Sunday 9 December, Antigua, Jolly Harbour Marina: Visit St.John’s and sunset drinks at Rum Bus beach bar. Or potholes and puncture.
Late up this morning after our late night of dancing and merriment in English Harbour with the super yacht crews. Jolly Harbor Marina seems to have returned to the quiet status now that all charters have changed guests yesterday and left the marina.
Early afternoon we head out for another road trip, this time to the capital St. John’s. Last time we visited (attempted to) everything was closed and not a soul on the streets. Maybe we have better luck today.
In the Historical Radcliffe Quay area, most outlets were closed and all quiet. But other parts were moderately busy – especially where the tourists had descended from a huge cruise-liner, visiting the few shops that were open. Next to the cruise-liner, several tripper boats with blaring music were disembarking their tourists, and we can’t help thinking how they can put up with that noise, let alone enjoy it. Alcohol ingestion, we guess!
We can’t quite make what is historical about this historical quay, as there is no obvious sign of old buildings. But it is nicely done, the colorful buildings being well maintained.
A hundred meters away from this, on the next street along, there is a street market with yet more trinkets and souvenirs. A colorful gathering of cluttered stands, with locals calling you in to show you their merchandise. The classic market one would come across on any of the Caribbean islands. Not many customers around though. And quite a contrast from the next street along, which is mobbed with passengers returning to their ship. This is the “duty-free street”, leading directly into the cruise-liner dock, and is lined with shops selling diamonds, jewelries, perfumes, electronics and clothes. You get the feeling this is about as far as most of the passengers are prepared to walk from their ship! The contrast between the two streets couldn’t be bigger. Two different worlds all together.
Another hundred metres up the hill it all becomes very quiet. Hardly anybody on the street and very few cars driving around. It’s all clean and colorful, with a mixture of old wooden houses and some more modern concrete built ones. It is an interesting contrast, and we wonder just what amazing stories some of these old buildings could tell.
Up the hill is St. John’s Cathedral which dominates the hill and overlooks the roofs of the town. After we enter the gate, we notice it is completely derelict. Maybe due to a passed hurricane. And sadly, we don’t notice any signs of on going works to rebuilt it.
Through a broken window we peek inside and we are surprised to see it is very clean. Not even any sign of dust. Maybe they do still have services here despite the exterior state of the cathedral.
Walking back to the car, we comment about the state of most of these islands. And cannot help feeling sorry for the locals. Foreign investors come in, develop resorts, and not only they take over the best beaches of the island, but they also take all their revenue out of the country. And the locals get nothing but employment – and then only labour type jobs.
The tourists come, spend most of their money in the resort and only rarely venture out to spend money in the local economy.
We then drive back south through several villages and observe how the locals are preparing their cook-up stands along the street.
And we giggle spotting the colorfully patterned underpants the men are wearing in full display above their belts, which are fastened below their buttocks. We’ll never understand this fashion! And I am secretly glad that Glen is not keen to blend in. 🙂 Whenever he sees this, he comments how tempting it is to go up behind them and jerk their trousers the last bit down. Probably best that so far it’s only a temptation!
The roads in these islands are not exactly renowned for their quality, and sure enough we pay our tribute to the pot holes. We have a flat tire. Our Japanese rent-a-wreck
has a spare wheel, but no jack. Luckily, in a car park nearby Glen gets a jack from some locals. Then he proceeds for the tire change. After the similar exercise we had with our previous rental car a month ago in Annapolis, he’s pretty slick. And we resume our excursion very quickly but much more carefully. The spare tyre is one of those space savers types, no bigger than a BMX tyre and absolutely no match for these potholes!
We make it to the Rum Bus Beach Bar just on time for the sunset drinks. Well, for the drinks mostly, because the sun goes down behind dark clouds and there isn’t a sunset to watch. Even so, we enjoy the place.
The “bus” from the bar name becomes obvious, as the main bar is an old red London double-decker bus, with the seating from the bus as bar chairs. It is a chill out place, unpretentious, with sun beds, bean bags and an interesting pool made inside an old life boat.
When mosquitoes start ravaging us, we end our visit and return to Cloudy Bay. We were planning to go out in English Harbour again tonight, but if we have another flat tire in the middle of the night, we are stuck on a Sunday night.
We make it to Jolly Harbour Marina just as the rain starts. Air conditioning goes on and we attack editing the next video.
