The Holiday and Its Makers
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THE Houonv AND ITS MAKERS: THE Touwsrs CHAPTER 6 stars and a predictable showbiz line-up of names like Julie Andrew% Michael Winner, Oliver Reed and Frank Sinatra. Luciano Pavarotti and his family stayed at Sandy Lane in February 1994. The Pavarottis had a suite (or two) on the 5ouud floor which looks out between mahogany trees to the beach. While the tenor The Holiday and Its Makers: frolicked in the sea - his face as pink as bougainvillaea, his beard bobbing above the swell - his gourmet privxe lunch on the ternce beyond the TheTourists splendour of his rooms was prepared: a white tent-like structure rose protectively like a giant parasol over a table set with linen and crystal. Two chefs from Sardinia cooked his pasta. Late afternoon, Grantley Adams International Airport, Barbados. The On the small gently curving beach, an elderly blonde woman in a American Airlines tlighr to New York has lefi, the very rich have black beach frock settles in to face the sun. She lies on a lounger tended departed by Concorde for London, and long queues form at the British by friendly elderly attendants in white hats like Spanish matadors. The Airways check-in desk for the overnight 5ight to Gatwick. Almost all the sunbathers are given a towel, asked whether they wish to lie in sun or passengers are white tourists, with skins rosied and bronzed by sunshine; shade and told IO display the yellow flag when they require service. some of the women and children have had their hair braided, a souvenir Security guards with walkie-talkies hover discreetly. The long, hot of ‘native’ style; the men carry outsize straw hats and are still wearing morning ends at the ocean-fronted restauranf where a ‘sumptuous lunch brightly patterned shorts and T-shirts with slogans such as ‘Life is a buffet’ is served. The days drift by amidst attentive service and courtesy. Beach’ or @muin’ Barbados’. Some hold duty-free Cockspur run, OI The west-coast tourists like luxury in bucketfuls. They stay in places gift-wrapped packs of flying fish, the Barb&m special& The final such as Sandy Lane, tucked away from normal life behind heavily holiday jokes and goodbyes have been said to taxi-driven, courien and guarded perimeter gates, with private drives of royal palms sweeping the representatives from the large tour operators such as Kuoni, down to marbled reception halls, swimming pools and fountains - and Thomson and Airtours. always beyond there is the Caribbean Sea. (Some of these hotels, The departing tourists are mainIy middle-aged, some are young although not Sandy Lane, are called ‘clubs’, a legacy of the days when honeymoon couples, there is a sprinkling of ftiends and family groups; you did not have to be a member but just the right colour to be admit- only a few look seriously wealthy, older perhaps with deeper tans, linen ted.) Even more exclusive arc the private homer. An example is Heron suits, golf clubs or tennis racquets. But for the most part the tourists, like Bay, the USQO million holiday home of Sir Anthony Barnford, whose most visitors these days to the Caribbean, are ordinary folk on a family made money out of steel beam supports. Guests such as Joan two-week package holiday. They have had, for the most paa, a 5eat Collins drop in to stay in a cottage in the grounds for New Year and to time. party with the likes of Rocco Forte (whose family owns Sandy Lane), Barbados, one of the earliest Caribbean holiday destinations, now David Frost and Robert Sangsfer at the Carambola Restaurant. For those attracts a broad tourist base: from south-coast cheap and cheerful, L399 rho care, ‘winter’ in the Caribbean retains its snobbish ring. each for 14 nights, flight and room (three sharing) at the Firholme Hotel They do it differently on the south coast at places like the Firholme and Studios, Maxwell, to west-coast super-luxury snobbery at Sandy Hotel, whose clientele is about as likely to tuck into a Sandy Lane buffet --i Lane Hotel g3,252 for seven nights, flight and halfboard), probably the as a Barbadian cane-cutter is. The south coasters pour off the charter most exclusive ‘property’ on the island. flights on the cheaper package tours. They tend to stay in modest Opened in 1961, Sandy Lane was built on a former sugar estate srrlf-cateting hotels and condos (not all on the beach), nip across to the (another example ofhow history links the old plantocracy with the new), supermarkets for tins of spaghetti hoops, have a day out on the wild east a two-storey P&dim creation built iu local stone, recently refurbished coast in their hired mini-moke, eat at Chefette’s takeaway facing a in a style where It&mate meets