Sudbury Northern Life Reporter Liz Fleming
If escaping the rigors of the world to hide away on a
relaxed island is your dream, make Anguilla your destination.
It's a hidden holiday gem many North American travellers have
yet to discover.
Just five kms across at its widest point and 26 km long, this
tiny piece of paradise, the most northerly of the Leeward
Islands in the Lesser Antilles, is a British territory. Once
Canadian tourists adjust to driving on the left side of the
island's one major thoroughfare and smaller side roads (no need
to panic - the speed limit is just 30 kms/hr), they feel
immediately at home with the friendly, English-speaking
islanders who want nothing more than the opportunity to welcome
visitors tired of the more hectic pace of neighboring islands.
The population is small - approximately 13,500 - and not
particularly entrepreneurial. You could wander forever on the
beaches of Anguilla and never have anyone try to sell you
anything - in fact, you'd be hard pressed to find a t-shirt
shop if you were desperate!
This is an island of beautiful, largely deserted sandy beaches
- 33 of them in total - where the weary vacationer can set up a
sun chair and bask in uninterrupted seclusion.
If you really must…
If you feel that you have to add more to your holiday schedule
than hours of relaxing by crystal blue waters on silky sand
beaches, Anguilla is ready to accommodate. Nearly as beautiful
beneath the waves as it is above, Anguilla is a favorite
destination for both snorkelers and SCUBA divers. You'll find
plenty of boats with captains eager to show you the island's
popular marine parks: Sandy Island, Dog Island, Prickley Pear,
Little Bay, Seal Island Reef System and the Shoal Bay Harbour
Reef System. The sites offer not only mini wall dives and
heritage dives, but also shore and wreck dives as well as the
island's most exciting attraction, El Buen Consejo, a 960-ton
Spanish galleon, which rests in the waters of the award-winning
Stoney Bay Marine Park.
Prefer your sight-seeing to take place on dry land? Birders
enjoy visiting Anguilla's salt ponds to train their binoculars
on the variety of feathered visitors who flap by, while gourmet
travelers rave about the outstanding cuisine offered at many of
the island's hotels and restaurants where the food is
first-rate, the service is outstanding and making reservations
is never a problem.
Bankie on It
No visit to Anguilla is complete without an evening - and
perhaps a day as well - spent at the Dune Preservation Retreat
at Rendezvous Bay, listening to the original reggae rhythms of
owner and singing sensation Bankie Banks.
Banks is as integral a part of the character of Anguilla as Bob
Marley is of Jamaica. The difference is, he's still very much
alive and singing his heart out in his beach-side bar, built to
feel as whimsical as the Swiss Family Robinson's tree house. Go
in March and be part of Moonsplash, Bankie's own musicfest that
draws thousands of visitors from around the world, or choose a
quieter month, when you can relax in the bar after the show and
share a beer with the great man himself.
Getting There
Paradise shouldn't be too easy to reach…so getting to Anguilla
takes an extra little step. Canadian travelers can fly Sunwing
to St. Maarten and then take a short ferry ride to the secluded
shores. It's the shortest and most exotic little commute you'll
ever experience!
