10 Most-Visited
Caribbean Islands
We took the 10 islands that Americans visited
most last year and searched for the hidden corners, the spots that make your
old standby feel new. Yes, you’ve been here before. But never quite like this.
By David Swanson, Thursday, Jan 5, 2012, 4:00 PM
ST. MARTIN
If there's any complaint
about this part-French, part-Dutch island-piled high with nightclubs,
restaurants, and resorts-it's that there's too much of everything. But in the
wake of the global economic downturn, construction has slowed-and even, in a
sense, reversed. A string of hurricane-battered structures at Mullet Bay on the
Dutch side was torn down (after 15 years) and replaced by a provisional park. On
the French side, the 154-acre private nature reserve Loterie Farm continues to
grow, adding poolside cabanas to its zip-line course, hiking trails, and other
outdoorsy amenities (loteriefarm.com, hiking $7, zip
line $48, pool access $28, 10-person cabana $240). And following a 13-year
effort, the Man of War Shoal reef earned certification as a marine park, giving
divers new reasons to take the plunge.
ARUBA
There's a reason Aruba's
luxury hotels, glitzy casinos, and designer boutiques are concentrated along
this Dutch island's western edge: the spectacular sunsets. Yet even a
non-morning person might want to sample the sunrise side for its weekly street
party called Carubbean Festival, which sprang up this summer (297/582-3777).
Every Thursday night, food and drink vendors set up stands to sell regional
specialties, primarily to local transplants hungering for a taste of home. This
cross-cultural mixer takes place, appropriately enough, in the working-class
community of San Nicolas, built to house oil-refinery workers who immigrated
here in the 1920s. "Aruba has opened its doors to many other islanders—a
lot of Jamaicans, Haitians, Dominicans," says Ruthlene Flemming, an Aruba
native and the event's coordinator. "It's our melting pot. And here, you
can experience a little bit of the whole Caribbean." The sunrise side is
also home to cactus-studded Arikok National Park, which features rebuilt access
roads, trails, and a new visitors center, thanks to a $10 million grant from
the EU (arubanationalpark.org, adult admission $5). The best budget-hotel
option, however, is back on the west side about a $20 cab ride away: MVC Eagle
Beach, a 19-room inn with ocean-view terraces, all-white bedding, and dark-wood
furniture (mvceaglebeach.com, from $90).
BAHAMAS
Some solitude seekers
insist there's a direct relationship between proximity and peace: The farther
you travel, the more quiet things get. Then there's Cat Island, a 48-mile-long
coral outcrop just 265 miles east of Florida and only 45 minutes from Nassau.
SkyBahamas Airlines flies to Cat Island daily from Nassau (skybahamas.net, round-trip from $109), yet of the over 5
million travelers to the Bahamas last year, only a fraction made a call on Cat.
What they found here wasn't much, and in a good way: thatch-roof beach bars and
empty pink-sand bays, diving and gentle hikes up Mt. Alvernia, the Bahamas's
highest point at 206 feet above sea level. There's a new waterfront restaurant
in Arthur's Town called Da Smoke Pot that serves sweet-and-sour conch and rum
punch, and hosts musicians on the porch playing Bahamian songs on the musical
saw (242/354-2094, sweet-and-sour conch $15). Nearby Pigeon Cay Beach Club
occupies a three-mile strand with seven simple, stand-alone rental cottages (pigeoncaybahamas.com, from $140).
U.S. VIRGIN ISLANDS
St. Croix, at 82 square
miles, is larger than St. Thomas and St. John combined, yet of the three U.S.
Virgin Islands, it gets the fewest visitors. Why? It's the most remote and the
least developed—good news for the agriculture-rich island's burgeoning food
scene. Among the most notable foodie stops are the farmstays and weekend
workshops at the Virgin Islands Sustainable Farm Institute on the island's
certified organic Ridge to Reef Farm (visfi.org,
three-day all-inclusive workshop $295), and the annual St. Croix Food &
Wine Experience, a festive, weeklong charity event in April that draws big-name
chefs such as Top Chef Masters star Graham Elliot Bowles and James Beard
award-winner Ana Sortun (stcroixfoodandwine.com,
events from $50). Sports culture is also thriving in all that open space.
