The Arawaks called it Yarumaqui, the island of canoe-making. To the Caribs it was Wadadli, a name that survives in the excellent local lager. Latter-day sailors know it as the home base for Sailing Week, one of the world’s premier yachting events, an exhilarating combination of intense offshore competition and onshore partying. Cable TV cricket fans who’ve never set foot in the Caribbean are familiar with its humbly-yet-aptly-named Recreation Ground, where the crowd’s antics are often as entertaining (and certainly more outrageous) than play on the pitch.
To more than half a million visitors who arrive every year by cruise ship and plane, Antigua is the tropical dream come true: a soft white-sand beach for every day of the year, caressingly warm Caribbean waters with more therapeutic qualities than any jacuzzi, and more shades of blue than an impressionist painting, daytime temperatures hovering around 30°C, refreshing north-easterly trade winds. There are superb luxury resorts in stunning locations, and all the amenities of a modern vacation (from casinos and haute cuisine to duty-free malls), added to the charms of some of the best-preserved Georgian architecture in the Caribbean and a vibrant island culture.
Even the island’s name — pronounced Anteega — sounds gently relaxing. And indeed, from serene beaches to sleepy country villages, you’ll find all the tranquillity you could wish for. But this soporific charm is shaken off on specific occasions: when the annual carnival looms, when there’s international cricket at the Recreation Ground, when it’s time for Sailing Week, and around Independence Day when Antiguans show their true Caribbean colours in exuberant displays of creativity, skill and celebration. It’s no coincidence that the top local band is called Burning Flames.
Once you’ve soaked up all the sea and sun you can take, you can reactivate with watersports and sailing, mini-golf and horseback riding, nature trails and hot-air ballooning. You can take a helicopter tour or play pirate at sea, carousing with rum punch and soca music aboard the Jolly Roger.
Lying near the northern tip of the Lesser Antilles, Antigua is the most modern and developed of the Leeward Islands. But its past is playing an increasingly important part in its development. The Georgian naval dockyards on the south coast, at Falmouth and English Harbour, once the nerve centre of English naval operations in the eastern Caribbean, are unique in terms of maritime history and conservation. Plans are under way to restore another historic site, Fort James, at the entrance to St John’s harbour.
Heritage and Redcliffe Quays in St John’s — trading and warehousing areas in colonial times — have become models of imaginative restoration, positive proof that architectural heritage is as much a tourist attraction as sand and sea. The elegant Georgian government house in St John’s is also currently under restoration. The windmills that powered the old sugar plantations still dot the landscape, some of them in ruins; but the famous Betty’s Hope windmill has been preserved for posterity, and at least one has been converted into an apartment with 360-degree views.
The much older, pre-Colombian past is still apparent too, as I discovered on my latest trip to Antigua. I’d been asked to take some photos of the megaliths on Greencastle Hill. It didn’t seem like a tall order: stroll up a hill, take a few shots, survey the island and roll back down. My geologist friend back home in Trinidad was sceptical, suggesting the stones were not megaliths at all, but natural formations. Had he actually seen them? When he sheepishly admitted he hadn’t, my spirit of adventure was fully roused.
I headed south-west from St John’s, full of the joys of the open road, and headed towards Jolly Harbour, winding through low hills and the occasional hamlet. I stopped for directions in the village of Ebenezer, where a one-armed barman’s gloomy comment — “Many does come lookin’ but few does reach” — should have alerted me.
With sunny mood intact, I followed the barman’s directions, bumping over a track which carried me closer to what looked like the smooth grass dome of Greencastle Hill. Some old men at the side of the track, whose advice I stopped for, were as doubtful as the Ebenezer barman. But, undaunted, I made my way on foot through a quarry. There I was confronted with reality. The “smooth” grass was chest-high and razor-sharp, and the hill rose vertically from the quarry floor.
Curiosity got the better of cowardice, and I scrambled up a sheer rock face before plunging into the rising tide of grass, desperately racking the memory banks for possible data on poisonous snakes but only coming up with the harmless Antiguan Racer. I didn’t see any Antigua Racers, but then I couldn’t see my feet either; I was too busy parting the grass in front of my nose.
