Remote St. Helena set to go commercial
One of the most remote islands in the world is about to enter the modern tourist age.
When the British exiled Napoleon Bonaparte to St. Helena in 1815, it took the conquered emperor a full 10 weeks to reach the island. Two centuries later, it’s still a five-day trip by mail boat — assuming you happen to be starting from somewhere as close as Cape Town, South Africa.
But Saturday, the tiny British overseas territory will get its first scheduled flights. Two weeks later, St. Helena’s first luxury hotel, a 30-room property in a trio of Georgian buildings, will open its doors.
About 2,000 kilometres off the western coast of Africa, St. Helena is best known as the place where Napoleon was banished after being defeated at the Battle of Waterloo. The house where he lived — complete with the original furnishings — is one of the island’s main tourist attractions.
But it’s not the only draw. The 122-square-kilometre tropical island offers mountain biking, sport fishing and scuba diving in waters where visibility is up to 30 metres. St. Helena is one of a handful of places in the world where humans can swim with massive (and passive) whale sharks.
Because of the limited transportation options, only a few thousand tourists make it to the island each year. The Royal Mail Ship St. Helena, a combination cargo-passenger ship, makes the trip just a few times a month. And until now, the airport was able to accept only private flights.
The airport cost more than $500 million and was meant to push St. Helena toward economic self-sufficiency. A month before it opened in 2016,
Meanwhile, the new hotel by resort developer Mantis, which owns five-star safari lodges in Africa, Explora resorts in Chile, and other high-end properties, promises to be a game-changer. St. Helena’s official tourism website lists just two B&Bs and a half-dozen hotels and guest houses, most of which have no websites.
“St. Helena’s draw card to tourists is without doubt its isolation,” said Matt Joshua, general manager of the Mantis St. Helena.
Mantis’s stone buildings date to 1774; they were originally officer’s barracks for the East India Company, which then ran St. Helena.