An A-Z of Caribbean Attractions by James Henderson
With its dependable sun, sea, sand, rum punch and easy-going island-life, these days more than ever the Caribbean is the ultimate rest-cure from the downward spiral of winter depression. Comfort comes in many forms, and here's an A-Z of Caribbean attractions - from private island enclaves, old colonial refinement and the very best luxury hotels the area has to offer...
The Antilles
The Caribbean islands are made up of the Greater and Lesser Antilles, a 1700-mile arc of islands which runs from the near the southern tip of Florida to the coast of South America. They vary in size from Cuba (the same size as England) to tiny cays and sandbars with just a few palm trees. They go by many names: the Antilles after a mythical medieval continent in the mid-Atlantic; the West Indies because Columbus struck west in search of India; and the Caribbean after the cannibalistic Carib Indians he found there.
Anguilla
A slumber-struck retreat with superb beaches, beloved of a well-heeled international crowd. Quietly chic with some expensive hotels (Malliouhana, Cove Castles and Cao Juluca) but also some mid-range hotels and some guest houses. Also has a string of waterfront restaurants.
Antigua
Also favoured by the well-to-do for its clutch of top-knotch hotels (Curtain Bluff, Jumby Bay, the mock-rustic Galley Bay, the Inn at English Harbour), but with a wide range of package deals too. Famed for Race Week out of Nelson's Harbour in the southeast, held at the close of the Caribbean winter sailing season.
Beaches
The Caribbean has some of the world's finest beaches - blinding white strands that run deserted to the horizon; talcum-powder sand washed with gin-clear water; palm-backed posing beaches where the body-beautiful roam; deserted smugglers' coves.
A pick of the best: Anse la Roche, an isolated cove on Carriacou in the Grenadines; Anse de Grande Saline on St Barts for starlet-spotting; Shoal Bay in Anguilla for supreme, palm-shaded sand; five miles of Negil Beach in Jamaica for unflinching hedonism.
Barbados
The grand dame of Caribbean attractions. The west coast or 'millionaires' playground' (with hotels like Sandy Lane, Settler's Beach, Cobbler's Cove and Coral Reef) has attracted the smart set for generations, but it is easy to have a good time on a less expansive budget on the south coast.
Bequia
Post-card picturesque, Bequia is the prettiest of the Grenadines. The Port Elizabeth waterfront is lined with neat wooden villas and small hotels nestling among the palms.
Carnival
People leave their jobs to get back to Trinidad's Carnival, a five-day extravaganza of calypso concerts and street parades. Thousands of costumed masqueraders shuffle-step through the streets of Port of Spain and, unlike Rio and New Orleans - 'just fashion shows' the Trinis claim - you can buy a costume and join in. Most other Caribbean islands have their own carnivals now and all are worth attending if you are on-island.
Calypso
Calypsos are the beat behind carnival and they bound along to a drum-driven rhythm. But they are more than simply dance-music; the lyrics sing of love, life, sex, politics, corruption and any topical issue; and the calypsonians, who call themselves 'Lord This' or 'The Mighty That', are more of a cross between commentators and comedians than mere singers.
Climate
The Bahamas were once known as the Isles of Perpetual June because the Caribbean weather is so dependably warm. The temperature hovers at about 80'F year-round. Seasons are dry and wet (two a year, in June and November).
The best (and most expensive time) to travel is January to April, when the weather is constant and the trade winds at their strongest. Hurricanes are the fiercest natural scourge in an otherwise clement area.
Diving
Scuba-diving in warm tropical waters takes you into a different dimension. You glide over vast hemispheres of brain coral and barrel sponges big enough to sit in; shoals of fish and crabs eye you quizzically. Famous dive-sites include: Bonaire slopes for colourful corals; Saba for pristine life; Turks and Caicos walls and the Cayman Islands where you can cavort with sting rays, if that's your sort of thing.
Festivals
There are many festivals besides the carnivals: sailing regattas, deep-sea fishing tournaments, Catholic fetes patronales (Saints'fei Days, but more like a week's celebration), even Hindu and Muslim festivities. Others are centred on music and dance, from imported jazz to massive gatherings like Reggae Sunsplash in Jamaica.
French Caribbean
The French Antilles (Martinique, Guadeloupe, St Martin and St Barts) have a standard of living equal to that of France itself. You may have to put up with crowds, but these islands have a tradition of food not found elsewhere, with classical French fare and local Creole dishes.
Getting Around
There are plenty of taxis in the Caribbean, but local buses are more fun and often more like mobile discotheques than a mode of transport. Many have names - Street Demon, Thunder Run (perhaps according to the self-esteem of the driver) - and you will get to know your fellow passengers pretty well in the crush. Hire cars (often min-mokes) are readily available, though they vary considerably in price and regulations across the islands.
Hustlers
Hustling is persistent in some islands and it can be annoying, even a little frightening for a first-time visitor. Small-time dealers scour the beaches and towns and will offer you anything from a Rasta wristband to a bag of ganja. An equally persistent and polite 'No' is the best way to keep your peace.
Hummingbirds
These tiny, shimmering creatures of great beauty have a metabolic rate so high that they have to keep flying and feeding all day. Trinidad, which has the most extensive birdlife in the region, has 16 species of hummingbirds alone.
Island Hopping
Most of the graceful inter-island schooners are gone now, so island-hopping is done by coffin-sized aircraft which hum like outsize tuning forks but which can stop on a sixpence. Airstrips (not much larger) can be a little alarming. The most sporting of them all is Saba in the Dutch Windward Islands, a 400 yard strip with a 100-ft drop at either end.
