St. Kitts Sunning

Check out the local fort, the batik 'factory' and start up some conversations with the locals about the annual Music Festivals.

Quick Tips:

Wear a hat, bring plenty of sunscreen and watch out for the monkees that abound and will steal your fruit drinks without a second thought.

Best Way To Get Around:

Hire a local driver to take you to tourist attractions and non-tourist attractions. Drink lots of 'Ting,' a grapefruit drink that comes in tiny, tiny bottles and is curiously refreshing.

This place has a gourmet reputation and when I visited, was not disappointed. It didn't hurt that the dining area was poolside, adding a cool ambience to the lush landscape. Views include the ocean on one side and Mount Liamuiga on the other. Special events include a Sunday champagne brunch and international dinners. Fieldings 1996 guide awarded it 5 stars a few years ago. I enjoyed the atmostphere and the friendliness of the staff most of all.

This is a working testament of natural beauty and native charm, a combination of lush landscaping and Batik artists who demonstrate and sell their works right on the premises. Eight acres of formal gardens includes a 350 year-old saman tree, croquet lawn, bell tower, hibiscus, bougainvellea and other rare plants. (Mind you, I haven't been back since the last hurricane, so let's hope things remain calm this ear.)

This is a strange island for me for a number of reasons. Despite it's beauty, there remains some controversy involving a veterinary school that I won't go into at the moment, thank you, but may be worth your while to research before heading here. It also has the creepy former-slaves-were-here feeling all around that I couldn't shake, no matter how much I tried. Naturally, the people here are dependent on tourism, so it's a Catch-22 situation. Since it's a mere two minute plane ride from neighboring Nevis, you may want to come just to check out some of the artwork that you'll find. But I just wish the whole slavery part of the world's past didn't exist. We'd all be much better off. That said, I tasted my freshest mangoe here, had some 'real' conversations with local people and tried not to be yet another 'Ugly American.' After all, wherever we go, let's be Ambassadors of Kindness and Good Intentions. (And tipping doesn't hurt, either.)