The beach and anchorage of StatiaWe left St. Maarten on Easter Monday to sail to Statia. It was a calm day and a beautiful sail! When we approached the island we were surprised to see all of the oil tankers around the bay. This is because Statia has a huge fuel loading dock and apparently is a storage and supply terminal for much of the Caribbean.
When we were anchored and settled in we noticed quite a party going on at the beach. It turns out that the locals were having a huge "Jump Up" for the Easter weekend. Tents, music, food, contests....you name it and they had it going on. Statia is a tiny island with only 3400 inhabitants, and it looked as though just about everyone showed up for the party.
The next day we decided to hike to the volcano. We left from the beach, climbed the steep trail up to the main road and walked to the trailhead which was about two miles...THEN we started the climb to the volcano. We climbed from sea level to 2000 feet to the edge of the volcano. We did not climb down into the volcano, but inside was like rainforest.
Coming back down we wandered through town and down the old cobblestone slave road to the beach. The town was quaint and quiet and we were surprised to learn of it's rich history. Statia was a free port trade center for all countries during the years all of the European countries were fighting each other and England was having trouble with the American rebels. Statia became an officially approved smuggling center for all of the Caribbean.
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