Island Retreats
There are some supremely luxurious private island retreats in the Caribbean: in the Grenadines are Petit St Vincent (PSV to habitués) and Young Island, a charming forested blip once swapped by the governor for his black stallion. In the Virgin Islands try Peter Island or Richard Branson's Necker Island.
Jamaica
The largest and liveliest of the former British Islands. The faint of heart can closet themselves in one of a string of villas and top-knotch hotels (Round Hill, Good Hope, Half Moon, the Jamaica Inn and Trident), but Jamaica is also an island to explore: for the inland bathing in rivers and waterfalls, for the hedonistic pleasures of Negril and for world-famous reggae bands playing to small home crowds.
Limbo
The Trinidadians must take credit/responsibility for the limbo, that impressive athletic feat which is now the scourge of every tropical party. Dancers perform an inverted high-jump, shuffling, sliding and shimmying under a (sometimes flaming) pole.
Liming
A traditional Caribbean pastime, centred on street front rum shops - a cross between passing the time of day and street theatre.
Monte Cristo
It is ironic that the world's finest cigars, so beloved of fat-cat businessmen, are made in Cuba, the self-appointed adversity of capitalism. Fidel himself may have stopped smoking them, but you will see Cuban builders puffing on Size 4 Monte Cristos while they are mixing the cement.
Mustique
An absurdly luxurious, little-island enclave in the Grenadines, peopled by notables as varied as Princess Margaret and David Bowie.
Netherlands Antilles
The Dutch Caribbean is split into two groups separated by 600 miles of the Caribbean Sea - the Dutch Windwards (Saba, St Eustatius and the over-developed St Maarten) and the Dutch Leewards (Bonaire, Curacao and Aruba), with colourful facades and curly gables like a tropical version of Amsterdam. The language of the Leewards is Papiamento, an unholy mix of Portuguese, African, Spanish, English and Dutch.
No Problem!
The popular T-shirt slogan and habitual call of West Indians when they are being so laid-back that it almost becomes annoying. If you complain that your meal is taking too long to arrive, they will reply coolly 'No Problem' and carry on regardless.
Oloffson Hotel
A magnificent gingerbread house in Port au Prince (Haiti's capital), used by Graham Greene as the setting for his novel The Comedians. The man who inspired the character Petit Pierre still breakfasts on the veranda each morning.
Plantation Houses
While most new hotels are furnished with white wicker and bright and breezy pastel fitting (and usually unnecessarily air-conditioned), there is the odd hangover from the plantation days. Alongside Jamaica, the tiny, twin-island country of St Kitts and Nevis has half a dozen excellent plantation hotels.
Rhythm
Music is played everywhere in the Caribbean, usually at high volume and all day long (except when the cricket is on). There is practically a different beat for each island. The best known is reggae, now grafted with rap to become dancehall; Trinidad reverberates to soca (from soul-calypso), and Martinique to the racing double beat of zouk. The Latin islands each have their rhythms too: the Dominican Republic bustles to merengue and Cuba and Puerto Rico each have their own version of salsa.
Rum Punch
Rum is the Caribbean 'national' drink. The rhyme for the classic rum punch runs: One of Sour (lime juice), Two of Sweet (cane juice or sugar), Three of Strong (rum) and Four of Weak (water or a fruit juice). Nutmeg is often sprinkled on the top (Blackbeard would drink his with a tincture of gunpowder). The locals tend to drink white overproof rums and it is well worth joining them.
Shades and Swimsuits
These are the essential wardrobe of the Caribbean traveller. Very few hotels still have a dress code: as a general rule, smarter places will ask you to wear a skirt or a jacket and long trousers at dinner.
Santo Domingo
Capital of the Dominican Republic and oldest European city in the New World.
Tradewinds
The Tradewinds are the refreshing equatorial breezes that blow through the islands for most of the year, taking the edge off the tropical heat.
Volcanoes
A couple of predictions for Caribbean volcanic activity (as yet unfulfilled): the appearance of one island (probably Kick-em-Jenny in the Grenadines, which has been steadily growing over the years) and the disappearance of another (it's not known which one).
Virgin Islands
A scattering of 100-odd islands and cays, divided between the US and the UK. St Thomas in the USVI is overdeveloped (into a superannuated shopping precinct), but east of here is a string of smaller islands with isolated coves and the Caribbean's best beach bars.
Watersports
From pedalos to parascenders, the Caribbean has them all. Join the rude-boys on a jet-ski for the afternoon, or tame the winds on a sail-board.
X-Rated Dancing
Caribbean dancing is all lower-carriage movement, a mesmeric swaying and pumping of the hips and thighs. Typically forthright, Trinidadian dancers lock themselves together from midriff to mid-thigh as they 'wind and grind' (back to back, front on back or just plain groin on groin). In the Latin islands they waltz with a graceful bustle, sensuality created by thighs that barely touch.
Yankee Dollar
An old calypso sings of working for the Yankee Dollar and it is still the currency in universal demand throughout the Caribbean. Most islands have their own currency, but hotel and often restaurant prices are set in US dollars. Credit cards are accepted everywhere on the tourist circuit. Generally the Caribbean is not cheap (unless you go native) and you can expect to pay similar prices as you would at home when eating out.
Yachting
The two main yachting areas are: the Virgin Islands, safe and relatively easy sailing along Sir Francis Drake Passage, and short hops between beach bars; and the Grenadines, which have a wilder beauty and less developed islands. Both have isolated, sandy coves and cays to which you can retreat. Gin palaces are readily available, with direct transfer to on-board heli-pads if you're feeling affluent.
Zombies
The name of the living dead in Haiti. They are not known to haunt the beach bars and hotels of the other islands.
Longing to get away from it all with a trip to a tropical paradise? See our selection of luxury hotels in the Caribbean.