Horseback riding and triathlons are popular, as well as diving and other water
sports. One of the newer options: Sea Thru Kayaks VI's tours through the
island's two bioluminescent bays (seathrukayaksvi.com,
90-minute tours $50). "Go when the moon isn't full, and you can really see
the lights twinkling," says local restaurateur and sommelier Katherine
Pugliese, a cofounder of the food festival. "You feel like you're in
pixie-land."
PUERTO RICO
San Juan is still numero
uno in Puerto Rico, but folks have increasingly begun gazing about 40 miles
east-to Vieques. The nearly two-year-old W Hotels resort here has lured
celebrity chefs (Alain Ducasse) and guests (Angie Harmon, Ryan Phillippe). But
what's drawing more casual types, however, is Vieques's laid-back personality.
Hospitality veterans Robin and Marsha Shepherd left their villa-rental business
in St. Bart's to open the 10-room Malecón House here in 2010, amid a row
of mom-and-pop inns (maleconhouse.com, from
$145). The most impressive and least crowded of the island's beaches
(some of which have hit worldwide top 10 lists) are part of the Vieques
National Wildlife Refuge, on land the U.S. Navy used as a target-practice
center until 2003. Today, it's managed by Puerto Rico's branch of the Fish and
Wildlife Service. "If it hadn't been for the Navy and Fish and
Wildlife," says Bill Barton, who owns Vieques Sailing (787/508-7245,
daylong boat trips including lunch $110, late Feb.-Oct.), "the east end
would look like Atlantic City."
BERMUDA
Sitting all alone in the
Atlantic Ocean 650 miles east of North Carolina, Bermuda is a true outlier.
It's not anywhere near the Caribbean Sea, and its food, architecture, and
customs are far more British-colonial than tropical paradise. Still, the island
(actually an atoll) has found an easy alliance with its neighbors to the south,
sharing in tourism efforts and reaping the benefits of their counterbalanced
seasons: The Caribbean booms in the winter, while peak season in Bermuda runs
from spring through fall. Though Bermuda is always pricey—four of the five most
expensive destinations in the Caribbean are here—visitors traveling now will
find lower airfares, reduced golf fees, and hotels that are more than 40
percent off summer rates. It's not quite sunbathing weather: December days
average 70 degrees. But it's perfect for touring the island's cultural
attractions. This January, the new Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art opens an
eight-month exhibition of Bermuda-inspired works by Georgia O'Keeffe, Winslow
Homer, and others (bermudamasterworks.com, entry $5). Also in 2012: the 400th
anniversary of the settlement of St. George's Town, the 350th anniversary of
Warwick Academy, the oldest school in the western hemisphere, and the 200th
anniversary of the Bermuda Post Office, which culminates with an April
exhibition of stamps from Queen Elizabeth II's private collection. Even the
hotels have history: The 200-year-old main house of the Greenbank Guesthouse
& Cottages incorporates cedar beams that were used as ballast in
transatlantic trading ships (greenbankbermuda.com,
from $145).
CAYMAN ISLANDS
The Caymans are
practically synonymous with two wealthy pursuits: deep-sea diving and offshore
banking. Dive 365, an initiative launched by the islands' Tourism Association,
is hoping to make at least one of those more accessible to regular folks (divecayman.ky). The project's goal is to establish and maintain
one Cayman dive site mooring for every day of the year, which means adding 79
sites to the existing 286 by the end of 2012. One of the most noteworthy
additions is the decommissioned U.S. naval ship Kittiwake, a 251-foot submarine
rescue vessel that now sits in 62 feet of water off Seven Mile Beach (kittiwakecayman.com, scuba pass $10, snorkel pass $5).
