Nevis is a wonderful, lush, beautiful island with amazing people. We had a fun, relaxing trip and I will not hesitate to go back in the future.
Our trip started with a flight from Tampa to Nevis, with a layover SJU. No problems! After clearing thru customs in Nevis (tiny, but efficient airport), we grabbed a cab and got to our Villa, which was only about 5 or so minutes away. Our cab driver pulls off the road in front of a small hidden white picket fence. We walk thru and are greeted by an amazing yard full of fruit trees, flamboyant trees, Ylang Ylang trees and all sorts of other flowers, shrubs and tons of palms of all different kinds. It looked and smelled amazing. We met Denzil the gardener and caretaker of the property. What a great friend and reference he was for the week. It’s a great villa with a great location and highly recommend it. <a href="www.nevisbythesea.com" target="_blank">web page</a> We took a minute to look at the amazing pool and property and then dropped our stuff to walk across the street to Oualie Beach Resort for sundowners. We were on vacation after all….. <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/toast.gif" alt="" />












Most of our days started with a dip in the pool and usually ended with a dip in the pool while watching the sunset from our porch.
I can still smell the Ylang, Ylang trees, I dream about them. We would usually have some friends in the yard eating breakfast every morning, a group of Vervent monkeys. There are lots of them on this island, but they are a little skittish which was just fine with us. But pretty cool to watch. We found out one of them had attacked a neighbor’s dog the week prior. Bad monkeys!
Anyway, we took an island tour one day with Stedmore of Smile on Me Taxi and he did an amazing job. I have never seen so many beautiful, old churches. The oldest church in the Caribbean is on Nevis. I believe it was built in 1643.The name of the church is St. Thomas Church.

The main town of Charlestown in very busy during the day, even though it is a small area. The Horatio Nelson museum was very cool. I suggest checking it out, along with some of the other establishments. The tour took about a couple hours to cover the whole island. There is all kind of cool things in Nevis. From hot springs to Nevis Peak, many old sugar plantations that have been turned into quaint plantation inns and resorts and beautiful botanical gardens. The islands population is around 11,300 but it doesn’t feel like there is that many people there.
The main beaches on Nevis are Pinney’s, Nisbett and Oualie. At least these are the one’s we made it to thru out the week. I have to say that Oualie Beach is my favorite. Very calm blue water and nice even sand. Plus, it was 200 yards from our villa! It also has Oualie Beach Resort, which is convenient for drinks. More on Oualie later. This island has volcanic origins so the beaches are not as white and the water not as clear as some other islands I have been to. That being said, it is still gorgeous, light golden brown sand
Ok, on to more important stuff: Beach Bars/Restaurants. Pinney’s Beach definitely is the place to be and Sunshine’s Beach Bar is it. Great location, great people, great food and drinks. It’s right next to the Four Seasons (which we refused to go to for reasons that we learned from locals) They have tons of beach chairs, picnic tables and then some really cool cabana like seating with large, wooden u- shaped benches with huge cushions and pillows. They also have 2 resident dogs, which are sweet and love to be petted. I am an animal lover so this made me not miss my dog so much. Let me just say, you could really spend ALL DAY (which we did) and not even know it at Sunshine’s. The Killer Bee is great, but my favorite is Ting with Zing.


Down the beach a little is Chevy’s Calypso Beach Bar.http://www.myspace.com/chevys_calypso_bar We had one of the best lunches at Chevy’s. We thought we were just getting a chicken sandwich, boy were we wrong. The chicken had been marinated and mixed with some peppers and other stuff and it was served on fresh, French bread with a side salad and some roti style veggies. Unbelievable. I highly suggest checking out Chevy’s. Amelia Cheverton is the part owner along with her father. They are very nice, wonderful people. The place is just an open air, small place so don’t be put off by looks. Once you see Amelia and her great smile, you will be hooked.

