17 Best Sights in St. Vincent, St. Vincent and the Grenadines

One of the oldest botanical gardens in the Western Hemisphere is just north of downtown Kingstown—a few minutes by taxi. The garden was created in 1765 by General Robert Melville, governor of the British Caribbean islands, after Captain Bligh—of Bounty fame—brought the first breadfruit tree to this island for landowners to propagate. The prolific bounty of the breadfruit trees was used to feed the slaves. You can see a direct descendant of the original tree among the specimen mahogany, rubber, teak, and other tropical trees and shrubs in the 20 acres of gardens. Two dozen rare St. Vincent parrots (Amazona guildingii), confiscated from illegal collections, live in the small aviary. Guides explain all the medicinal and ornamental trees and shrubs; they also appreciate a tip (about $5 per person) at the end of the tour. A gift shop, open Monday through Friday, has local crafts, artwork, books, confections, and a traditional creole lunch menu.

One of the oldest botanical gardens in the Western Hemisphere is just north of downtown Kingstown, a few minutes by taxi. The garden was created in 1765 by General Robert Melville, governor of the British Caribbean islands, after Captain Bligh—of HMS Bounty fame—brought the first breadfruit tree to this island for landowners to propagate. The prolific bounty of the breadfruit trees was used to feed the enslaved workers. You can see a direct descendant of the original tree among the specimens of mahogany, rubber, teak, and other tropical trees and shrubs across 20 acres of gardens. Two dozen rare St. Vincent parrots (Amazona guildingii), confiscated from illegal collections, live in the small aviary. Guides explain all the medicinal and ornamental trees and shrubs. A gift shop (open weekdays) has local crafts, artwork, books, confections, and a traditional creole lunch menu.

Started by the French in 1786 and completed by the British in 1806, the fort was ultimately named for Britain's Queen Charlotte, wife of King George III. It sits on Berkshire Hill, a dramatic promontory 2 miles (3 km) north of Kingstown and 636 feet above sea level, affording a stunning view of the capital city and the Grenadines. Interestingly, its cannons face inland, as the fear of attack—by the French and their Carib allies—from the ridges above Kingstown was far greater than any threat approaching from the sea. In any case, the fort saw no action. Nowadays, it serves as a signal station for ships; the ancient cells house historical paintings of the island by Lindsay Prescott.

Welsh-born landscape designer Timothy Vaughn renovated 7½ acres of neglected commercial flower beds and a falling-down plantation house into a stunning, yet informal, garden spot. Anthurium, ginger lilies, bird-of-paradises, and other tropical flowers are planted in raised beds; tree ferns create a canopy of shade along the walkways. The gardens are in the shadow of majestic Grand Bonhomme Mountain, deep in the Mesopotamia Valley, about 12 miles (19 km) from Kingstown.

At Rawacou Bay, close to Argyle International Airport, two stunning black-sand, high-surf beaches are separated by a rocky headland with a trail down to a man-made lagoon—a swimming pool created by placing huge boulders in the sea to prevent the high surf from smashing against the shore. The water by the beaches isn't safe for swimming, but the lagoon pool is; however, be cautious when the surrounding water is particularly rough. The beautiful grounds of Rawacou Recreation Park, shaded by coconut and sea grape trees, include a performance venue, a volleyball court, and vendor huts. The park is a popular site for picnics, weekend parties, and special events. Amenities: food and drink; parking; showers; toilets. Best for: partiers; swimming; walking.

Once an important whaling village, Barrouallie (bar-relly) today is home to fishermen earning their livelihoods trawling for blackfish, which are actually small pilot whales. The one-hour drive north from Kingstown on the Leeward Highway takes you along ridges that drop to the sea, through small villages and green valleys, and beside quiet bays with black-sand beaches and safe bathing.