Half an hour later I flopped down in the blazing sun on the summit, wondering if I could truthfully report on Antigua’s restful charms. Wiping the sweat from my eyes I looked for the megaliths. There was only grass.
I stumbled around in disbelief. Finding some large, round, pinkish boulders lurking below the grassline, I took some pictures. Maybe the geologist was right. I consoled myself with a glorious view of the shifting tones of the Antiguan landscape below.
I was about to head back down when something prompted me to investigate the other side of the summit. Crossing a shallow dip, I looked down. Eureka! Below me were two smaller peaks, one ringed with vertical stones, the descent marked by other stones. Even my exhausted eyes could follow the line directly through these leader stones to the circle, on to two peaks beyond, and then out to smoke-wreathed Montserrat on the sea horizon.
This kind of line-up was too precise to be coincidental. Convinced that these really were megaliths, and delighted my climb hadn’t been in vain, I set to work with the camera. I finished the rest of the film and whipped out another to load for some close-ups. The film refused to load. I tried a new battery. Nada. Pacing around the stone circle, perplexed, I remembered the ominous Ebenezer barman. Maybe I just wasn’t supposed to take any more pictures.
The sun was falling into the sea. Time for me to get off the hill. This side looked an easier prospect, and I could see a road threading somewhere below. I dived back into the sea of grass, feet skating off hidden boulders. Reaching an impenetrable patch of prickly bush which dropped vertically, I retraced my steps; I began seeing visions of spending a night stranded on the hill.
As happy hour hit the island, and sensible visitors were sipping cocktails in luxury resorts while admiring the sunset, I finally crawled through dense thicket down the last 150 feet of the hill and limped gratefully to my car. Back in my hotel room, I reloaded the camera first time.
A supper of grilled lobster at the Amaryllis Hotel restored me. Safely off the hill (where, I discovered, the ashes of former governor Earl Baldwin of Bewdley are buried), I can now recommend the ascent for those with a passion for adventure tourism and an interest in prehistoric astronomy and phallic worship. But take a guide. There’s a much easier and safer way up, I’ve been told.
There are other far less strenuous nature trails in Antigua. In Wallings Forest, near John Hughes Village in the south-west, you can see some of Antigua’s 150 bird species, including the Black-whiskered Vireo, the Antillean Euphonia and the Red-necked Pigeon, and trees with such distinctive names as locust, ironwood, mahoe, black loblolly, turpentine and gunstock.
Near to Wallings are the Body Ponds, three dammed ponds used for water storage. They are protected by what may be the Caribbean’s oldest conservation law, the 1721 Body Pond Act, which prohibits the felling of trees within 30 feet of the ponds as the trees “keep the waters fresh and cool”. In an island where the average annual rainfall is only 44 inches, water storage is essential; the Potworks Reservoir in the south-east, reputedly the largest expanse of fresh water in the Eastern Caribbean, covering 320 acres, was completed in 1970. The reservoir’s western edge is a favourite haunt of birdwatchers hoping for a glimpse of the West Indian Whistling-Duck, an Osprey or Great Blue Heron.
Nature tourists will want to make offshore trips to Great Bird Island, home of the Red-billed Tropicbird, and Pasture Bay on Long Island, where Hawksbill turtles nest from late May to December.
Those who prefer to do their touring by car will find they can reach most places within an hour, though it’s wise to carry a good map, as signposts are infrequent.
In St John’s, it’s best to park and walk. The downtown area is dominated by picturesque Redcliffe Quay, whose warehouses have been restored as chic shops, restaurants and bars, and Heritage Quay with its casino and duty-free complex alongside the cruise ship berth. Above the town loom the twin towers of the Anglican cathedral, its pitchpine interior providing welcome shade and coolness for contemplation. The Antigua and Barbuda Museum is housed in the old courthouse on Long Street: it has a fine collection of pre-Columbian archeology, as well as colonial and post-emancipation exhibits.
