Hamilton: Bermuda's colourful harbour

Capital of Bermuda since 1815, Hamilton faces its pale pastel-painted facades onto one of the western Atlantic's most protected natural harbors.

The center can be comfortably explored on foot along the harbor.

The pastel-colored facades of Front Street, the main street along the port, house shops and offices inside colonial buildings built between the nineteenth century and early twentieth century.

A few blocks away, the Cathedral of Bermuda, rebuilt in Neo-Gothic style after a fire and completed in 1911, allows climbing to the top of the tower for a view of the entire port.

Continuing along the coast, one visits the Bermuda Underwater Exploration Institute, dedicated to the wrecks and marine fauna surrounding the archipelago: its coral reefs have sunk so many ships over the centuries that Bermuda earned the nickname 'Atlantic graveyard'.

Toward evening, the moat now transformed into a garden of the Fort Hamilton, a fortress from 1870 built against an invasion that never came, overlooks the city from above.

Fort Hamilton was built with cannons pointing inland just as much as toward the sea: the real threat feared at the time was a land attack from the United States, which never materialized.

On days when bagpipe ceremonies are held at the fort, the sound still carries all the way to Front Street, mingling with the traffic of the harbor below.