The approach, especially if you are sitting on the right side of the plane, will bring a prayer to your lips - prayer that the wing will not hit the mountain.
Not to worry: The plane always makes a smooth landing on what must be the world's smallest commercial runway, which is overshadowed by 100-foot cliffs. The plane taxis for about 6 inches, then turns toward the dollhouselike international terminal of Saba (pronounced say-ba). The island, a 5-square-mile rock in the Caribbean, is about a 14-minute flight south from St. Maarten and well worth the harrowing arrival.
Once on the ground in Saba, it is necessary to navigate the Road. Josephus Lambert Hassell, who took a correspondence course in road-building, designed it. It took 25 years to build the Road, which is hand-swept daily.
Its concrete ribbons and 14 hairpin turns lead to the main towns of the Bottom, Windwardside and Hells Gate. On the way to the towns, there is a view of the Great Wall of Saba, the poor man's answer to China's version.
But though the airplane landing and the Road are thrill rides, most people come to Saba to relax, dive and hike. Underwater sites and visibility are extraordinary. Sea walls drop to about 1,000 feet just a mile from shore, and Saba Marine Park maintains sites that include shoals, reefs and corals.
Since everything is on a slant on Saba, hiking is a given. Its most famous trek is up Mount Scenery, the peak of the rock that is Saba. This hike is 1,064 steps to the top, 2,855 feet above sea level.
The Crispeen Trail ends just above village of the Bottom, which is actually located about halfway up the mountain. The trail passes through lush greenery and the new Ecolodge Rendez-Vous Lodge, where the bellhop is a donkey named Brownie.
Goats occupy the Sulphur Mine Trail, which weaves alongside the mountain to an abandoned mine, now home to a bat colony.
Maps are available at the Trail Shop in Windwardside, where they show the must-see, 1937 documentary It's True. Back then, the island's ratio of women to men was 11-1. Every new male on the island was treated like a king. Women operated the island businesses.
If a woman hoped to land a man, she had to do three things: tat lace, cook and brew a mean Saba Spice, which features 151-proof rum.
Saba lace and Saba Spice now are among the island's best souvenirs, and quality cuisine still thrives. In fact, one restaurant, the Gate House Cafe, recently won a Wine Spectator magazine award.
The Swinging Doors offers a great $10 barbecue plate every Tuesday and Friday night and Saturday afternoon. It is the place to hobnob with the locals, whose surnames are likely Johnson, Hassell or Peterson.
The 1,500 Sabans typically live amid greenery and flowers in lattice-trimmed, white houses with red corrugated-metal roofs and green shutters. These gingerbread houses hang off the mountain on tiny roads and give the island a fairy-tale aura.
"We are a step back in time," says Glen Holm, head of the Saba Tourist Board. "Our charm is, it took us a long time to move into the 20th century."
The island next door
Saba shares many qualities with the neighboring island of St. Eustatius, more commonly called Statia (pronounced stay-sha).
Both islands are under the Dutch Crown and are lovely, tranquil diversions from the crowded resort destinations that surround them, but Statia has a unique charm. The 11.8-square-mile island has a valley separating its two dormant volcanoes.
Statia is a playground for divers, hikers and history buffs. During the 18th century it was a hub for trade between Europe and the Americas. Ships carrying slaves, sugar, cotton, ammunition and other commodities crowded its harbor.
After the Revolutionary War, Statia was the first country to recognize U.S. independence, firing an 11-gun salute to the American brigantine Andrew Doria on Nov. 16, 1776. The Brits did not appreciate this goodwill gesture. In 1781, British Adm. George Rodney looted the island.
Between 1781 and 1816, there was chaos on the island: The Dutch, English and French vied for control, which changed 22 times. The Dutch finally won out.
Remnants of those bygone days are evident around Statia. The cliffside Fort Oranje, from where the famous saluting cannon shots were fired, was built in 1636. Located in Oranjestad, Statia's only village, its courtyard is the site of the original Dutch Reformed Church, built in 1776.
Flanking the church is an 18th-century graveyard where people were often buried atop one another, partly to keep families together, partly to save space.
The outside of another religious structure, Holen Dalim, is located on Synagogepad (Synagogue Path). It is one of the oldest synagogues in the Caribbean (1738). Jewish settlers once managed the island's commerce, but Rodney stripped them of their riches and deported them to other islands.
Rodney's former home, Doncker House, is now the St. Eustatius Historical Foundation Museum. It chronicles Statia's history from pre-Columbian times.
The big trek on Statia is to the top of the Quill, a 1,968-foot extinct volcano. The Statia Marine Park can arrange a private guide for the long and windy trek. Wild orchids, ferns, elephant ears and other flowers border the trail to the perfectly formed crater.
If lizards are your thing, plan to stay at the Kings Well Hotel. Owner Laura Piechutzki has created an iguana refuge on the property.
But it is the island's dive sights that lure most visitors. The Atlantic side is often rough, but on the Caribbean side, sting rays, eels, turtles and barracudas live in an undersea neighborhood where giant pillar coral, huge yellow sea fans and reef fingers abound.
The Dutch built dikes and an artificial harbor centuries ago but the sea keeps reclaiming the shoreline, and the underwater ruins of those Dutch-built walls are home to abundant schools of juvenile fish.
Other modern and archaeological dive sites include wrecks and sunken cannons.
- Roberta Sotonoff is a freelance writer living in Glenview, Ill.
IF YOU GO
GETTING THERE: Connecting flights from Tampa International Airport reach the island of St. Maarten. From there, Winair (call toll-free 1-800-634-4907, or visit www.fly-winair.com on the Web; e-mail reservations@fly-winair.com) flies to Saba and Statia.
