Dominica

Dominica was cited as one of the poorest and cheapest of the Caribbean islands we would visit. The reality we saw seems to be rapidly changing. All the housing we saw looked tidy, spacious and well kempt with no evidence of the ramshackle dwellings made of tattered wood and corrugated iron that we’d seen further south. There is far more rainfall than in the other islands and that may account for better housing. Our guide also told us how it is easy to get a mortgage from the bank and many people buy a plot and build a capacious home. Terms start at 11% for a car loan over three years and reduce for longer terms on a house.

Those involved in the tourist trade are living very comfortably. We also chatted with a street vendor trying to make her living selling trinkets to cruise ship passengers. She told us that her daughter had won a scholarship to study medicine in Cuba. Although her tuition was paid, she was not permitted to take any work to pay her food so her mother was sending her tourist cash from Dominica. Now the daughter has a practice in St. Lucia, but the mother still sells trinkets by the roadside.

The only thing of value were the drinks at the beach bar. This was the only opportunity we had to see the ‘real’ Dominica as tourists arriving by sea are tightly controlled. We had to obtain a permit to move between the only two permitted anchorages, and each time the local ‘guides’ had advance notice of our arrival and monopolised our agenda. Having billed itself as the “eco-“ or “nature-island”, they have also managed to button-hole their visitors and ensure that they see only those parts of the island they want us to and extract as much of the tourist dollar as they can.