Visit to Saint Kitt's



Atlantic on the left and Caribbean Sea on the right



This past weekend I visited the island of St. Kitt's. Only being here three days and a very short flight of 20 minutes from Antigua, it was surprisingly different in many ways. Something I almost instantly noticed was it's much cleaner! There are also sidewalks, which is a plus. People were very nice to me. I was in a gas station buying a single pack of advil and the cashier started taking my medical history, trying to figure out why I was having a headache. In the end she told me to drink more water. Which I did.



The restaurant where I stayed on the second floor

 After getting off the plane Saturday morning and reaching immigration, I asked the officer what was the cheapest place to stay and he informed me of guest houses. Which are very simple yet exactly what I was looking for. Cheap. A bed, shower and cable TV. I ended up staying above an Indian Restaurant called 'Star of India'. This was just what I needed. $40 a night. Cant really find cheaper than that in my opinion.

The town I stayed in was the capitol , Basseterre. This town is located right before the southeast peninsula of St Kitt's begins. Just like other tropical countries that I have visited so far, it is very colorful and has plenty of taxis. Colors of red green black and yellow are all over. Every building seemed to be two stories high with balconies accompying. Reggae music flows through the streets day and night was interesting to listen to.

All day Saturday was filled with walking through the one way streets and finding food. The basics was what I was looking for. Place to sleep and something to eat. Since finding Star of India rather easily I was looking for what I was going to eat. Another thing that is somewhat surprisingly is that there is a lot of SUBWAYS in the caribbean. Which is something that makes me happy since I am from the town where the Subway World Headquarters is located (Milford, CT).

The weather in Saint Kitt's was very wet. It rained each day I was there. Sometimes for only 25-30 minutes then give may to sunshine. At night, however, it rained constantly. Very rainy and windy. Saint Kitts was also not as hot as Antigua. Which was weird to me. Only 20 minutes by palne but that hot caribbean sun did not seem to touch Saint Kitt's.

Sunday I woke up and knew what my task was going to be. It was to get to the top of Olivees Mountain. About 3,000 feet. Everything seemed alright until I went to Subway, again, to grab some food for my ascent. When I was paying for the Sub I told the cashier what and where I was going. She instantly gave me a look of insanity. Which made me a bit cautious of the trip ahead. She said she had lived on the island all her life and never hiked there. Which made me curious because Saint Kitts is very mountainous. Volcanic in origin, there are hills, inclines and mountains everywhere. Either way I was going up that mountain. On my hike up just to the base of the mountain I was already hot and sweaty.

Paved roads turned into side roads which turned into dirt roads which then turned into trails which finally turned into small, tight dirt trails. Not really knowing the 'exact' way up the mountain, I was simply looking for the easiest way up. Using my monoscope and trying to locate some paths was the way for me. The dirt trails finally came to an end and I had to bushwack through tall bamboo grass or canefield style grass. Not sure which. Either way it was tall and it hurt. Doing that for about 30 minutes hurt and I was out of breath. When I thought I was almost there and to the top...I was not. Not even close. Soaked with rain and sweat I called it quits and started to descend, but through another way. Still somewhat lost and not on any path what so ever I started to climb down into something of a valley full of rocks. Which literally turned into a jungle. With plenty of vines that did come in handy.

After descending for about another 30 minutes I made it to the bottom of the jungle with what looked like no place to go. A 'brick wall' made out of trees, grass and rocks. Until I looked up a little hill to my left and saw a hole with some light in it. I climbed up and saw a sheet of metal on the ground. Looked a little further and saw a little pig farm. FINALLY I knew I was out. I hopped into the pig stable and walked through then jumped the other side.