Enjoy the quiet life on the secluded islands of the Bahamas while you can. The developers think they're pretty spectacular, too.
By DAVID BARLYN
Published March 19, 2006
To find Tippy's, a beachside bistro on the string bean-shaped island of Eleuthera, zigzag across a minefield of potholes called Queen's Highway, loop past the eerie remains of an abandoned Club Med, and then ask the guy standing in the road for directions. He may very well be David Barlyn, the bistro's gregarious owner. Don't let his T-shirt and flip-flops fool you. Or, for that matter, the rickety shack with wooden benches. This is not some down-at-the-heels fish fry, but the epicenter of the island's emerging social whirl.
"Not to name-drop," Barlyn said, "but the people who purchased homes up the road include Leon Levy, who started the Oppenheimer Fund; Luci Baines Johnson, the daughter of President Lyndon Baines Johnson; and the granddaughter of Lord Mountbatten," the last viceroy of India.
"It's people with that kind of stature," he said. "Patti LaBelle and Lenny Kravitz are also here."
On first blush, it doesn't quite make sense. There are no private golf courses on the island, no five-star hotels, not even a boutique for shopping. But walk into Tippy's and onto its lopsided deck, and the allure becomes self-evident: white sandy beaches that stretch as far as the eye can see, unblemished by condos, hotels or even footprints.
"I've built hotels all over the Caribbean, and this is one of the most beautiful beaches out there," Barlyn added. "It's an untold hidden gem."
But that's about to change. This 110-mile-long Bahamian fishing island, with its spectacular barrier reefs and lazy pace, is being groomed as the next big thing. Continental Airlines recently added new nonstop flights from Miami and Fort Lauderdale. (It takes just over an hour.) And all across the island, luxury hotels are going up.
Cotton Bay, a sprawling resort now being built, will include a 73-room Starwood (the Westin, W, Sheraton brands) hotel, expected to open as early as the end of this year. A Club Med is scheduled to be torn down this spring and replaced by French Leave, a 270-acre resort with a marina, boutique hotel and oceanfront homes. Another marina is being readied at Cape Eleuthera, on the island's southern tip, as part of a 63-home development. And an underwater hotel has been proposed by Poseidon Undersea Resorts, with capsulelike bungalows offering views of the coral reefs.
What's happening on Eleuthera is also taking place on Bimini, the Abacos and the other, lesser-known islands of the Bahamas. Until recently, going to the Bahamas meant the casinos of Freeport, the tourist hustle of Nassau or the Las Vegas-style resorts of Paradise Island. Never mind that the Bahamas is an archipelago as long as Florida. The 30 or so other inhabited islands are so off the tourist radar that they are simply lumped together with the 700 uninhabited islands as the Out Islands.
Not anymore.
Virgin beachfronts are being sold and developed. No-frills bungalows are being razed for condos. And new resorts are appearing up and down the archipelago, seeking to bring the sophistication of Caribbean destinations like Anguilla and Turks and Caicos to the backwaters of the Bahamas.
In the Abacos, where sailing lodges were once the rule, the Abaco Club on Winding Bay - built by Peter de Savary, the British shipping magnate turned private club owner - now offers stylish cabanas for $1,000 a night, along with an 18-hole golf course, 2.3 miles of beach and a members-only clubhouse. On Andros, the largest of the Bahamian islands, Tiamo Resorts carved out a 125-acre eco hot spot with solar-powered bungalows surrounded by coconut palms and coral reefs. Celebrities like Johnny Depp and Nicolas Cage have reportedly been snapping up private islands in the Exumas for $3-million and more.
For most upscale travelers, however, the Out Islands hit the radar when a Four Seasons opened on Great Exuma Island two years ago, raising the area's profile and luxury quotient by several notches.
And nowhere is this buzz louder than on Eleuthera, where the pace of development has been so anemic that the island's only traffic light, knocked out by Hurricane Andrew in 1992, has yet to be repaired. Not that there is much traffic: On any given day, you can drive for 30 minutes along its crumbling roads and not pass a single car.
