After we tied up in port, we decided to head out and see what we could see on the island. The Emerald, along with the Carnival Freedom, were the first ships into port that season so the dock was a madhouse of taxi drivers and tour operators jostling for tourist dollars. The port itself is right next to the town, so we figured we would just walk around a bit, however, no one was really excited about spending the day shopping there or whatever so we allowed ourselves to listen in on the various pitches being made by the taxi drivers and tour operators--bearing in mind what we already knew about the cost of doing various excursions in a more formal way through Princess Cruise Lines itself.
Ultimately, we were pitched a tour of St. John's Cathedral (from whence the port town of St.John's gets its name), a drive down to Nelson's Harbor, which was where the British maintained a major presence during the era of the buccaneers, and a drive to a purportedly beautiful beach to spend the afternoon for $25 per person. The Antiguans, like many other islanders formerly under British rule, do not haggle very well, if at all, so we soon learned that talking people down off their initial price was much harder to do then it would be in Mexico or the Dominican Republic, for example. Still it was a decent price relative to the other offers, so off we went...
The first stop, which was almost within walking distance of the pier, was St. John's Cathedral. Badly damaged over the years by weather (Antigua is definitely in the hurricane belt), the locals have been actively engaged in restoring this landmark, though much work remains to be done on this 300+ year old site. We actually never got in to the church itself because of the damage, but it was wild to see all these centuries old sarcophagus in the yard surrounding the Cathedral. (Pictured below: the view from the deck of the Emerald Princess into town with St. John's Cathedral in the background)
Back into the amazingly foul-smelling van (bananas do go bad--very bad--and I don't know why someone would ever allow that to happen in their vehicle, but chock it up to local flavor) to cut across to the other side of the island to see Antigua's original harbor. Our driver assures us there is not much to see amongst the British installations there--especially at $12 a person--so instead takes us high up on a hill to see it from above and look into the windows of the cottage where Queen Elizabeth spent her honeymoon overlooking the harbor. (see picture below)
Moving right along to a completely different part of the island, we get a pretty good picture of how the average Antiguan lives. Certainly quite friendly and polite people (they were once British subjects, so the politeness is pretty endemic), Antigua remains challenged economically--though my parents, who had been there once before years ago, thought that overall things looked a lot better. Still, since more than 80% of their economy is tourism related and that only during part of the year, you are not going to see the relative prosperity that an Aruba or even the Bahamas exhibits. Having Oprah Winfrey, Julia Roberts, Jean-Claude Van Damme, etc. all down there with their resort homes on an adjacent private island where the entry fee is $25 million in net worth may be one way of trying to bring money in, though I don't think the average resident is giving up their chicken coop just yet because of it.
What is lacking economically, however, is made up for, at least in a small part, by the beauty of its beaches. Antigua boasts (repeatedly) that they have 365 beaches, one for every day of the year. Clearly, some of those beaches are going to be more noteworthy than others and we were definitely grateful to have a driver that could take us to one that wasn't crowded like the ones within walking distance of the pier. I could try and complain about a beach that looks like this:
but I think if I did, that could be grounds for being committed.
Next Post: Onward to St.Lucia!
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