Anse Chastanet

Anse Chastanet is on the west coast of Saint Lucia, north of Soufrière, at the foot of a steep forested slope. The sand is dark grey volcanic, the bay is small, and the reef begins within a few metres of the shore.

It is a diving beach before it is a swimming one. Saint Lucia is a volcanic island with steep terrain that drops straight into deep water, and at Anse Chastanet the reef wall runs from the shallows to forty metres within a short swim — a shore-entry dive site of a quality that usually needs a boat. The bay is part of the Soufrière Marine Management Area, established in 1994 after conflict between fishermen and the diving industry, and now cited as a case study in how such disputes get resolved.

The beach is narrow, dark and shaded by forest, with warm calm water and coral immediately offshore. The road in is famously bad — steep, unpaved and rutted — which is why many arrivals are by boat from Soufrière. The Pitons, two volcanic spires and a World Heritage site, are a few kilometres south. Anse Mamin, a short walk north around the headland, is the quieter half of the same bay and sits on the ruins of an eighteenth-century sugar plantation, with the mill and aqueduct still standing in the forest.

Development is a single resort on the slope behind, plus a dive operation and a beach bar. The beach is public, as Saint Lucian beaches are, and reached either down the road or by water taxi.

The reef starts a few metres out and drops in a wall, which is the whole reason to come. The sand is grey volcanic and steep, the road in is genuinely bad, and most people arrive by water taxi from Soufrière. Anse Mamin around the headland has the plantation ruins in the forest and half the people.