The Caribbean, then

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Well, specifically:

Bridgetown (Barbados)
Pointe-a-Pitre (Guadeloupe)
Roseau (Dominica)
Fort-de-France (Martinique)
Castries (St. Lucia)
Kingstown (St. Vincent)
St. George's (Grenada)

Going on a cruise in three weeks, will be in each place from breakfast to about 6pm. Mardi Gras will be on Guadeloupe, so I guess that covers that. Anyone been to any of the other places and can recommend anything?

[San Bernardhinault]

The Caribbean, then

A long time ago I spent 6 weeks island hopping around the eastern Caribbean on a LIAT fly-where-you-like ticket, popping in for a few cricket matches. My memories are hazy and out of date, I'm sure, but I loved it. It's a very chilled out environment. Anyway, broadly south-to-north:

I loved Grenada, except when the cruise boats came in. Nice beaches, nice people.

Barbados was cool for 1-dayers, but the western side of the island was a bit excessively touristy. The eastern side where the waves are too big for families to play had a beautiful, long, bleak sandy beach

St Vincent's black sand beaches are kind of cool, but the best thing I did there was the hike up the Soufriere volcano.

Didn't see St Lucia. Their beer, like all the beer in the Caribbean, is rubbish

My only experience of Montserrat was my plane to Antigua not showing up and then getting on one the next day with Viv Richards on board

Dominica is awesome. Much less developed than the other countries (but the roads are in great shape because they backed the US invasion of Grenada and therefore Reagan shovelled aid money to infrastructure there). No great beaches, but a really lovely, mountainous interior, with a great long walk through all kinds of volcanic shit, steaming fumaroles and whatnot to a giant boiling lake.

I was a victim of an attempted mugging in Guadeloupe. Apart from that, because it's basically part of France it's very odd because all the road signs and everything just looks like you're in France. Odd.

[ursus arctos]

The Caribbean, then

That would be because you are in France, of course.

[San Bernardhinault]

The Caribbean, then

They don't have that many muggings in France.

[Sam]

The Caribbean, then

Clearly in that part of France they do.

[Magik]

The Caribbean, then

San Escobar is the new hot destination.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Escobar

[Jah Womble]

The Caribbean, then

Have visited all bar Dominica and St Vincent.

As wonderful coincidence would have it, I was in Barbados as a young 'un in summer 1975 (ie, concurrently with the hit record of that name, which oddly I've just written about over on that 'records containing speech' thread). I returned in 1991, and that time met with some hassle and hostility in Bridgetown, which was - generally - far less appealing than Savannah Beach (Christchurch), where my g/f and I were staying.

That same 1975 trip, my family visited Guadeloupe (lovely and unspoiled), Martinique (ridiculously over-priced) and Reduit Beach (Castries), St Lucia, where we stayed for two weeks. Like San B, my best-recalled moment there was the trip to the Soufriere volcano. But, as I say, this was over forty years ago: thankfully, I have many photos and even a couple of short, silent home movies taken on the ol' man's Agfa (now converted to DVD, I should add).

More recently, I spent Christmas 2002 in St George's, Grenada and had a great time with me best buddy. The people were generally very friendly and welcoming, and we were informed by the local cabbies that the Grenada police had even been disbanded as there was no crime there at all. (Indeed, the biggest headline for the entire time we were there was the 'news' that Air Canada had agreed a new twice-weekly service to the island...) That said, we were both vigorously searched for weed before flying home. (Well, our baggage was.)

The town was almost destroyed by Hurricane Ivan just two years later, with 90% of homes sustaining damage, but has since been rebuilt. Most likely, mainly from nutmeg - which seems to be put to about 5,000 different uses in Grenada, as well as representing one of their biggest exports.

Enjoy your cruise, R.

[Evariste Euler Gauss]

The Caribbean, then

Enjoy your cruise Rogin, but don't forget the issues around staff working conditions:

https://story.californiasunday.com/below-deck

[WOM]

The Caribbean, then

Longform featured that story this week. What a grim reminder of something I shamefully already knew. When you're on board, though, those people are virtually invisible. 'Behind the scenes' is very much the case on those ships.