St John’s itself can be busy, especially on days when there are cruise ships in port. But when you take to the road and head out of town, you’ll find few cars. The island’s gently rolling hills — eroded remains of volcanic rock, coral and limestone — rise to Antigua’s highest point at Boggy Peak (1,330 feet) in the south-west.
Besides the obvious trips to English Harbour and Jolly Harbour, Fig Tree Drive — from Old Road on the south-west coast — takes you through some of the only remaining forest on the island as it weaves its way behind Boggy Peak. If you head for the east coast, you can visit sleepy Parham, the first English settlement, with its huge octagonal church, and Betty’s Hope plantation, before savouring the Atlantic spray of Devil’s Bridge at Indian Town Point.
Experts may have to determine the true history of the Greencastle Hill megaliths, but it’s generally agreed the first inhabitants of Antigua were the Siboney, who arrived from Venezuela around 3,000 BCE. They were followed in the early Common Era by the Arawaks, and then, at about the same time as Columbus appeared, by the more warlike Caribs. Columbus didn’t bother to land in Antigua. Sighting it on November 11, 1493, on his second voyage, he settled for naming it after Seville’s miracle shrine of Santa Maria de la Antigua, before continuing west in search of the riches of the Indies.
For more than a century and a half, there was little further European disturbance. A party of Spanish settlers was driven away by the Caribs in 1525, and it wasn’t until 1632 that the island was settled by English sailors, who founded Falmouth and experimented with tobacco, indigo and cotton before introducing sugar in the 1640s.
By 1748, sugar was king in Antigua. There were 175 mills, and most of the vegetation had been cleared (along with the Caribs) to make way for sugar cane, which dominated the island’s life and economy for the next 200 years. African slaves built this economy; their descendants now make up the majority of the present population of nearly 70,000.
After full emancipation in 1838, the ex-slaves established their own communities like Liberta, away from the hated plantations. Their culture still informs every aspect of daily life, from the national dish of fungee and pepperpot to the board game warri, which is more popular here than dominoes on virtually every other Caribbean island, and the music, dance and costuming of carnival.
British rule lasted until independence in 1981. The protected natural harbours on the south coast served as dockyards for the British fleet, especially in its ongoing battle with the French for Caribbean supremacy. Long before he became the hero of the Battle of Trafalgar, a young naval officer called Horatio Nelson was stationed in Antigua (1784-7). He didn’t like it much (he referred to it disparagingly as “a vile spot” and “this infernal hole”), and had a miserable time trying to enforce England’s draconian trade laws. But modern-day visitors can enjoy advantages Nelson couldn’t have dreamed of.
Nelson’s Dockyard, which lies in the heart of the English Harbour National Park, is the world’s only surviving Georgian naval dockyard. The “men o’ war” have been replaced by yachts, and most of the original buildings — the Admiral’s house, the copper and lumber store, the blacksmith’s workshop and officer’s quarters — have been converted into restaurants, hotels, yacht charter offices and even a bank. The former Admiral’s house serves as a museum.
I had met Desmond Nicholson, the man responsible for opening the museum back in 1953 and for initiating the whole dockyard restoration, on my first trip to Antigua. Then in his early 70s, but with all the energy and enthusiasm of an adolescent, English-born Desmond had first arrived in Antigua in 1949 aboard a 70-foot schooner with his naval officer father.
“Like Nelson,” he explained, “we’d been cruising the islands of the West Indies” and, sailing into English Harbour, “saw what lovely cruising, boozing and snoozing grounds it would be.”
The family promptly dropped anchor. When a visiting American asked for a ride on the schooner, he unwittingly started a family yacht charter business which must be the best-known in the Caribbean. With his passion for naval history and sailing, Desmond is the ideal guide to the dockyard. You can still catch him at the museum on the days when he’s not at The Antigua and Barbuda Museum in St John’s, another institution he’s played a major role in.
On my latest trip to the dockyard, after lunch on the patio of the Admiral’s Inn, watching frigatebirds dive-bomb the water for theirs, I stumbled on one of Antigua’s more amusing historical episodes. At the quayside was a sturdy schooner with a bright blue-and-yellow hull. Bending over the deck, paint brush in hand and Havana cigar clamped between his teeth, was a deeply tanned short man in his 50s.