In 1815, under the supervision of British Colonel Thomas Browne, Carib and African slaves drilled a 360-foot tunnel through solid volcanic rock—an engineering marvel at the time—to facilitate the transportation of sugar from estates in the north to the port in Kingstown. Today, Black Point Tunnel (also known as Jasper Rock Tunnel) is the centerpiece of Black Point Historic and Recreation Park, which also has an interpretation center, children's playground, and bathrooms. The tunnel, just off beautiful (black-sand) Black Point Beach between Georgetown and Colonarie (pronounced con-a-ree), links Grand Sable with Byrea Bay. The park—a film location for the film Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl—is about an hour's drive from Kingstown and is open daily, 7 am to 5:30 pm.

Swimming at Black Point Beach is unsafe due to high surf and strong ocean currents.

St. Vincent's second-largest city (and former capital), halfway up the island's windward (Atlantic) coast and surrounded by acres and acres of coconut groves, Georgetown is a convenient place to stop for a cool drink or snack or other essential shopping while traveling along the windward coast. It is also the site of the now-defunct Mount Bentinck sugar factory. A tiny, quiet town with a few small shops, a restaurant or two, and modest homes, Georgetown is completely unaffected by tourism.

South of Kingstown and separated from Villa Beach by a rocky promontory, Indian Bay has golden sand but is slightly rocky in some places; it's very good for snorkeling. La Vue Hotel & Beach Club, high on a cliff overlooking Indian Bay Beach, operates a beach bar and grill. Amenities: food and drink; toilets. Best for: snorkeling; swimming.

The capital of St. Vincent & the Grenadines, a city of 16,500 residents, wraps around Kingstown Bay on the island's southwestern coast; a ring of green hills and ridges studded with homes forms a backdrop for the city. This is very much a working city, with a busy harbor and few concessions to tourists. Kingstown Harbour is the only deepwater port on the island.

A few gift shops can be found on and around Bay Street, near the harbor. Upper Bay Street, which stretches along the bayfront, bustles with daytime activity—workers going about their business and housewives doing their shopping. Many of Kingstown's downtown buildings are built of stone or brick brought to the island as ballast in the holds of 18th-century ships and replaced with sugar and spices for the return trip to Europe. The Georgian-style stone arches and second-floor overhangs on former warehouses—which provide shelter from midday sun and the brief, cooling showers common to the tropics—have earned Kingstown the nickname "City of Arches."

Grenadines Wharf, at the south end of Bay Street, is busy with ships loading supplies and ferries loading people bound for the Grenadines. The Cruise-Ship Complex, adjacent to the commercial wharf, has a mall with a dozen or more shops, plus restaurants, communications facilities, and a taxi stand.

A huge selection of produce fills the noisy, colorful Kingstown Market, a three-story building that takes up a whole city block on Upper Bay, Hillsboro, and Bedford Streets in the center of town. The market is open Monday through Saturday, but the busiest times (and the best times to go) are Friday and Saturday mornings. In the courtyard, vendors sell local arts and crafts. On the upper floors, merchants sell clothing, household items, gifts, and other products.

St. George's Cathedral, on Grenville Street, is a pristine, creamy yellow Anglican church built in 1820. The dignified Georgian architecture includes simple wooden pews, an ornate chandelier, and beautiful stained-glass windows; one was a gift from Queen Victoria, who actually commissioned it for London's St. Paul's Cathedral in honor of her first grandson. When the artist created an angel with a red robe, she was horrified by the color and sent the window abroad. The markers in the cathedral's graveyard recount the history of the island. Across the street is St. Mary's Roman Catholic Cathedral of the Assumption, built in stages beginning in 1823. The strangely appealing design is a blend of Moorish, Georgian, and Romanesque styles applied to black brick. Nearby, freed slaves built the Kingstown Methodist Church in 1841. The exterior is brick, simply decorated with quoins (solid blocks that form the corners), and the roof is held together by metal straps, bolts, and wooden pins. Scots Kirk was built from 1839 to 1880 by and for Scottish settlers but became a Seventh-Day Adventist church in 1952.

