Discover St. Helena

A Category VI marine protected area, nearly as large as France, surrounds St. Helena. The island offers a range of reasons to travel: Post Box walks, an annual marathon, diving at shipwrecks and history in Jamestown. Depending on your interests, different themes take centre stage.

Marine protected area and wreck diving

St. Helena is surrounded by a Category VI marine protected area that is nearly the size of France. This comparison gives a sense of the protected area’s vast scale. Eight shipwrecks off St. Helena can be explored by divers, but only with a local guide. Before travelling, check which operators are currently available. The two maritime themes serve different purposes: the marine protected area describes a broad setting, while the wrecks offer divers a specific reason to visit. This helps you distinguish a general interest in marine conservation from the question of whether you want to include a wreck dive in your trip.

History in Jamestown

The Walk-Through History takes you through a historic part of Jamestown and presents St. Helena’s history in chronological order. This arrangement gives the narrative a timeline. The initial installation includes 28 panels about internationally significant figures who have visited Saint Helena since the island was discovered. Buildings of the East India Company have also been preserved in Jamestown. These offer two historical perspectives: the installation arranges the island’s history chronologically and focuses on figures who visited the island, while the preserved buildings are architectural evidence of the East India Company. For travellers interested in history, the chronological account and architectural heritage offer different points of interest.

Choose your reason for travelling when searching for hotels

For walks, the right level of difficulty matters; for the marathon, it’s the event date; and a focus on history points to Jamestown. Whether you’d rather be active, focus on history or explore maritime themes gives your planning a clear direction. The Post Box walks vary in difficulty: some are suitable only for very experienced hikers, while others are family-friendly. The difficulty level of the specific walk is therefore key to choosing one. For a group with different levels of hiking experience, it’s important to check how each route is graded; the family-friendly walks are only one part of the range. The race, billed as the “World’s Most Remote Marathon,” takes place annually on St. Helena, but dates can vary. If the race is your reason for travelling, check the specific event date before planning your trip around it. The fact that it takes place every year does not tell you the date of that year’s race.

Discover more destinations: Jamestown, Eritrea, Rwanda, Benin, Zambia, Tanzania, Libya, The Gambia.

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