Recently I was in the very fortunate position to visit the island of Saba here in the Caribbean. If you love tranquility, hiking and diving, Saba might be the place for you to visit.
The island of Saba is located in the north east Caribbean, and is actually Dutch territory. This means it still falls under the Dutch flag, but to be honest you hardly can see any of this. Only 1500 residents live here, and an additional 1500 medical students temporary live here. This means almost everybody knows each other, and therefore there is hardly any criminal activity going on.
Imagesource: Wikipedia
The island is an old died out volcano with not a single flat area on it. It looks like there is a mountain sticking straight out of the sea, the hills are steep.
View from the plane. You fly so damn close to the walls
Getting to Saba
Saba is not very easy to reach. This is mostly because there is not a lot of demand for transportation. A 2 hour ferry trip from Sint Martin or a 12 minute flight from Sint Martin are the easiest ways of getting there. When Im saying easiest way of transportation, this is only literally. The boat ride is like being tumbled in a washing machine for hours, since the sea is extremely rough in this channel, getting seasick is very likely on this ferry.
We reached the unspoiled Queen!!
When flying to Saba, expect the craziest thing you could ever imagine. The Saba runway is only 397 meters long, and on the edge of a cliff. This means only special planes, and specially trained pilots are able to land here. When flying from Sint Martin you fly directly into the mountain, and just before crashing into it, you take the steepest downward turn to the left you can ever imagine. Not a good one if you have fear of flying like myself!
Here is my Dtube video about this flight
https://steemit.com/dtube/@karinxxl/xw7di8ia
20 Persons max container with wings. Not suitable for claustrophobics!!
Also take off from this cliff is ridiculous. You literally need every inch of the runway. The planes engines are on high speed already before the pilot releases the breaks and you get catapulted towards the end of the cliff. You dont take off, you just literally drive off the cliff, drop a little, and then ascend. I though I would have a heart attack, but I guess Im still alive after all ;)
Not an inch to spare of this runway
So after this trip from hell, why on earth would you even want to go to Saba??
The main reason why people go to Saba is just to chill, to hike and to go diving. Saba is almost like a atol and it has a steep underwater cliff surrounding the island called the Saba bank. This bank has a lot of wildlife and coral on it, so is a must do for diving fans. It is not really something for beginning divers, because the underwater current is very strong. Im not really into diving myself, so I let this be. I did enjoy the view of all the boats getting out, and I even saw a diving class for their PADI in a pool. Very cool to see all the exercises the students have to do before they are set free into the ocean.
Licenseplate from a Saban car. Not even close to a normal Dutch licenseplate
Hiking
Hiking on Saba is just extraordinary! The main route people tend to do is the hike to the top of Mount Scenery. What is cool about this summit, is that is actually the highest point of Holland. Hardly any Dutchies know this, most people think the Vaalserberg in Limburg is the highest point of Holland. But since Saba is an actual 'gemeente' of Holland, Mount Scenery is indeed the highest point of the Dutch Kingdom.
Read more about this hike here:
https://busy.org/@karinxxl/walk-with-me-to-mount-scenery
This sign you will find at the summit. Vaals located in Holland, Mount Scenery in the Caribbean. Both Dutch but miles apart!
The hike up to there is absolutely stunning. The most common route up is walking the Saba stairs. This is a 1064 stair trail going through the jungle all the way up. Yes jungle I said, with all kinds of rain forest vegetation, and even (harmless) snakes along the way. To me this trail up is not the coolest one to do, you also have other hikes that are not only stairs, which also end somewhere on the stair trail. A little bit more diversity never hurted anyone, right?
The Mount Scenery radiotower, most of the time in the clouds
On top of Mount Scenery is a radio tower. There is no road towards the summit, so everything on this tower is brought up to there by hand. The story is that tourists were even offered money to take a bag of cement with them while hiking up.
The climate for hiking is also perfect. Saba has a daytime temperature of around 24 degrees Celsius due to its altitude. In combination of the shade from the trees, any time of the day is perfect to go hiking. Never go alone though, and do not go after heavy rain. The trails tends to get slippery, and they are not very busy. I went hiking for two days straight, and didnt see a single human soul on the same path.
A bit of clouds while gazing over Windwardside town
The view on the 877 summit is often in a cloud, so dont feel disappointed. Also when we were there, it was very cloudy only around the summit. The combination of the clouds and the height literally made me dizzy, planes and heights are not my strongest point ;)
Where to stay in Saba?
Saba only has 80 hotelbeds on the whole island. This means you can not just go there and look for spot to stay. You really have to check this in advance before going. Customs will ask you where you are going to stay on arrival. They know every sleeping place, but also know every resident, so you cant really fool them. Just so you know ;)
Queens Garden in the evening. Cool lighting in a fairytale environment
The Queens Garden
We treated ourselves on a stay at the Queens Garden. This is the most luxurious resort on the island, which also often houses the Dutch Royal family. If you ever have some cash for spare (or good connections), this is THE place to go. Exquisite service, delicious food and drinks and beautiful rooms. Every room has a half outdoor private Jacuzzi. If you ever want to feel like a celebrity, seriously just go there. You wont regret this for one second!
Need I say more??
http://queensaba.com will get you all additional info on this one!
I will dedicate a separate post to this place, because it deserves so much more attention on how cool it is.
Saba after the hurricane
As well as almost every other northern Caribbean island, Saba was also hit quite hard buy hurricane Irma. But now 5 months afterwards, you hardly see any of this. The island is perfectly green again, while all trees and bushes had lost all their leaves. The whole island was brown after the hurricane. Luckily for Saba they had put all their electricity lines underground in 2016. This means that after the hurricane in about 3,5 hours internet was back, and in 6 hours the whole island had their electricity back. Compare this to Sint Martin where after 5 months still some areas do not have electricity, this is extraordinary. Only 6 or 7 houses had severe damage to their roofs because of the diamond shape of the roofs, this prevents the wind from taking it. The road are clean with no potholes in it, I did not see any debris anywhere on the mountain. Saba is just maintained perfectly!
One of the 1 million fantastic views
Funfacts about Saba
- Because of the small population, Saba has a lot of issues with inbreed reproducing. Half of the population has the last name Hassell or Johnson. People started developing birth defects because of the inbreed and a lot of Dominican ladies were 'imported' to extend the variety of the population.
- After hurricane Irma, ships were not able to reach the island for a while. The supply of Heineken dried up, and the population shifted over to drinking Hennesy. A sharp increase of barfights was the result of this, people were not used to drinking hard liquor. Dont take away the Heineken from Sabans.!!
- Nobody on Saba locks their car or house, ever!
- Saba has one main road, leading from airportside in the east through the south to the westpart of the island. The northern part of the island is not reachable by car. This road was only built in the 1950'. A Saban guy homeschooled himself in road building principles, and from there everything was built by hand.
All houses in Saba are required to have a red roof, an other fun fact
And so on, and so on! I really loved the place!! Do you want to read more about Saba?? Stay tuned the next couple of days.
All images are taken by me 