This post originated from an RSS feed registered with Agile Buzz
by Martin Fowler.
Original Post: Bliki: Saba
Feed Title: Martin Fowler's Bliki
Feed URL: http://martinfowler.com/feed.atom
Feed Description: A cross between a blog and wiki of my partly-formed ideas on software development
Recently we returned to one of our favorite places in the world, Saba - a very small island in
the Caribbean, close to St Martin. In many ways the best things
about Saba are the things it doesn't have. There are no beaches, no
golf courses, no casinos. The mass tourism and resort complexes that
litter so much of the Caribbean have ignored Saba since it's too
small and too hilly. As a result the island is wonderfully quiet and
relaxed.
The road, heading up from
the airport to the village of Hell's Gate.
As a result only a few tourists go to Saba. For those that do the
main activity is diving. Saba is surrounded by coral reefs in a
marine park, and the resulting diving is excellent. (However since
the reefs are 30' and deeper, there is little for snorkelers.) Most
of the diving is a short boat ride from the harbor, so you can take
your surface time on shore and quickly get to the next dive site
when you're ready.
It was five years since our last trip there, and our favorite
dive operation, Saba Deep,
was under new management. Fortunately Cheri and Tony still have the
same spirit of small boat dives that made us keep coming back.
During the days we were there there was often only the two of us in
the boat (indeed on one occasion there were three dive masters with
the two of us). The team is relaxed, loves diving, and are very
professional about it.
Swimming
among the rocks and lava outcrops at Tent Reef
Saba also has nice hiking trials that can fill a couple of days.
The most popular gives you the irresistible opportunity to hike to
the top of the tallest mountain in the Netherlands (around 3000 ft).
My favorite trail is the Sandy Cruz trail which loops around the
rain forest on the north slopes of Mount Scenery.
The island's vertical nature yields quite a few special
stories. Such as the island's road. They got Dutch civil engineers
to survey a road early this century and were told it couldn't be
built. So one of the islanders took a correspondence course in civil
engineering and the islanders built the road themselves. My wife (a
structural engineer) appreciated both the road and the Dutch
engineer's reaction - apparently that road would break just about
every building code in the US. The airstrip is a similar story, it's
the shortest landing strip you are ever likely to land on. Sit by
right hand window and you'll swear that that wing will scrape the
mountainside going in. But in 30 years there's never been an
accident.
Hiking
the Sandy Cruz trail
Another new experience for us was to stay at the Queen's Garden resort. It's an
extremely nice resort that does dive packages with Saba Deep and
we'll be happy to return there again. They offer good food, and
there's also good restaurants in Windwardside - we had good meals at
Brigadoon and Eden. We don't
expect it will be five years before we return.
(First version of this page published 2003-11-22.)