Laura Ashley. Both old and new money turquoise sea, sunbathe at Rockley Beach, drink rum punch at a pirate hole up at Sandy Lane: European aristocracy, American financiers, sports party aboard the Jolly Roger, dine on ribs and pasta, burgers and garlic bread, and have cocktails called Thousand Flushes or Bajan Silk Panty. At 136 137 LAST RESORTS: TOURISM IN THE CARWBEAN I Tm HOUDAV AND ITS MAKERS: THE TOURISTS night, they disco and karaoke at the Reggae Lounge, the Ship Inn with ofwhom come from the Atlantic seaboard states and the mid-West, like ‘the feel of an old English pub’ or Harbour Lights (‘exclusive open air puem Rico (29 per cent of all US stayoven) and the Bahamas (17 per beachfront club with top live entertainment’). ‘ent), with 9 per cent going to Jamaica and 8 per cent to the Dominican Between these extremes of holiday style are middle-class families with Republic. children or older people escaping the northern winter. At Wortbing, a Europeans spread themselves more widely. In 1993, the British liked Canadian widow sunbathes by the pool of an ‘apartment hotel’, pmaica (114,000) best, while Barbados (lOO,OOO), long the favowite overlooking Dover Beach. ‘This is my eighteenth visit. I come for four destination, fell to second place. The next most popular destinations weeks every year and have already put my deposit down for next year.’ were Antigua and Barbuda (50,300), St Lucia (49,000), both of which She Gods Barbados congenial and ‘very British’; the sandwiches are made bad grown considerably in popularity, and the Bahamas (40,000). These of nice thin bread and the tea is good. Over the yean, things have five destinations, all former British colonies, accounted for 69.2 per cent changed, she says. ‘The beaches are emptier but the supermarkets are of all tourists visiting the region from the UK. The least known for the better stocked and the roads and pavements have improved.’ A British British were the Dutch Antilles and the French Caribbean. couple with two children who stayed on the west and south coasts Germans tend to favour the Dominican Republic (143,404 through (‘They assume you’re richer on the west coast’) in self-catering Puerta Plats alone) and Cuba (63,003). Three English-speaking islands accommodation had found the island friendly and safe. ‘We were never came next in popularity: Jamaica (36,140), the Bahamas (36,015) and made to feel uncomfortable. We hired a car, shopped locally and felt very Barbados (28,920). These five accounted for 76.1 per cent ofall German much at home. Everyone was very helpful.’ tourists to the Caribbean in 1993. For the French, the most popular Tourists to Barbados, representing around 5 per cent of all stayover destinations were Maainique, Guadeloupe and Cuba, while the Domin- visitors to the whole region. come from all over the world. In 1993, ican Republic also gained ground.’ there were 395,979 of them (compared to 50,000 in 1963, 222,080 in Traditionally, most visitors arrived during the long northern winters. 1973 and 328,338 in 1983). More than 40 per cent came from Europe, This was the pattern set by the super-rich before the arrival of long-haul predominantly the UK; 29 per cent from the USA; 12 per cent from jets. Now, the Bahamas can be reached from Florida in under an hour Canada; and less than 20 per cent from the rest of the world, including while New York is only four hours from Jamaica. Even for Europeans, the Caribbean itself and Latin America. There were even a few Japanese travrlling times are manageable, with the Eastern Caribbean only nine and South Africans.’ hours’ flying time away. This has changed the profile of the Caribbean For the Caribbean as a whole, a slightly different pattern emerges. The holiday-maker; now, even those with short holidays and average incomes USA provides the majority of stayover visitors (52.4 per cent in 1993); can afford it. Americans average around one week in the region and Europe (17 per cent); and Canada (5.8 per cent). Some 8 per cent of Europeans nearly two weeks. visiton that year came from within the Caribbean, with 16.5 per cent The other change that accessibility has brought is that the Caribbean is being either ‘other’ or unspeciiied.’ no longer an exclusively winter destination. The busy ‘bigh season’ from While the USA remains the most important market, its share has December to March remains the fashionable time to be in the Caribbean, shrunk. In contrast, the European market has expanded. In 1993 more but arrivals are now much more evenly spread over the year. The than two and a quarter million Europeans visited the region; three times su*nmer, with its lower rates, is also popular, especially with first-timers more than in 1985.