Probably the most extraordinary thing about the island of St Helena is that it was ever found at all. A tiny ten by six mile speck in the South Atlantic 1,200 miles from the coast of West Africa, it lay undiscovered for around 14 million years able to evolve its own unique flora and fauna untouched by the outside world. But almost from the moment Portuguese explorer Juan de Nova was blown there by the Trade Winds in 1502 it assumed an importance out of all proportion to its size. Jamestown is the capital of the South Atlantic island of Saint Helena, discovered by in 1502 by Juan de Nova . It was a key stopping place for the ships of the East India Company and other vessels - at its peak it serviced a thousand a year. It played a role in both slavery and its abolition: when the trade became illegal it was the base from which the British sought to capture the perpetrators and free their human cargo. And it was the place to which Napoleon was exiled after his defeat at Waterloo. The emperor who had escaped Elba was not going to get away so easily from the most isolated place on earth. Framed by cragged volcanic cliffs soaring 800 metres (2,600 feet) above sea level, the island is just 122 square kilometres in total . The island, which is smaller than central Paris has just 4,200 inhabitants - and 850 of them live in the small capital of Jamestown . Early next year a £218m airport will open and make this British Overseas Territory no longer quite so isolated. At the moment though the only way to get there is still by sea and for most that means the RMS St. Helena. This Royal Mail Ship is the island’s lifeline. It carries in all its supplies and up to 150 passengers who range from returning or departing Saints (as the residents are known) to tourists with a taste for something different as well as, more recently, construction workers, entrepreneurs and conservation experts. Early next year, an airport will open on the island. The £218 million project will make this British Overseas Territory far more accessible . Once the airport is open in February 2016, the ship service - which takes five days from Cape Town - will be retired . Here, the runway of the future airport is visible. The upcoming airport will be located in the Prosperous Bay Plain area of the island . This means it’s a ship of two halves: the front laden with dozens of huge containers, the back a sun deck where we take dips in the little swimming pool and play quoits, shuffleboard, skittles and passengers v. crew cricket. In between are a couple of lounges with bars where travellers can listen to talks and watch films. These are not compulsory, of course, and many of the Saints for whom the voyage is basically just a bus service sit and watch benignly. For the rest of us they’re a wonderful ice-breaker and a source of great fun and fierce rivalry: passions are running particularly high by the final of the three night accumulator quiz. As it stands, the only way to reach Saint Helena is via ship - the RMS St. Helena, a Royal Mail Ship that transports all supplies to the island . Traveller Liz Gill describes the ship as a 'ship of two halves': the front laden with dozens of huge containers, with a sundeck out back . We are fortified in all this by the most enormous hearty meals: there’s even an extra savoury course after the cheese at dinner though I never get that far myself. Sailing on the St. Helena has been like stepping back in time. Captain Rodney Young himself tells me that sometimes he surveys the deck and thinks this is still a bit of Empire on which the sun has not yet set. For me at times though it seems even further back and I think a lot about all those ancient mariners crossing this vast ocean where in a ten-day round trip we sight only two other ships and even the wandering albatrosses say goodbye after a couple of days. It’s good preparation for the island itself which emerges from the waves at dawn like a dream. There is in fact something rather Alice-in-Wonderland-ish about St Helena as if everything has shrunken to produce a geography and a society in miniature. The edge of the runway will offer spectacular views of the blue water, nestled among the jagged rocks of the coastline . While visiting, Liz climbed the island's infamous Jacob’s Ladder: a 699-step staircase that towers 600 feet in the air . So within only 47 square miles of land mass there are barren deserts and lush cloud forests, a black sand beach and towering crags, rolling pastureland and peaks of up to 2,700 feet. On a central ridge it’s possible to look in one direction on the empty moonscape of Sandy Bay and in another on sheep scattered fields which could be in Sussex. Similarly in human terms for a population of 4,000, barely the size of an English village, there is a governor, a legislative council, a hospital, three primary and one secondary school, a cathedral with a bishop plus places of worship for several different denominations, a