Officially the name is Saint Christopher Island, but that’s a lot of characters so, like the UK, it has become custom and practice to abbreviate. We like St Kitts - we’ve been here a few times, and for a good while it was a contender on our “islands to retire to” list.
We’re very late arriving today, fallout from our detour to Grenada yesterday, so much more south than the original itinerary. This affords us time for change. Starting with breakfast, which this now half-sea-day means we have time to go to Club Orange and enjoy a Full English - I can honestly say it’s the first time in 40+ cruises I’ve had a credible sausage - quite a milestone!
Next we get in five miles on prom deck three (we may live to regret this) with the added benefit of lots to see as we approach St Kitts, and then finally we can watch the crew doing rope throwing and other mooring manoeuvres we usually don’t get to see as they mostly happen at unearthly times in the early morning.
Oddly, today is the first time we’ve arrived at the cruise terminal, having mostly experienced tenders and even once three years ago being berthed at the container port!
Suddenly we’re clear to disembark and dockside we pop into a shop for water. In doing so Hubby drops our map-for-today, we always carry a paper backup even though it’s highly unlikely to see daylight. However a Bobby sees this and hands it over, chatting like any Caribbean does, wanting to know what we’re going to do. She is mortified when we tell her - somehow walking a considerable distance in the heat of the day is frowned upon. She calls her superior, who is equally sceptical and quite opinionated!
The formidable sergeant gets the taxi controller over, hoping to persuade us it’s not a good idea. Finally they all concede defeat, and a taxi driver is called over, but not before we’ve handed our full details and contact information over to the police. We negotiate $50 and that’s it, our gentle-giant driver, aptly named Tank, is taking us to Brimstone Hill Fort. He wonders is we’re in the army, since normal people don’t do such strange things!
The fort is wonderful - a UNESCO world heritage site, steeped in history and mostly well preserved. It’s high up, the taxi straining around hairpin bends and through narrow gates to get to the top. We say goodbye to Tank and begin our day.
The fort dates back to 1690 when, having already occupied St Kitts for half a century, we started building after a skirmish with the pesky French the year before. Its commanding position makes it very successful and it remains the best preserved fort in the Americas, hence the UNESCO accreditation. HMQ visited in ’85 to open the restorations, and very recently Prince Charles was here to view the Prince of Wales Bastion (the smaller bit with eleven guns.) The officer’s quarters boast a splendid colonnade, unfortunately all that’s left as the rest was made of timber.
All in all it’s a wonderful visit be we have to get on with the main job, walking back down the coast to find a ship in time for dinner!!
As we descend we visit the ordnance house and get great views back to the fort, and much lower down find this lime kiln, apparently one of the best preserved in the world (regular readers will remember we found a pretty good one along Hadrian’s wall in the summer of ‘21.)
We turn left onto the coastal road and start or journey back, first past the local shipyard, which is entirely on dry-land, they lift yachts and cross the road to do the work.
There are monkeys on this island, and we see a few in the distance this visit, but like a lot of wildlife they run away, but we also find a small ‘aviary’ with some photogenial inhabitants. And yes I know the correct term is ‘monkey house’ but London Zoo this isn’t!
Although it’s the main island road traffic is relatively quiet and we’re able to cross easily to find different interests, such as the chimneys dotted around that are a nod to the legacy sugar cane plantations, a roadside bar with great view, and as we approach town (Basseterre) we walk past the substantial medical and veterinary schools. At the university playing fields we see there has been a pitch invasion - or are they just goat-power lawnmowers?
All in, an excellent walk of some 13.5 miles in four hours.
Pool time of course, and I have a great chat with a fellow Facebooker - we meet at last!
Meanwhile bunkering is going on below - when you’re this big, you don’t pop into a petrol station, the station comes to you!
Tonight is the second singer’s show. Cantaré is a great group and deliver another excellent performance.
We’re going French again, to Rudi’s - named after the long-time head chef of the entire HAL enterprise. Sadly we missed seeing him as he got off the day we embarked, but the quality continues regardless. Tonight it is marinated lobster (yep that’s a starter!) then coq au vin and finally berry soufflé, a Dutch speciality named Saltzburger Nockerl.
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