For the rocker Lenny Kravitz, that's precisely the appeal. "I bring one pair of pants, a couple of T-shirts and no shoes," said Kravitz, who visits several times a year, or whenever his touring schedule allows. He has a 20-square-foot "shack" near the northern village of Gregory Town, as well as an Airstream trailer parked on a private beach. "I'm not quote-unquote Lenny Kravitz here. I'm just Lenny."
Likewise, Patti LaBelle is just Patti. "All I do is stay in the kitchen and cook," said LaBelle, the singer and cookbook author, who has an all-white cottage facing the ocean. "I don't go there to party."
Good thing, too, since there isn't much to do. Except for the half-dozen hotels clustered around Governor's Harbour, its shabby capital, the island has almost no organized tourist facilities. Shopping means going to the market behind the Shell gas station. Lunch is served at your hotel and few places else. And night life is nonexistent, unless you're willing to drive 45 minutes to Elvina's, a dive decorated with rusty license plates in Gregory Town.
But for everything that Eleuthera lacks, there is a beach with your name on it. Gaulding Cay Beach is so shallow that you can walk out 150 feet and still be only waist-high in water. Club Med Beach is arguably the most beautiful, with pink-hued sands hemmed by crystal-blue water. Surfer's Beach is for wave riders, but there are also beaches for snorkelers, swimmers and shell collectors.
On New Year's Eve, a stylish international crowd gathered at Tippy's, drinking champagne and snacking on lobster pizzas. As fireworks streaked across the starry sky, Tim Crutchley, 44, an advertising executive from Liverpool, England, took to the streets and began dancing to the Bahamian beats of Junkanoo. It was his first visit to the island, and he was sold. "Have you ever seen anything so authentic?" he asked. "Other places can be so plastic."
But the island's infrastructure has seen major upgrades. Power outages, which used to occur three times a week, have been reduced to monthly. Cell phone towers now dot the flat landscape. And much of the island has been wired for broadband.
The rapid development of Eleuthera has left some residents uneasy, despite assurances from developers that they will preserve the island's character. "As you can see, everything is quite natural," said Wim Steenbakkers, the managing director of Cotton Bay, during a recent tour of the 1,500-acre property. Narrow paths were cleared and concrete pilings sprouted from the sand, but the vegetation otherwise remained intact. "We're blending everything into the environment, rather than bulldozing it."
Longtime visitors, however, are not convinced, and are worried that the new resorts will sap the island of its rustic and backward feel. They point to Great Exuma, about 70 miles south of Eleuthera, where the arrival of the Four Seasons has effectively cleaved the island in two.
Nancy Bottomley, an American expatriate is beginning to feel like a stranger in her adopted land. "Four Seasons has rearranged the social structure of the island," said Bottomley, who runs the Regatta Point, a cozy but hardly fancy six-suite guesthouse near George Town. "We've always had wealthy people, but they came here to enjoy the simple life."
"Now I have to tell people not to expect Godiva chocolates on their pillows," Bottomley added, as she steered her flimsy flat boat past a sailboat regatta. "This is not a five-star island."
For now, at least, the Out Islands are a throwback to a more innocent time, a place where everyone hitchhikes, nobody complains that the bakery opens late and schoolchildren run up to complete strangers just to say hello.
So what if the kitchen takes 40 minutes to prepare a sandwich. Or that the puddle jumper is delayed. Or that the gas station closed at 11 a.m. - the locals will happily lend you some gas.
"You're not treated like a tourist here," said Ann Cutbill Lenane, 43, a real estate agent from New York City who recently traded her weekend place in East Hampton for a five-bedroom house on Eleuthera. She, too, was at Tippy's, in a white tank top and flip-flops. "On many islands, you feel like you have to be invited. But this place is so instantly welcoming. I want growth, but I hope that doesn't change."
"I've built hotels all over the Caribbean, and this is one of the most beautiful beaches out there."