He invited me aboard for what turned out to be my first audience with Caribbean royalty. Canadian-born Bob Williamson introduced himself as His Majesty King Robert the Bald, the newly-crowned King of Redonda (an uninhabited rock 35 miles south-west of Antigua — one of Antigua’s sister islands, the other being the gorgeous Barbuda).
King Bob’s ceremonial sword was all the proof of authority I needed. I felt duly honoured to be treading the boards of St Peter, the Royal Redondan Navy’s flagship, built in the early 1990s to the design of a 1780s Baltic Trader; it had crossed the Atlantic with a suitably surreal crew — an English gigolo on the run, a Schwabisher used-car saleswoman and her dog, a Bavarian short order cook, and a Hungarian navigator.
The eccentric story of the half square mile of volcanic rock which is Redonda begins in 1865, when Irish Montserratian trader Matthew Dowdy Sheill celebrated the birth of his long-awaited son by claiming the place as his kingdom. It was formally annexed by Britain in 1872, but the title of king has never been disputed. It has certainly been contested, though, since the days of Sheill’s son King Felipe, who became a popular novelist in England. There are currently nine pretenders to the throne. From Felipe on, all Redondan monarchs, including King Bob, have been writers, while the Redondan aristocracy has boasted literary figures like J.B. Priestley, Dorothy Sayers and Lawrence Durrell. Writers with aristocratic pretensions and some spare cash may well find favour with King Bob, who’s probably not above selling off a baronetcy to provide prize money for the annual Redondan literary awards.
The Kingdom of Redonda may be fantasy, but Antigua’s annual Sailing Week, which runs from the last Sunday in April to the first Saturday in May, is nothing less than fantastic. Even confirmed landlubbers surveying the scene from the safety of Shirley Heights experience vicarious thrills as the yachts speed past below, spinnakers billowing, toward the finishing line.
Now in its 34th year, the Caribbean’s leading regatta for mono-hulled racing yachts is ranked among the world’s top five sailing competitions, along with such long-established races as Cowes in the Isle of Wight and Block Island in Maine. Five thousand skippers and crew and an equally impressive contingent of glitterati and jet-setters make the annual pilgrimage to Antigua. In 1999, a record 261 yachts crossed the finishing line, while the 2000 regatta, won by Sayonara (owned by Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, one of the wealthiest men in the world), attracted competitors from 33 countries, including first-time entries from the Dubai Yacht Club and Chile.
According to Event Manager Jay Rainey, Sailing Week attracts both serious world-class competitors with their own yachts, and groups like the 60 German doctors who charter bareback yachts. But whether they’ve come to win or simply to sail, the yachties throw themselves just as enthusiastically into the nighttime and lay day parties, especially the end-of-race, carnival-style jamdown with local bands pumping soca, reggae and rock.
Those whose interest in yachting is aesthetic, rather than competitive, will enjoy the Classic Regatta which precedes Sailing Week. The Classic is a unique celebration of traditional sailing vessels, with a spectacular fleet of hand-crafted yawls, ketches, gaffers and schooners. Other races include February’s Red Stripe Regatta, the July Carib Cup and the Jolly Harbour Regatta in September.
Antigua Carnival, held during the last week of July and the first Monday and Tuesday in August, is an onshore spectacle every bit as exhilarating as Sailing Week. This is when you’ll meet indigenous culture at its most flamboyant. The climax, as in every Caribbean carnival, begins at J’ouvert, pre-dawn Monday morning, when traditional carnival characters take to the streets. You’ll encounter some who owe their origins to West African festivals, like the stilt-walking Moco Jumbies or Jumpa Bens, or the fearsome horned John Bull, draped in banana leaves.
Others have more recent antecedents: the colourful masked Highlanders with their ribbons and bells (their costume is based on Scottish military dress), the Housecoats in dressing gowns, pyjamas and nighties, or the uniquely Antiguan Skelly Hoppers, modern versions of the skeleton dancers so popular in the Christmas celebrations of the past, when they led the Jumbie Jamboree party for the dead chanting:
Back to back, belly to belly
Ah doh give a damn
Cos Ah dead already.
