. “Keep hope alive.”
Chad William
Hailing from the tiny village of Fond Gens Libres, founded at the foot of the mountain by freed slaves more than 200 years ago, William hardly breaks a sweat as he negotiates the trail, which was carved centuries ago by villagers seeking high ground as the invading British threatened to capture and re-enslave them.
But it’s not just the mountain’s historical relevance that has brought me here today. It’s the promise of unparalleled panoramas.
Caribbean Castaway on Peter Island
Peter Island, BVI–Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate’s life for me. As Johnny Depp so convincingly depicted in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” films, there was an undeniable allure to the life of those seafaring swashbucklers in centuries past: the freedom, the adventure, the really cool clothes.
Drake Channel, British Virgin Islands.
Sure, there was a downside. It was a cut-throat profession (har!), and there was always the chance you might be doomed to sail the ocean forever as one of the insatiable undead, like the crew of Jack Sparrow’s ship–or in a far more likely scenario, be abandoned on a lonely spit of land.
Pirates poetically dubbed the latter punishment “being made governor of your own island.” But, as I’ve discovered, that’s not such a terrible fate after all–if you happen to be marooned on Peter Island. (more…)