Montserrat Saint Anthony

Saint Anthony is the southernmost parish of Montserrat, a small British Overseas Territory in the Caribbean's Leeward Islands. The area contains Plymouth, the island's former capital, and the Soufrière Hills volcano, and it remains almost entirely within a volcanic exclusion zone rather than functioning as an ordinary town or city.

The parish was once the commercial and administrative heart of Montserrat. Plymouth grew as a Georgian-era port, and the island's long Irish heritage earned it the nickname the Emerald Isle of the Caribbean. Eruptions beginning in 1995, and especially the pyroclastic flows of June 1997, buried much of Plymouth in ash and forced the permanent evacuation of Saint Anthony.

Today the landscape is dominated by abandoned buildings, church ruins such as Saint Anthony's Church, and views of the still-active Soufrière Hills volcano. Access is controlled, but licensed guides lead tours to safe viewpoints and parts of the exclusion zone where visitors can see the buried capital and the scale of the volcanic destruction.

Because Saint Anthony has no resident population, accommodation, restaurants and services are concentrated in the safer northern settlements such as Brades, Little Bay, Salem and Woodlands. These communities serve as the base for exploring the island and for joining guided volcano and Plymouth tours.

For travelers, Saint Anthony offers a rare look at a modern volcanic disaster and Montserrat's remarkable resilience, while the wider island provides hiking, diving, quiet beaches and strong links by air and ferry through Antigua.