The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-01-18

/ lifelong pleasure. First, there is st.
| Thomas largest of the Danish islands
! It presents a charming picture from
| the sea with the town of Charlotte
, Amelia crowning it's three hills There
! are good hotels here, a theater, club
houses and the finest bay rum in the
/ world. From St. Thomas ii IS but a
short trip to Porto Rico. about which
the American tourist naturally knows
! and wants to know more than OF Tor
! efgn lands, for here We are at nome
| again under the old flag. san Juan'
| our steamers port of call, viii attract
! the visitor as an almost perfect specl-
| men of a walled town; its portculls
! moat and gates are still to be seem
| and one may walk the battlements once
! guarded by Spanish halberdiers. Here,
/ too. one may see enshrined the ashes OF
Ponce de Leon. And then We shall
come TO Martinique, printed deep IN ali
our minds as the scene of the greatest
volcanic disaster of modern times ana
OF its astounding monument, the pillar
of viscid lava, rising nov out OF the
crater of the volcano eight hundred feet
above its brim.
Barbados is not far away, and offers
a pleasant hating ground. The. scenery
of the interior still retains the stern
picturesqueness that has suggested TO
so many the Trossachs of Scotland
And then we shall come to Trinidad,
whose capital, Port of Spain, is one of
the handsomest cities in all the West
Indies, while the seeker for the curious
will be attracted by the asphalt lake
situated on the other side of the Gulf
of Paria and covering ninety acres.
If we pursue our voyage further TO
the southwark we shall come now to
the mainland of South America at La
Guayra; an excursion from it by rail TO
Caracas and Valencia will well repay
the visitor. The trip is one of the most |
picturesque that the world affords, for
the traveller, save when he is in tun- |
>nels, is rarely out of sight of the sea |
till he has climbed 1900 feet and passes
gently down to the metropolis Graded |
between the hills. Near Caracas is /
Valencia one of the oldest outposts of
European civilization on this CONT
nent; a centre of Spanish government
as early as 1855. From La Guayra our
vessel makes her way to Puerto Cabello.
Thence we come to Curacao. the cap
ital of the Dutch West Indies. whose
chief city, Willemstad, is a startlingly
quaint Renaissance of Holland in the
New World. So New Amsterdam may
have looked 200 years ago. Then, as we
turn northward again, there is Jamaica,
most important of the British West IN
dies, its institutions being as distinc
lively English as those of Devonshire.
From Jamaica we shall come present.
~ to Santiago de Cuba, memorable as
the scene of the greatest naval battle
of our time. But even We're it not for
these memories Santiago would attract
the traveller by the beauty of its site,
framed as it is against a background of
purple mountains which enclose the
harbor on three sides. Here may be
seen a tablet COMMUNICATING the exc
cution by the Spanish in 1873 of the
men of the ''Virginius.'' Just
outside the town, an agreeable excur-
sion is to San Juan Hill.
Havana, of course, is visited. What
Venice was to the Italy of the eigh-
teenth century Havana has been to the
West Indies, and from the first one
feels that one is among a gay, pleas
people. If this wearies you,
you have but to go on to Nassau, where
English rule prevails. Finally, there
are the Bermudas. In midwinter the
air here is balmy, equable. so that
many tourists proIong their sojourn
here till spring.
The most successful business men
are those who study their competitors
and accept suggestions from their
work 1t is not a bad idea to follow
out in developing a Hawaiian tourist
trade.