Boom in the Caribbean

Boom in the Caribbean ALEC WAUGH Last September as I watched, morn- ing after morning, on the “Today Show,” the spearhead of Hurricane Inez cutting its swath through the Caribbean, circling this island, miss- ing that, doubling back upon its tracks, I thought of that sister hurri- cane which for twenty years has been sweeping the same area, leveling vil- lages, uprooting trees, changing the appearance of a dozen islands—the hurricane of the tourist boom.

In Guadalupe today, the tourist will peer through the window of his aircraft to see what is left of Pointe- a-Pitre; in just that way for a long while now the regular visitor who chooses every year a different group | of islands has asked himself what is left of the place he left four years ago. Will the view from the bunga- low he rented be obstructed by a luxury hotel? Will the bay where he bathed have been requisitioned by an aquatic club? Has a main road been cut through the orange grove where he used to picnic? In this jet age of the packaged trip, when travel costs less and everyone earns more, it is inevitable that the attractions of sea and sand, of sun and_ shade should prove irresistible to the frost- bound Northerner. The growth of the aircraft industry has coincided with a craze for snorkeling, water-skiing, sailing, deep-sea diving; photography has played its part. The Caribbean is at its best when the North is at its worst. It is not surprising that clipper after clipper should glide out of Ken- nedy Airport, to disgorge its hourly cargo on this or the other “folder’s paradise.”

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Alec Waugh

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Boom in the Caribbean ALEC WAUGH Last September as I watched, morn- ing after morning, on the “Today Show,” the spearhead of Hurricane Inez cutting its swath through the Caribbean, circling this island, miss- ing that, doubling back upon its tracks, I thought of that sister hurri- cane which for twenty years has been sweeping the same area, leveling vil- lages, uprooting trees, changing the appearance of a dozen islands—the hurricane of the tourist boom.

In Guadalupe today, the tourist will peer through the window of his aircraft to see what is left of Pointe- a-Pitre; in just that way for a long while now the regular visitor who chooses every year a different group | of islands has asked himself what is left of the place he left four years ago. Will the view from the bunga- low he rented be obstructed by a luxury hotel? Will the bay where he bathed have been requisitioned by an aquatic club? Has a main road been cut through the orange grove where he used to picnic? In this jet age of the packaged trip, when travel costs less and everyone earns more, it is inevitable that the attractions of sea and sand, of sun and_ shade should prove irresistible to the frost- bound Northerner. The growth of the aircraft industry has coincided with a craze for snorkeling, water-skiing, sailing, deep-sea diving; photography has played its part. The Caribbean is at its best when the North is at its worst. It is not surprising that clipper after clipper should glide out of Ken- nedy Airport, to disgorge its hourly cargo on this or the other “folder’s paradise.”