This towering volcano, which erupted in April 2021, is 4,048 feet high and so huge in area that its surrounding mountainside covers virtually the entire northern third of the island. The eastern trail to the rim of the crater, a two-hour ascent from Rabacca Dry River, was a fairly easy trail until the volcano's recent eruption—which spewed thick ash and gases over northern St. Vincent. The trail has reopened, but is now far more challenging as most of it was swept away during the eruption.

Just off the main road beyond the small fishing village of Layou, about 30 minutes north of Kingstown and just north of Buccament Bay, petroglyphs (rock carvings) were carved into a giant boulder by Amerindian inhabitants sometime between AD 300 and 600. The petroglyphs are on UNESCO's tentative World Heritage Convention list; the meaning of the carvings remains unknown.

The rugged, ocean-lashed scenery along St. Vincent's windward coast is the perfect counterpoint to the calm leeward coast. In between, the fertile Mesopotamia Valley (nicknamed Mespo) affords a view of dense rain forests, streams, and endless banana and coconut plantations. Breadfruit, sweet corn, peanuts, and arrowroot also grow in the rich soil here. Mountain ridges, including 3,181-foot Grand Bonhomme Mountain, surround the valley.

In the village of Owia on the island's far northeastern coast and at least a two-hour drive from Kingstown, Owia Salt Pond is a natural saltwater pool created by the pounding surf of the Atlantic Ocean overflowing a barrier reef of lava rocks and ridges. The Owia Salt Pond Recreational Site, 217 steps up from the pond, has a peaceful garden with gazebos, a children's play area, and a surrounding forest that protects the steep slopes. The village itself is the home of many descendants of the indigenous Kalinago (Carib) people, as well as the home of the Owia Arrowroot Processing Factory (one of six such plants in St. Vincent). Long used to thicken sauces and flavor cookies, arrowroot is now also used in pharmaceutical products. St. Vincent produces 90% of the world's supply of arrowroot, but that is only a tiny fraction of the maximum levels exported in the 1960s. Take a pleasant swim in Owia Salt Pond and enjoy a picnic lunch on the adjacent grounds before the long return trip to Kingstown.

This rocky gulch just north of Georgetown was carved from the earth by lava flow from the 1902 volcanic eruption of nearby La Soufrière (which most recently erupted in April 2021). When it rains in the mountains, the riverbed changes from dry moonscape to a trickle of water to a gushing river—all within minutes—and then simply dries up again. Before the Rabacca Dry River Bridge opened in 2007, drivers would often get stranded on one side or the other whenever it rained.

The long stretch of sand in front of the row of hotels facing the Young Island Channel (Mariners, Paradise Beach, Sunset Shores, and Beachcombers on the "mainland" and Young Island Resort across the channel) varies from 20 to 25 feet wide to practically nonexistent. The broadest, sandiest part is in front of Beachcombers Hotel, which is also the perfect spot for sunbathers to get lunch and liquid refreshments. Villa Beach is a popular beach destination for cruise-ship passengers when a ship is in port. Amenities: food and drink; water sports; toilets; showers. Best for: swimming.

The Wallilabou Estate, halfway up the island's leeward coast, once produced cocoa, cotton, and arrowroot. Today, it is Wallilabou Heritage Park, a recreational site with a river and a small waterfall, which creates a small pool where you can take a freshwater plunge. You can also sunbathe, swim, picnic, or buy your lunch at Wallilabou Anchorage—a favorite stop for boaters staying overnight. The Pirates of the Caribbean movies left their mark on Wallilabou (pronounced wally-la-BOO), a location used for filming the opening scenes of The Curse of the Black Pearl in 2003. Many of the buildings and docks built as stage sets remain, giving Wallilabou Bay (a port of entry for visiting yachts) an intriguingly historical (if ersatz) appearance that's especially fun for kids.