Antigua

Antoine's view

The people of Guadeloupe call it "Antigue", and it is often a cruise destination for the pleasure boats from Pointe-à-Pitre.

Here in fact was born the blooming industry of "charter" sailboats in the Caribbean : in the years 1950, a British sailor called Nicholson offered tourists their first sailing cruises through the archipelago...
The idea caught on, and fifty years later, the most beautiful sailboats in the world gather in December in beautiful English Harbour, before starting a new chartering season. I do appreciate the beauty and historical value of this harbour, which Admiral Nelson had chosen for his headquarters, but I have for a long time learned to love Antigua's "hidden side", the many anchoring spots that can be found on its windward shores: of course, coral reefs are numerous there, and they can be deadly if the visibility is bad, to the point that charter companies that rent "bare-boats" ( i.e. sailboats without a crew) do not allow their customers to sail this part of the island : so it is even quieter !

It is also very quiet on the island of Barbuda, twenty miles further north, in one of the beautiful anchorages of its south shore. I chose, one year, to spend the whole hurricane season in Antigua, always ready to seek shelter in one of the nearly perfect shelters that can be found there.
I took advantage of that long stay to discover the island, its villages and celebrations, in particular Carnival (here, it is held in August !) when the whole town resounds with the Junkanoo or Jouvet, the natives getting up very early to start their long, dancing and jumping processions through the town before the sun is too hot.

Thirty miles west of Antigua rises the astonishing rock of Redonda, deserted, arid and steep; I once had a chance to ascend one of the gullies that indent its cliffs, and to find on the summit hundreds of young boobies, ready to take off for their first flight; the gigantic cave that opens up at the island's extremity would make a fantastic setting for an Indiana Jones movie!

South of Redonda, the island of Montserrat, also a part of the British Commonwealth, suffered a few years ago of a terrifying volcanic eruption that buried its capital, the airport and half of the island. Today, it's only from Antigua that one reaches Montserrat, by boat or by helicopter, to visit the island, that's literally reborn from its ashes, and whose inhabitants anxiously wait for the return of the tourists that once brought the island a large part of its resources : they find here an opportunity to observe, in real life an impressive and quite recent manifestation of volcanic activity.