The Leeward Islands are predominantly Protestant, and carnival was traditionally celebrated immediately after Christmas (as it still is in St Kitts and Nevis), rather than in the pre-Lenten season of islands with a Roman Catholic heritage like Trinidad. The shift to August started back in 1953 with a one-day carnival event, staged to celebrate the coronation of Queen Elizabeth 11. This proved so successful that carnival was officially fixed in the new slot from 1957.
One of the more recent additions, along with the immensely popular local band Burning Flames, has been an input from what seems like an unlikely source: the Catholic Church. Since 1993, the Catholic Vitus Mas Group (named for the patron saint of dancers, clowns and actors) has played an increasingly important role both in carnival and in keeping traditional culture alive. On the road at carnival time, the group is accompanied by an iron band (a percussive-style group from slavery days) or steelbands, ensuring the local survival of these indigenous Caribbean music-makers in an age of high amplification and DJs. Highlanders are traditionally accompanied by fife bands (also known as string bands), whose instruments include metal or bamboo flute, home-made yuca-lili (ukulele), grater, guitar and boom pipe bass.
Since 1997, The Vitus Cultural Performers, an offshoot of the mas group, have been presenting shows highlighting Antigua’s cultural heritage and traditional carnival characters. They represented Antigua at last year’s regional arts festival, Carifesta, and you might well find them providing the floor show at your hotel one night. For Keva Margetson Vitus‚ PR officer, there’s no problem in mixing religion and carnival. “Celebrating our local culture is an extension of our faith . . . we give thanks for the talent God has bestowed on our people.”
Outside of carnival, there are two other occasions when traditional culture is highlighted: Independence Day on November 1st, and National Heritage Day (the last working day before Independence). This is when islanders don their national dress, the women’s madras head-ties recalling the cottas of the past which were used for supporting loads, from wedding cakes to water.
At the Independence Food Fair in St John’s, you can sample the national dish of pepperpot (salted pork, beef or chicken cooked with greens, spinach, ochro, squash and pumpkin) and fungee (cornmeal); or try trasha dumpling (coconut and flour) cooked on a yabba (clay coalpot). This is just one of the sturdy clay pots hand-crafted without a wheel by the women of Seaview Farm, who have passed down the technique from mother to daughter for over 100 years.
Bowls, plates, kettles, coalpots, flowerpots and crotchie pipes are all moulded by hand from the dark brown clay dug out west of the village. Shaped with the aid of a stone or a wet cloth and then painted with red clay, the pots are placed on top of a wood pile and fired. The origins of this functional pottery may well lie in the ancestral memory of African village life.
Although to some cricket may only be a sport, in Antigua it is both high and low culture, an integral part of the landscape, lifestyle and national pride. From beaches to well-tended village pitches and the mecca at St John’s — the Antigua Recreation Ground — you’ll see Antiguans of all ages at play. International and regional matches at the ARG have been transformed into carnival-style entertainment with DJ Chickie’s Hi Fi blasting the latest Caribbean music from the stands, and cross-dressing Laban Kenneth Blackburn Llewelyn Boucanon Benjamin, aka Gravy, cavorting outrageously. Sadly, after 12 seasons, Gravy has now hung up his dresses and retired.
The island is justifiably proud of having produced West Indian stars like fast bowlers Andy Roberts and Curtly Ambrose, and two successive Windies captains: “master blaster” Sir Vivian Richards and Richie Richardson. The degree to which Antiguans take their cricket seriously can be measured by their tributes: they renamed the St John’s street where Sir Viv was born in his honour, and placed the bat with which he made the fastest Test century on display in the Antigua and Barbuda Museum.
I was caught out by the other former Windies captain, Richie Richardson, at Runaway Bay where he manages Lashings Beach Bar and Guest House with an English partner. I’d arrived early and asked the receptionist to call him. As she contacted his cell phone, a shadow fell across my feet, and I turned to find Richie with the face of a prankster schoolboy, finger pressed conspiratorially against lip, telling her he’d be there “any minute,” then poking his head round the office door to floor her. This was a relaxed Richie few cricket fans have seen, but then he wasn’t facing the stress of the upcoming series against Australia, and he readily admitted: “When I retired, I was really tired of cricket. With the travelling and constant playing, the only breaks I was getting was when I was injured.”
