Why Anguilla?

Upon hearing that my husband and I recently returned from vacationing in Anguilla, we are usually inundated with questions. Here is a sampling:

"Why Anguilla?"
We had decided last winter that it was time to take a 2nd vacation to the Caribbean. In March of 1999, we had spent a week on the Caribbean island of St. Kitts. We wanted to replicate that experience by staying on an island where the water and beaches were as beautiful as St. Kitts’s Friars Bay, the food was as suburb as the restaurant at Ottley's Plantation, The Royal Palm. We wanted an island that wasn't crowded and was off the beaten path. We also wanted to stay at a resort that was right on the beach (Ottley's, though lovely, was not). Subsequently, we happened to catch a program on the travel channel which named Anguilla’s beach, Upper East Shoal, as one of the world’s best beaches. Actually, in March 2005, Anguilla was voted as #1 in “World’s Best Beaches” by judges from Conde Nast Traveler, USA Today and Fodor’s. After further research, we discovered the following facts about Anguilla: cruise ships were limited to no more than 400 passengers, high-rise hotels, casinos and nude sunbathing were banned, and they had almost a 100% employment rate with very little crime. But most importantly Anguilla is known for food and is home to numerous four star restaurants. We had found our island.

How do you pronounce it?
Anguilla rhymes with vanilla and is pronounced Ann-gwilla.

Where is it?
It is the most northerly of the Leeward Islands in the Eastern Caribbean.

How big is it?
35 square miles. 16 miles long and 3 miles wide. On a side note, some say Christopher Columbus christened the little island Anguilla (Spanish for eel) after he sailed past it and saw her long slithering shape.

How do you get there? And is it a direct flight?
Okay, getting there is reminiscent of the movie, "Trains, Planes and Automobiles". And no, it is not a direct flight; Anguilla’s airport is not large enough to handle commercial airline flights.

Our journey to Anguilla went like this:
Left home Saturday, April 1st for Chicago around 3:30 p.m., spent Saturday night in Chicago at The Courtyard Marriott (we were taking advantage of one of their park and stay packages), woke up at 1:40 a.m. Sunday morning (lost an hour due to day light savings time) luckily did not fall back asleep as our 2:30 a.m. wake up call did not arrive, arrived at O’Hare around 3:45 a.m., from O’Hare flew to Atlanta arriving around 10:00 a.m., flew from Atlanta to St Maartens, arrived in St. Maartens around 1:30 p.m. eastern time, took a taxi from the airport in St. Maartens to their ferry depot in Marigot, at Marigot caught the 2:30 p.m. ferry to Anguilla, at Anguilla’s ferry depot in Blowing Point went through customs, took a cab to our resort at Rendezvous Bay, arrived around 3:30 p.m. The return trip‘s journey was identical, only reversed.

Where did you stay?
We stayed in an upper villa at the Rendezvous Bay Hotel, located right on Rendezvous Bay. Though not posh, it had an old world charm that takes you back to another era. Rendezvous Bay which is 1 1/2 miles of pearl white sand was one of our favorite beaches, extremely calm and great for swimming.




How did you get around?
We rented a car for the first five days at $35 a day, and a jeep for the last two at $40 a day. It is a must for exploring the island. The roads were in good repair and it was easy to find our way around considering that road signs were scarce. Driving is on the left-hand side of the road; we found this easy to adapt to. We did, however, find their habit of frequently stopping their vehicles in the middle of the road forcing drivers to go around them and their tendency to not dim their bright lights for approaching vehicles to be annoying.


What did you do?
We quickly fell into a routine. Each morning, upon waking we would sit on our balcony, admire the view and drink our coffee. Then we were off in our rental car to explore the island. We visited at least one of the 33+ beaches each day, spending the mornings walking and exploring a beach or two. We found all of them to be spectacular. Around noon we would stop for a leisurely lunch usually accompanied by a rum punch. The afternoons were spent back at Rendezvous Bay, walking the beach, reading a book or napping in the lounge chairs in front of our villa. We would then go to dinner at one of the islands four star restaurants. After dinner, we would return to Rendezvous Bay, stroll on the beach and gaze at the Caribbean sky. Oliver’s, one of our favorite restaurants, is pictured on the left.

How was the weather?
The weather was gorgeous; highs were in the 80's every day, lows in the high 70's. It rained Tuesday night, but the sky was clear when we woke Wednesday morning. We did encounter a light shower for about an hour Friday afternoon; fortunately we were at a restaurant eating lunch.

And lastly, did you like it and would you return?
My husband feels that we have found our island. It is everything we wanted and more; the beaches were beautiful and unspoiled, the restaurants, though expensive were fantastic, the sunsets were spectacular, the people were friendly, the island was clean and we felt safe.




Unfortunately, this may all change. There is quite a bit of development planned for Anguilla. The owners of the Rendezvous Bay Hotel have plans to raze their property and build twenty of the most fantastic villas ever seen in Anguilla. There are also plans to build a low-rise 2,083 room resort on the previously undeveloped east-end. This would be built on what was my husband's favorite beach, Savannah Bay. It is the remote, isolated beach pictured on the left. Hopefully Anguilla will remain the unspoiled, affordable island that we visited, but I have my doubts.