Vintage Vieques

Travelers smitten with this 21-mile-long island off the coast of Puerto Rico love it as much for what it lacks as for what it has. Absent are malls, stoplights, casinos and golf courses. Only one lodging has full resort amenities, and it hasn’t been a raging success.

Newcomers, on the other hand, are wowed by what Vieques does have. Pristine beaches stretch for miles, the sweep of white sand interrupted only by swaying palms and tangles of mangrove. A bioluminescent bay lit by billions of microscopic organisms (and considered one of the finest in the world) delights kayakers on moonless nights. Rural guesthouses offer laid-back hospitality.

Travel writers are fond of proclaiming Vieques “the Caribbean as it used to be,” usually with the caveat: Get there fast before it changes.

On the horizon: Faster ferry service to the mainland; a proposal to build a tourist-oriented town; and a W hotel, part of a chain more often associated with hip, urban spots than island idyll, opening in 2008.

The island’s locked-in-another-era quality is the result of a twist of fate that is either tragic or fortuitous, depending on your view. The U.S. Navy occupied much of Vieques for 60 years, using the unpopulated eastern end for target practice. After years of protest, the military departed in May 2003, and outsiders flooded in to claim a piece of paradise. Land prices skyrocketed. Now, Viequenses grapple with what the future will bring on an island where protest is second nature and where opposing opinions can collide with hurricane force.

Signs of chic already are creeping into a place once regarded for its laid-back funkiness. The 2-year-old Bravo Beach Hotel, whose minimalist lines were reshaped from a former hacienda house turned motel, sports Frette sheets and iPod docking stations in its nine guest rooms and villa. At Thanksgiving, actor Benicio Del Toro dined on the VIP terrace (certainly the first VIP anything on the island), and its wine-tasting room and sushi bar host a New York clientele that pops over for long weekends. New restaurants serving nouvelle Caribbean cuisine have joined spots dishing out typical rice-and-beans criolla fare.

“There’s too much pressure for change not to happen,” says Eli Belendez, owner of the Crow’s Nest, an inn whose restaurant is a popular local hangout. “But not many communities have the opportunity of planning their growth the way this island does. It’s a very vocal process. Community groups are strong because they felt empowered after getting the Navy out.”

The island has only two towns — Isabel Segunda on the north coast, home to many of its 12,000 residents — and Esperanza on the south coast, a single strip of tourist-oriented establishments fronting a short seaside promenade. In between, a handful of narrow blacktopped roads are dotted with simple homes and more elaborate guesthouses and villas. The former Navy land — about two-thirds of the island — is now under U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service jurisdiction and is the Caribbean’s largest wildlife refuge. On the island’s far west side and along its south coast, rutted dirt roads burrow through the brush, ending at some of the Caribbean’s most gorgeous — and deserted — beaches.

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Courtesy of grouptravelblog