Richie appears to have few regrets about retiring from international cricket, and while he expressed an interest in coaching young players, he seemed perfectly content to be at home on his island. “I enjoy Antigua, being in the sea, spear-diving or on the beach, it’s so peaceful and quiet.” He hasn’t abandoned the game either, playing for the English-based Lashings celebrity team. Friday nights you’ll find him playing beach cricket at Runaway Bay, and if you’re lucky, you might end up fielding alongside Sir Viv and sons, or a visiting Shane Warne.
While cricket occupies a special place in the Antiguan sporting arena, there are many other options for visitors. Watersports predominate: scuba diving, snorkelling, water-skiing, parasailing, windsurfing, jet bikes, wave runners, Sunfish dinghies and sausage runs, to name a few. Most major resorts like Jolly Harbour, Long Bay Hotel and Sandals allow non-residents to hire equipment, while Sunsail Colonna on Hodges Bay offers sailing holidays and its own flotilla of yachts. Wind- and body-surfers can either take it easy on the sheltered west coast, or hit the waves on the east at Half Moon Bay or Willoughby Bay.
Deep-sea sport fishing has its own Whit Weekend tournament, but throughout the year anglers can charter boats from Falmouth Harbour to go in search of tuna, wahoo, kingfish and dorado. The barrier reefs which surround the island contain some 500 dive sites (coral canyons, wall drops, caves and wrecks) with plentiful underwater plant life and nearly 400 species of tropical fish. Most dives are shallow, up to 60 feet deep, except below Shirley Heights (110 feet) and Sunken Rock (122 feet). Popular sites include Cades Reef underwater park, Horseshoe Reef, Barracuda Alley and Little Bird Island, while Deep Bay has several wrecks to explore.
Sailing is as much a part of island lifestyle as cricket, and there are numerous marina, bareboat, cruiser and day charter options, as well as the Nicholson and Sun Yacht charter fleets. Visitors interested in racing can enter the Antigua Yacht Club Thursday races out of English Harbour, or the Jolly Harbour Saturday races. For a more leisurely take on the sea, try a cocktail and barbecue cruise on a Wadadli Cat or the Jolly Roger.
On land, mountain bike touring is an excellent way to see the island. Golfers have two championship courses to choose from: Cedar Valley and Jolly Harbour. For pure fun, try the floodlit mini course at the Dickenson Bay Leisure Centre, where you can refresh yourself between rounds at Putters Bar and Grill. Tennis courts and squash courts can be booked at hotels, the Jolly Harbour sports centre or the English Harbour sports complex.
After all this activity, you’ll be ready to taste the local cuisine. Home Restaurant on the outskirts of St John’s in Lower Gambles combines charming vernacular architecture with Caribbean haute cuisine; Julian’s in St John’s has a walled courtyard with fountain and palms which serve as a spectacular backdrop to a menu of “modern classical cuisine”. Coconut Grove Beach Restaurant at Dickenson Bay is famous for its romantic al fresco setting and seafood, as is Miller’s by the Sea at Fort St James. You can sample excellent French cuisine at Le Bistro or Chez Pascal, Italian at Al Porto in Jolly Bay and Abracadabra in English Harbour, or Tandoori Indian at Chutney just outside St John’s.
For an insight into Antiguan arts and crafts and for souvenirs, visit Harmony Hall, overlooking Nonsuch Bay. This is the island’s main art gallery, but Island Arts Galleries at Hodges Bay, run by English artist and movie make-up whiz Nick Maley, is also worth visiting for its range of local and Caribbean art, not to mention Nick’s collection of digitally-enhanced old photos of Antiguan life, and a chorus of resident toucans and parrots.
According to Tourism Minister Molwyn Joseph, tourism accounts for 70% of Antigua’s income, and consequently “tourism is everyone’s business.” Aware of the fierce competition which exists throughout the region, Joseph says “superior service” is the way forward, while insisting: “You won’t find a more caring, friendly and hospitable people.”
