Sample an active life on the Ocean waves
CAN'T sit still? Try an island-hopping cruise around the Caribbean with a new activity to experience at every port.
Three days into my southern Caribbean cruise and I had already trekked up a volcano, snorkelled over dazzling coral and gallopeda white horse through the surf.
If you want a new activity every day, this is the place – and the way – to do it. You don’t have to be a fitness fanatic to cruise with Ocean Village but I like to keep active on holiday.
The ship’s offering of sporty excursions alongside more traditional tours meant there were plenty of new experiences to be had.
What better way to immerse myself in one of the most diverse cruising areas of the region? The stretch of theLesser Antilles that extends from St Lucia in the north to Venezuela in the southencompasses numerous islands that are close together but all different, from Spanish-speakingIsla Margarita to Dutch-inspired Curaçao.
I joined my cruise in Barbados, a speck of colonial Britain, all chic resorts, Michelin-starred restaurants, cricket and scarlet pillar boxes.
St Vincent, the largest of the Grenadines, is only a few nautical miles to the west but is another world of volcanoes and dense rainforest.
The island has an edgier, less polished feel, with development hugging the coastline and the interior criss-crossed with hiking trails and populated by colourful birds.
For my first excursion I chose the four-hour hike up La Soufrière, the island’s highest peak. The trail started at Georgetown, a 90-minute, hair-raisingdrive from Kingstown along the stunning east coast, dotted with ramshackle villages and black sand beaches.
I joined my cruise in Barbados, a speck of colonial Britain, all chic resorts, Michelin-starred restaurants, cricket and scarlet pillar boxes.
This walk, for which you need to be reasonably fit, was quite a scramble but it was worth it. We climbed through forests of giant bamboo, over steep ridges and inside deep, water-filled gullies.
Surprisingly our group of 15 and two guides had the mountain to ourselves. At the summit we stareddown into a massive crater, wisps of sulphur gas escaping from the cone and a murky-looking sulphur lake, thousands of feet below.
A day later I was basking on the deck of a huge catamaran on an excursionfrom Mayreau in the Grenadines to the Tobago Cays.
These uninhabited islands, no more than specks on the map, are clustered inside a reef, the sea a brilliant turquoise, the beaches powder soft. Private yachts moor for lunch but the Cays are protected from
development.
Snorkelling over the coral reefswas like swimming in an aquarium; orange and white clownfish, electric blue surgeon fish and shimmering parrot fish, withbeak-like mouths for munching on the coral, teemed around me. Lobsters nestled in the rocks and slender fan corals waved in the gentle swell.
I could have stayed allday but we were leaving the British-influenced Caribbean and sailing south for cactus-strewn, semi-desert Isla Margarita off northern Venezuela.
Here the language is Spanish and there’s no rainforest, just long stretches of empty beach backed by scrub-covered hills. Beers and tequila were flowing in the beach bar next to the dock (a satisfying spot for most passengers) and hammocks, cigars, Venezuelan chocolate and hand-woven hats were on sale in the market.
I went riding at the wonderful Cabatucan Ranch. It was real Wild West stuff, meandering through towering cacti forests and water courses and along spectacular cliffs, before that gallop along the beach in the surf.
The horses were all sleek and sure-footed – just as well as some of the steep, rocky tracks were not for the faint-hearted.
Other passengers chose kite or took a tour into the capital Porlamar in search of Spanish colonial architecture and duty-free bargains.
Curaçao in the Dutch Antilles offers a different ambience. Our ship moored opposite a row of brightly coloured gabled houses reminiscent of Amsterdam.
There was an air of conspicuous consumerism in the capitalWillemstad, brimming with shops and bars selling Heineken and Blue Curaçao liqueur.
Keen to snorkel, I headedfor the marine park, although apparently youneed to dive to see the best of the underwater life.