Amazing Antigua

 We docked this morning in Antigua and  this was the view from  our  balcony 

Antigua  is  a  tiny island., only 11 miles by 14 miles. The majority  of the population  live in the capital,  St John.  Industry  used to be  sugar production,  but that ended in 1970 and  today tourism  accounts for  75% of the  economy. 

Antigua's national sport is cricket, and the island is the home of legendary cricketer Sir Viv Richards.  Strangely, none of the Americans on the bus had heard of him.  You'd think they didn't play cricket in America or something.   When I was a teenager I had a season ticket at Glamorgan County Cricket Club and the West Indies cricket team were touring the UK that summer.  I went over to Swansea cricket ground to watch the Windies take on Glamorgan - it was a weekend and the carnival was going past on the seafront road outside the ground.  After Viv Richards had hit 2 6's in a row out of the ground and  into floats, they had to stop the game for 15 minutes until the carnival floats had all gone past.  Swansea cricket ground is also famous for being the place where another great West Indian cricketer, Gary Sobers, once hit 6 6's in an over off Glamorganshire bowler Malcolm Nash.   Perhaps I should stop talking about Glamorgan Cricket Club's "achievements"....

Our included tour today was a bus trip around the  island visiting  the most beautiful  spots like Shirley's heights - which overlooks  English Bay.

Then we went  to  Nelson's  docklands. This is the  best preserved  Georgian Era dockyard in the world  and was home  to  the  British  Navy Caribbean  Fleet  during the 1700s and 1800s. Today the dockyard is a UNESCO world heritage site and  as part of our visit  we were treated to  some Antiguan rum punch.  We'll after  having a Pina colada in  San Juan I could  hardly  refuse a rum punch  in  Antigua  could I?

The bus dropped us off near the  dock and we  took a short detour to  see St John's  cathedral before  heading  back to the ship.