His ministry also has plans to develop eco- and heritage tourism, and — as I found out from Cameron Fraser, Chairman of the Cruise Ship Association — plans to develop St John’s harbour are well under way. They include dredging the harbour to a depth of 35 feet to accommodate ships up to 140,000 tons, building a commercial port at the Rat Island entrance to the harbour, a second berth for cruise ships at Heritage Quay, and developing Fort James into a 20-acre historic site and park, complete with historical re-enactments in costume and cannons firing. Fraser says the development is on course for a summer 2002 completion, and that after cruise ship bookings “in excess of half a million for 2000, we’re confident with the expansion it’ll be up to one and a half million.”
The face of St John’s is already changing, with its new market and vendors’ mall, but whatever the future brings, Antigua will remain a romantic jewel in the Caribbean, as I discovered on my last night there. Walking out of the Siboney Beach Club to drive my car to the airport, I took a farewell glance at Dickenson Bay. On the beach, a tourist couple in matching T-shirts were plighting their troth, a mere jump from the sea, while a lone tenor steelpannist serenaded them.
Ah, the romance of the tropics!
ENTERTAINMENT AND NIGHTLIFE
Julian’s Bar, St John’s Live music
O’Grady’s Pub, Redcliffe Street, St John’s Live entertainment Wednesdays with Laurie Stevens
Spinnakers, Dickenson Bay Beach bar with Friday night live music
Abracadabra Bar and Restaurant, English Harbour Live jazz/piano bar Thursday; live music, DJ, fashion shows and special events on weekends
Colombo’s, English Harbour Live entertainment Wednesdays.
Casino at Royal Antiguan Resort, Deep Bay.
BEST BEACHES
Unless you plan to stay indefinitely, you may never get to visit all the beaches, but here’s a selection you won’t want to miss, starting from the north and working anti-clockwise:
Dickenson Bay Just before the northern tip of the island, this half-mile stretch is the best-known and most active beach, lined with some of the major hotels and resorts. Endless watersports
Runaway Bay South of Dickenson, with gently sloping sand and safe water, ideal for kids. Beachfront restaurants, Lobster Pot and Lashings
Fort Bay Closest to St John’s and favoured by locals. Watch out for undercurrents
Deep Bay, Five Islands Beyond the Royal Antiguan Hotel with beach bar and parking
Galley Bay A quiet strip popular with surfers
Hawksbill Beach A series of four crescent-shaped beaches on the Five Islands peninsula, with nude bathing on the last
Jolly Beach One of the longest white-sand sweeps, with safe bathing. Passes available from Jolly Beach Hotel for food, drinks and entertainment
Valley Church Bay Secluded and unspoilt, with calm waters favoured by pelicans
Ffryes Beach Long sweep with shade for games or barbecues
Darkwood One of the Caribbean’s most photographed beaches, with views of Montserrat
Turner’s Beach and Johnson’s Point On Crab’s Hill Bay, with two bars well known for lobster dishes
Morris Bay Next to exclusive Curtain Bluff Hotel, refreshing cool clear water
Carlisle Bay Wide bay scenically set at beginning of Fig Tree Drive
Rendezvous Bay and Doigs Beach Quiet beaches accessible on foot
Pigeon Beach Narrow strip close to English Harbour
Windward Beach Deserted white-sand beach
Galleon Beach On the way to Shirley Heights, a perfectly maintained beach of English Harbour Inn and Galleon Beach Club, with Italian restaurant
St James’s Club Passes available to this luxury facility
Half Moon Bay Popular but large enough to stay uncrowded; crescent bay with body-surfing waves. Beach bar and riding stable at one end
Brown’s Bay and Green Island Small beach close to Harmony Hall, overlooking Nonsuch Bay. Boat trips to Green Island
Long Bay Still waters and superb bathing. Facilities available at Long Bay Hotel or exclusive Mango Bay resort
Jabberwock Beach Unspoilt beach popular with locals, nesting site for endangered Hawksbill turtle.