police force, a prison, two newspapers and two radio stations. What this means for the visitor is a wide range of activities. I seemed to fill almost every hour of the nine days I spent there while the ship sailed on to Ascension Island and back. Despite being barely the size of an English village, the capital boasts a legislative council, several schools and two newspapers . Two were spent walking: there are lots of trails graded in difficulty and many routes have ‘post boxes’ which hold visitors books and rubber stamps. One day we climbed Diana’s Peak in the company of David Pryce, a mine-of-information Englishman known locally as The Bug Man who is on a three year project to catalogue the local invertebrates. On another we walked with a young Saint Aaron Legg to Lot’s Wife’s Ponds, Lot and his wife being giant geological features and the pool being a serene inlet protected by rocks from the crashing waves beyond and filled with colourful fish. The walk was an hour’s climb up a steep rocky hillside and half an hour’s descent down the other side ending in having to slither down a rope for the last 30 feet but more than worth it. It was one of the loveliest places where I have ever swum. Marine life is a big attractions for snorkelers and divers – there are also several wrecks to explore – and fishermen who can chase tuna, wahoo and marlin. We were too late for the seasonal visit of whale sharks but 200 dolphins did their best to compensate, cavorting around our boat as we sailed out to the seabird colonies. I also had an enchanting afternoon watching wirebirds, the island’s only endemic bird so called because of its spindly legs and something of a conservation success story. The island is full of trails - of varying levels of difficulty - as well as fabulous swimming and diving opportunities . As well as there being several ship wrecks to explore, the marine life is another major draw for snorkellers and divers alike . By contrast there was a Napoleon themed day: a visit to Briars Pavilion where he stayed briefly when he first arrived, Longwood House where he lived for six years until his death in 1821 and his tomb in the pretty valley setting he chose himself. Though his body was repatriated to France 19 years later and much of Longwood’s contents like the clothes and the death masks are replicas, the places are still resonant if melancholy. And it’s not every day one can stand on the exact spot where an emperor passed away.. Other experiences included a cookery lesson making tuna fishcakes, pumpkin stew and pilau – pronounced plo – a spicy legacy of St Helena’s diversity, which its people made up from arrivals from India, China, Madagascar, Britain and West Africa. There were also visits to the ‘world’s remotest distillery’ run by ex-pat Brit Paul Heckling who produces among other drinks a spirit called tungi made from prickly pear and’ the world’s remotest coffee plantation’ run by another ex-pat Bill Bolton who decided to revive the Bourbon Arabica bushes originally brought over from Yemen in 1732. Saint Helena is also home to the 'world's most remote distillery' and the 'world's remotest coffee plantation,' both run by British ex-pats . Then there was the small but excellent museum, the forts, batteries and cannons dotted around the place, the fine collection of St Helena prints and drawings at Prince’s Lodge (in pre-photography days ships had their own artists on board) , the Boer cemetery (6,000 were imprisoned here during the Boer War but given freedom to work, trade and organise events) and the Plantation House grounds to see Jonathan the tortoise who is at least 182 years old and probably the world’s oldest reptile. And finally I did what any self-respecting visitor has to do and climbed Jacob’s Ladder. Once a tramway for hauling goods up the cliff side in the capital Jamestown this is now a terrifyingly steep 600 ft high staircase of 699 steps. Not wanting to risk passing out halfway up, I took it very slowly, pausing every 50 steps and reaching the top in 28 minutes. I was pretty puffed up with pride but quickly deflated when I learned the record stands at 5 minutes 11 seconds. Discover the World (01737 214 291; www.discover-the-world.co.uk) offers a 20-night self-drive holiday to St Helena from now until March 2016 priced from £3,451pp (two sharing) including 10 nights on the ship, two nights in Cape Town and 8 nights bed & breakfast on the island. For more information about St Helena, visit www.sthelenatourism.com. Currently, the only way to reach the island is aboard the RMS St. Helena, learn more at www.rms-st-helena.com.
St Helena, a 122 square kilometre island in the middle of the South Atlantic, will soon be much easier to reach .
Early next year, the island's £218 million airport will be complete, opening it up to tourists like never before .
The remote destination is perhaps best known as the place where Napoleon was exiled after his Waterloo defeat .