Devil's Bridge

Most people come to Antigua for the soft side — the 365 beaches the island never stops mentioning, the calm Caribbean shallows on the west coast. Devil’s Bridge is the opposite, and that is precisely why I wanted to see it. It sits at Indian Town Point on the rugged eastern edge of the island, where there is nothing between you and West Africa except several thousand kilometres of open Atlantic, and the water arrives accordingly.

The arch and the blowholes

The bridge itself is a natural limestone arch, carved over centuries by the relentless surf that the Atlantic swell drives straight into this headland. It spans a narrow inlet, and beneath and around it the rock is pocked with blowholes — gaps where the waves force themselves up through the stone and erupt in spouts of spray that go off with a sound somewhere between a wave and a detonation. I stood watching for a while, timing the sets, and every sixth or seventh wave the whole headland seemed to exhale.

The name, our guide explained with the slightly weary delivery of a man who tells this story daily, comes from a darker history: enslaved people on the surrounding sugar plantations are said to have come to this point, and the place carries that weight. He told it plainly, without dressing it up, and I was grateful for that. It is not a detail the tourist boards lead with, and it changes how you stand at the edge of the rock.

Standing on the edge

You can walk out onto the rock around the arch, and people do — but the surface is sharp, uneven and frequently wet, and the Atlantic here is not the forgiving body of water that the island’s west coast advertises. I watched a man in flip-flops attempt to pose for a photograph directly over a blowhole and reconsider his entire approach to life when the next set came through. Lia, who has a far better sense of self-preservation than I do, stayed a sensible distance back and spent her time photographing the way the spray caught the light. She got the better pictures. She usually does.

The wider headland is open scrubland with sweeping views up and down the wild east coast, and it is one of the few places on Antigua where you can stand and hear nothing but wind and water. After the curated calm of the resort beaches it felt almost confrontational, in the best way. I have always trusted coastlines that don’t try to please you, and this one makes no effort whatsoever.

When to go

Come on a windy day with a decent swell running — counterintuitively, the rougher the sea, the better the spectacle, since calm conditions leave the blowholes silent. It is part of a national park and entry is free; there is a small car park and the walk to the arch takes only a couple of minutes. Wear proper shoes, keep well back from the wet rock, and do not, under any circumstances, follow the man in the flip-flops.