One rainy day, we did our own island tour. There are so many small inns and plantations on this island. They are all gorgeous. Most of them are in the mountain areas with the exception of Nisbett Plantation, which is the only plantation in the Caribbean on the beach. It is amazing and very pricey. But if I were looking for ultimate luxury and romance (honeymoon), I would pick this place any day over the Four Seasons. You definitely must spend a day at Nisbett Beach and walk down to the coconut grove a half a mile and watch all the monkeys misbehaving. This beach in my opinion is the prettiest (white sand, clear blue water) on Nevis that we went to.
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Also stop at Montpelier Plantation.It is equally as gorgeous as Nisbett but it’s in the mountain area. Most of the inns in the mountain area do have private beach pavilions on Pinney’s or another beach with free transportation to and from.
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During our tour we stopped at Double Deuce Beach Bar. A little further down the beach on Pinney’s. It is kind of hard to find, but worth it. You have to walk across a little wooden bridge over a small lagoon and there it is. Hands down, the BEST burger I have ever had anywhere. No joke. They are half-pound of organic local beef topped with a secret pineapple and wild honey sauce. I ate the whole burger. We could not coax the recipe out of Lyndeta (part owner) or her staff, but needless to say, I will not have another burger until I go back to Double Deuce. Great rum punch and wonderful people. They also have beach chairs and freshwater showers, pool table and a rockin’ crowd on Thursday nights and full moon parties. It’s a very cool place no matter what time of day you go. The other items on the menu looked and smelled amazing as well.
One good thing about Nevis (maybe it’s just during low season) is that the resorts/restaurants all rotate when they have live entertainment. Monday’s its Chevy’s Tuesdays it’s Oalie Beach Resort, Wednesdays its Sunshine’s (really any day/night there is good) Thursday’s it’s Double Deuce late night and Nisbett Plantation for early evening steel pan band. We hit them all and then some. One great thing is that there was a huge mix of people from locals, to ex pats to tourists. I was pleasantly surprised at the amount of locals at these places and we got to meet and became friends with quite a lot of them. You see the same faces at all these places. We actually got invited to a couple local private parties and those were our most fun times. One was actually an employee appreciation party for Oalie Beach staff. We had no idea at the time and we found out, we were very honored they invited us.
I cannot say enough good things about the people at Oualie Beach Resort. http://www.oualiebeach.com/ I HIGHLY suggest this wonderful place. It is right on a beautiful beach. They have several small Caribbean style gingerbread cottages. Some have kitchenettes if you desire that. If I were not staying at a villa I would definitely stay there. It’s not terribly expensive and you cannot beat the location, food and people. Did I mention how great the staff was? We were not even staying there but they always treated us like we were. They have an awesome beach BBQ on Tuesdays that is not to be missed. This was our second home on Nevis.
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As far as nightlife is concerned, if you talk to the locals, you can find some fun places. A couple of them in Charlestown are Eddy’s and The Courtyard. Lot’s of good music and good drinks. We spent a couple late nights at The Courtyard and really enjoyed ourselves. It’s exactly as the name says, a huge open courtyard in the middle of town. You would never know from the entrance how cool it is when you get “inside.” There also is a constant smell of fresh baked bread from the bakery close by. Amazing. We also partied with a very famous actress one night. She was so cool and down to earth. Just like one of the girls. No I did not get a picture of her. I don’t take my camera out late night for obvious reasons…
We did a horse ride one day with the Gilbert’s who own www.ridenevis.com .The ride went along a couple of the beaches, up a small mountain and thru a coconut grove. This was probably one of my favorite things on this trip. It was surreal to be riding thru the coconut grove as it started to rain. I will take the sights and sounds of that with me the rest of my life. By the way, John Guilbert is also the curator of the Horatio Nelson museum so stop in and say hello.
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The trip was amazing, the people amazing and the island is gorgeous. One thing that was nerve racking was how fast the locals drive. I was scared at first, but got accustomed to it. I have never had to dodge so many heards of goats either. I mean it was crazy. I have seen lots of goats on other islands but never this many and they are everywhere.
It also did rain a little every day, but it would eventually clear up. We did not make it to St. Kitts but we did have an amazing view of it from our villa. One cool thing is Nevis Peak and the peak on St. Kitts were always shrouded in clouds.
We also got the beginnings of Tropical Storm Noel, but it didn’t dampen our spirits.
Our villa was great and just what we needed. We spent more time outside on the porch and at the pool than inside.
If you are interested in going to Nevis, check out this great website: www.nevis1.com


Sorry this has been so long, but I start typing and remembering all the fun we had!!