"The Kittiwake has a history that divers can relate to, with recompression
chambers and lots of bulkheads to explore," says Nancy Easterbrook of
Divetech, a local dive shop that helped to prepare the vessel for her sinking
in January 2011 (divetech.com, two-tank boat dives $110). "Because the top
is only about eight feet below the surface, you can snorkel the wreck
too," she says. Affordable hotels on Grand Cayman are rare, but one good
pick is 130-room Sunshine Suites, just a stone's throw from the Ritz-Carlton;
each room has a fully equipped kitchen (sunshinesuites.com,
from $158).
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
The Dominican Republic
is a great place to find affordable all-inclusives, particularly in Punta Cana,
on the island's east coast. But along the north shore—famous for its sporty
adventure culture—more intimate hotels and house rentals offer a worthy alternative.
In Cabarete, the Residencial Casa Linda villas look more like a neighborhood
than a resort, though all rental units come with daily housekeeping service (casalindacity.com, two-bedroom villas from $100). The villas
are only five miles down the road from Iguana Mama Adventure Tours, which
offers trips to the 27 Falls of Damajagua, known for daredevil-quality jumps
and slides over the waterfalls (iguanamama.com,
full-day tour $89). In recent years, north-coast outfitters have seen an
increase in the popularity of-and the competition for-canyoning and cascading
excursions. One new arrival, Monkey Jungle Dominicana, located between Cabarete
and Sosúa, stands apart for its philanthropic bent (monkeyjungledr.com, zip line $54).
All the profits from its zip-line and suspension-bridge tours go to the free
on-site medical and dental clinic, which is staffed by volunteers and treats
patients who cannot afford health care. Kitesurfing may be Cabarete's most
popular outdoor pursuit, and while there's no shortage of local instructors to
show you the ropes, it's almost as much fun just to watch the theatrics from
the waterfront Nikki Beach lounge (nikkibeach.com,
cocktails from $7)—drink in hand, of course.
JAMAICA
It's easy to get to
Jamaica (flights are frequent and relatively cheap) and easier still to find a
resort destination for just about every type of traveler: romantic Negril for
honeymooners, family-friendly Montego Bay, busy Ocho Rios for cruisers. What's
harder is finding an all-inclusive hotel that doesn't sequester you in its own cocoon
at the expense of exploring the Jamaican culture beyond. Treasure Beach, on the
south coast, is home to just a handful of hotels, all of them small-scale and
dedicated to opening their doors to the community. At Marblue Villas Suites, an
eight-suite hotel with custom-made local cedar furniture, guests often stray
into the nearby fishing villages for coffee, dinner, or drinks (marblue.com, from $139). Jason Henzell's Jakes Hotel, which
evokes Moroccan riads with arched doorways and colorful tapestries, is one of
the area's largest properties, with 49 rooms, two restaurants, and a spa (jakeshotel.com, from $95). Henzell
is committed to helping interested guests connect with their surroundings. On
working farms in the nearby Pedro Plains area, the hotel runs a monthly series
of organic, local-food dinners, which are drawing Jamaican residents and
visitors alike (four-course meal $95 including drinks and transportation).
"There's a vibrancy that leaks into every aspect of life here," says
Liz Solms, an NGO veteran who works with local growers to supply the produce
for the meal. "It's there in the spiciness and richness of the food, and
even in the way people communicate with one another."
TRINIDAD & TOBAGO
Tobago is like
Trinidad's backyard, a 116-square-mile haven just a 20-minute flight on
Caribbean Airlines from its bigger, noisier sibling (caribbean-airlines.com, round-trip
flights from $48). Where Trinidad has restaurants, nightclubs, and 96 percent
of the country's population, Tobago has empty beaches, calm bays, and
spectacular brain-coral reefs. There are also almost three times the number of
exotic bird species as there are hotels, and the birds have free rein in the
Main Ridge Forest Reserve, one of the oldest protected forests in the western
hemisphere. When it comes to human nesting, it doesn't get more peaceful than
the four-room Gloucester Place Guest House in Parlatuvier, on the island's
north coast (gloucesterplace.com, from $100).
Shaded by coconut palms and mango trees, the guesthouse even has its own
natural waterfall and an infinity pool overlooking the Caribbean.
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