We’d decided to do our own thing today as none of the tours particularly caught our eye. We woke up and once again we had sailed right into the heart of the town – Basse-Terre, the capital. As we weren’t in a rush this morning I was able to phone Mum from the top of the ship whilst overlooking the town and it was really good to hear Mum’s voice and know she was ok.
There was another huge great cruise ship in dock next to us and when we disembarked and walked out of the port terminal it was a chaotic scene. There were taxi drivers and tour guides touting for business everywhere. We thought we wanted to go to visit Fairview Plantation House, not to do a whole island tour but the guy we asked wanted $100 just to do this, which was a joke. We couldn’t be bothered with the hassle and decided to revert to our original plan which was to just walk around the town here. Cruise News had made it sound attractive and I had a list of the historic points of interest.
Out here amongst the old Georgian buildings it was very different, very chilled and relaxed on this sunny Saturday morning. We soon found The Circus with its ancient clock tower and then walked through to Independence Square. This place had a dark history as it was where originally slaves were bought and sold. However, it had been renamed and was now a lovely shady park celebrating the islands independence from Britain in 1983. There was a marquee set up and we were approached by a young lady who said they were promoting health by offering free tests for blood pressure, cholestrol etc and we agreed with her that, as we were on a cruise, now possibly wasn’t the best time to get tested! Interestingly she said she was a medical student from Puerto Rico but over here studying in St Kitts.
We wandered into the cool church and then down some backstreets. It was tidier than St Vincent’s and the people friendlier. As we wandered, the buildings got more and more run down and picturesque. There were lots of little stall holders outside selling stuff for Valentine’s Day…it was all very colourful.
We’d now wandered a bit more off the beaten track but still close to the waterfront. As we took our photos we were approached by a guy called Carl who introduced himself saying that St Kitts was where he was born but now he spent his time split between here and Canada. He was smartly dressed but slightly intimidating as he intensely questioned us about why we were photographing a particular little shack. He wanted to know EXACTLY why we’d chosen THAT building. The truth was it was pretty colours against the dark mountain background but he didn’t seem to want to accept this. It was only when I said I was an artist that he accepted it as he was a writer and he believed that we see the world differently. I also think he was trying to make a point about the fact that some tourists want to see the old architecture and not everything has to be gentrified and spruced up. Blimey, mate , you might be right but chill out!
Anyway he told us that we were standing on Westbourne Ghaut and that the water running down the middle of the road came all the way from the mountains and in fact was an open sewer. There was a colourful bridge over the bottom of the street as when the rains come the road gets flooded and is dangerous. Next, Carl took us to find the market, just around the corner and introduced us to his friend Ernestine (Tine). He wanted her to tell us about the history of the market. She was very friendly but really just wanted to serve her customer their bananas. The market wasn’t particularly busy..there were no other tourists in here and the friendly stall holders were happy for us to wander around taking photos. Carl said his farewells and off he went.
I decided to try and capture the stall holders in my sketchbook whilst Jane wandered off taking photos of the colourful murals. I’d only just started when my new best friend Sonja came over to chat to me. She was interested in what I was upto and was really nice to chat to. She too was a fellow creative and she showed me her amazing food creations on Facebook. She also wanted to interview me ‘for her country’ as she videoed me answering her questions about where I came from and how much I loved St Kitts, which by now I genuinely did! Again, part of me was wondering what she wanted but as far as I can tell…she just wanted a chat…and to get to 10,000 followers on Facebook so she can get paid for her posts.
Next I found myself chatting to two fisherman who were descaling their days catch down on the beach. It turns out everyone here knows Birmingham and they’ve all been to the Bullring!
By now it was very very hot and we made our way back to the port. We found Mrs Moore’s colourful ‘Eat to Live’ bar and I had 2 huge glasses of lemonade whilst I made Jane have beers so that I could Womble some more bottle tops! After refreshments we got back on the ship for the afternoon. Jane went up on the pool deck to watch England lose the rugby and I had a cool sleep in our room!
I loved St Kitt’s and we’ve barely scratched the surface of it as it also has loads of fab beaches, historic sites and plantation houses and the whole of the island of Nevis to explore. Frigate Bay is one of the beach strips with bars with irresistible names like The Monkey Bar, Zanzi Bar, Boozies on the Beach and my favourite Mr Shiggidy Shack’.
Yes, I could definitely come back here.
Where shall we go to next? 