Romantic Plantation Inns of Nevisby Judy Babcock Wylie
Nevis is just two miles across the water from St. Kitts, in the north end of the Leeward islands in the Eastern Caribbean. At one time this 36 -square mile island produced more sugar than all other Caribbean islands together. This lasted from 1750 to around 1820, after which Britain's emancipation laws prevented ownership of slaves, and Europe was turning more to sugar beets to satisfy its sweet tooth. The islanders are easygoing and friendly but you may be confused at first by their North England accent. After World War II Nevisians could get an English passport and many emigrated to the Manchester area of England. Later many families came back to the island, but their accents linger. Whether or not you stay at a plantation inn, you'll want to tour them for their history and have a drink or a meal on their stone verandahs with spectacular views . Here are four of my favorites. Nisbet Plantation Beach Club Dinner in the former plantation house is an elegant and languorous affair, the air dense with the sweet scent of flowers and the mild drone of overhead fans moving the languid air. Dinner is served on rich, dark Caribbean mahogany tables. I began dinner with the creamy chilled Nevisian Soursop soup, made from a sweet-tart fruit like a melon., and continued with blackened grouper with kiwi and mango relish. You're likely to hear local string band music in the evenings, which includes guitars, a ukulele, a tambourine, a hand -made flute, and a banjo, with a piece of PVC pipe providing the base notes. Breakfast or lunch is served at Coconuts, an informal eatery near the beach, where breezes waft past your table as you dine on fresh fish and local lobster. The thirty acres of the Nisbet Plantation Beach Club, after its life as a sugar plantation, was later a coconut plantation that sold copra. But in 1950, a wealthy Maltese woman, Mary Pomeroy bought it and in 1953 turned it into an inn. Mary was a free spirit who flew her own plane, loved to land it in the alley between coconut palms, and was known to sit on the front porch of her plantation with a shotgun, ready to shoot people caught poaching her coconuts. She was rumored to have been an international spy during World War II. She sold the inn hurriedly in 1968 when political tides in Nevis turned against her, and later mysteriously disappeared. Later the Barnum family of circus fame owned it. It is now owned by the Minister of Tourism for Bermuda. Montpelier Plantation Inn Golden Rock Plantation Inn Hermitage Plantation Inn Island Experiences
At the other end of the scale is Miss June's where the local hostess Miss June, over 70 years old, hosts dinner twice a week in her home, including a buffet of 30 West Indian dishes, social conversation, and demitasse and after- dinner drinks in the living room later, much as if you were invited to a private party. It costs $75 per person but is worth it. Local music wafts through the air and Miss June tells stories full of island lore. If you want to go native and eat a popular local dish, try "Goatwater" which our guide Leon said was his favorite dish. It's a stew made of yams, spice and potatoes, and served on Saturdays in local restaurants.
Department of Tourism, St. Kitts and Nevis (New York Regional Office) Nisbet Plantation Montpelier Plantation Inn Golden Rock Hotel Four Seasons Resort Nevis Hermitage Plantation Inn |
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On the tiny island of Nevis in the Eastern Caribbean, the trees are full of Green monkeys and tree frogs sit in water at the crux of the trees, singing merrily all night long. Ruins of old stone sugar cane mills provide romantic scenery, hammocks swing under coconut palms, and the shallow waters offshore harbor lobster and octopus. Sprawling former sugar plantation great houses and cottages provide lovely lodgings, and black sand beaches reveal the island's origins as a series of volcanic eruptions over 2 ½ million years ago. It's a recipe for romance. 
An old great house sits in front of a long expanse of lawn dotted with coconut palms, and which runs down to the sea. The Nisbet Plantation Great House was built in 1778, on land that included a sugar mill that crushed sugar cane for juice. The lodgings are in wooden cottages, each named for plantation estates on the island. A premier cottage l has AC, a raised bed, a big bath, rattan furniture and a big sitting area. The resort hugs a mile of white coral sand beach, and is the only hotel on it. Service at Nisbet is gracious but unaffected, not surprising since there is a long tradition: six staff current staff people had great-grandfathers who worked here.
Golden Rock Plantation Inn has the island's best honeymoon suite, a two -story affair made of lava rock, with two round rooms, rough wood floors and view of the ocean from a window seat with pillows, all built inside in an old sugar mill chimney. The mahogany four- poster bed was made here. Owner Pam Barry's great great great grandfather was Edward Huggins, who built many of the local sugar mills. The land, at the edge of a misty rain forest, houses only seven cottages. The surroundings are lush, boasting 50 varieties of mango trees alone. Any visit includes a chat with Pam's parrot. 
Two wonderful personal experiences in dining on Nevis are at extreme ends of the social spectrum. At Sunshine's on the beach next to the Four Seasons Nevis, locals and visitors are encouraged to kick back, sit at one of the plywood tables, wriggle their toes in the sand and have a local lager or a "Killer Bee," made of rum, passion fruit, lime juice and angostura bitters. while you play dominoes or checkers with young locals. The hip, bearded proprietor, who goes by the name "Sunshine" boasts the "Best fried chicken on the island". But he also serves lobster and other local seafood.
The best views on Nevis are saved for those who hike the Upper Round Road Trail, which follows a road built in the late 1600s to provide access to estates and cane fields that once surrounded Nevis Peak. As you hike, you'll see cashew nut trees, balsa wood trees, and also coconut palms, which were once important in the cosmetic trade . You'll see "jumby beads" a plant that has a flower that looks like a red eyeball of spirits, and star grass, with tiny white star like flowers. You're likely to see wild goats and may see the shy African Green monkey or the quicker Mongoose. The trail is a project of the Nevis Historical and Conservation Society. But romance is not far no matter where you walk in Nevis. Just look up, and you'll see the dreamy white crown of clouds that caused the Spanish explorers to name this island Nevis, from the Spanish for "Our Lady of the Snows."