Saint Barthélemy

Columbus named the island in 1493 for his brother Bartolomeo. Too dry and rocky for plantations, it was settled from the 1650s by poor French families from Normandy and Brittany who lived by fishing, salt, and subsistence farming. Because there was little plantation agriculture, slavery played only a minor role, and the island retained a large population of white, French-descended smallholders with their own customs and dress.

In 1784 France ceded Saint Barthélemy to Sweden in exchange for trading rights in Gothenburg. Sweden made Gustavia — named for King Gustav III — a free port and ran the island for nearly a century before selling it back to France in 1878. It was then administered as a dependency of Guadeloupe.

American visitors, beginning with the Rockefeller family in the 1950s, and later a wider jet-set crowd, discovered the island and shaped a deliberately low-density, high-spending tourism model — no large hotels, no big cruise ships, no casinos. In 2007 residents voted to separate from Guadeloupe, and Saint Barthélemy became its own French overseas collectivity with fiscal autonomy. In 2012 it moved from EU outermost-region status to that of an EU overseas country and territory. Hurricane Irma battered the island in September 2017, and it rebuilt quickly and upmarket.

French is the language of administration and daily life, and the island is Catholic and culturally very French. The small permanent population — around 10,000 — includes old "Saint-Barth" families, some of whose older women still wear the quichenotte sunbonnet and among whom a Norman-rooted patois lingers, alongside metropolitan French residents and a Portuguese and West Indian workforce.

Sailing and fishing are the heritage, and the calendar turns on the harbour and the regattas — the Bucket, Les Voiles de Saint-Barth — as well as Carnival, the music festival, and Pitea Day, which keeps up the link with the Swedish town. The culture of the visitor economy is understated wealth: beach clubs, villas, and long lunches rather than nightlife spectacle.

About 10,000 people live on the island, with tiny Gustavia as the capital and port. The economy is luxury tourism — villas and small hotels — the duty-free harbour, and construction. There is no French income tax for qualifying residents, and property prices are among the highest in the Caribbean.

Almost everything is imported, much of it transhipped through Sint Maarten, and fresh water comes from a desalination plant and household cisterns. Getting around means a small car or scooter on steep, narrow roads. Crime is close to nonexistent, and life outside the high season is quiet and village-like.

French bistro and fine dining set the tone, with excellent seafood — spiny lobster, mahi-mahi, snapper — and imported French produce, cheese, and wine. Creole cooking appears in accras, boudin, and colombo curry. The beach clubs range from the see-and-be-seen to the more natural settings at Saline and Gouverneur.

Fresh baguettes and pastries are a daily fixture, rosé is drunk by the case in season, and the ti-punch — rum, cane syrup, and lime — is the standard aperitif.

Gustavia is a compact, red-roofed harbour town with Swedish-era street names, the three surviving hilltop forts (Karl, Oscar, and Gustav), the Wall House museum, and the boutiques along the quay. The beaches, small but choice, are the other draw: wild, undeveloped Anse du Gouverneur and Anse de Grande Saline, with no buildings or facilities; lively St Jean, split by the airport approach, where aircraft skim the ridge just above the sand; calm Flamands; and Colombier, reached only by trail or boat.

The short, steep landing at Gustaf III Airport is a spectacle in its own right. The old fishing village of Corossol keeps some traditional life, the island's nature reserve protects turtle-nesting beaches and the Grand Cul-de-Sac lagoon for snorkelling, and the spring regattas fill the harbour with classic and racing yachts.