Haiti

You want shiny sequins and sanitized carnival bling? Plenty of places will serve that up for you. Jacmel’s street theater is another game altogether, close to the surreal, where individuals and troupes parade and act in homemade costumes and papier-mâché masks from local artisans. Vodou, sex, death and revolution all play their part, mixed with street music and wild antics, in a parade where both crowd and performers mix as participants. And where else will you see a donkey dressed in sneakers and hat, talking on a cell phone?

Haiti is such a mountainous country that it would be a shame to only experience them from afar, whizzing around in traffic. The perfect hike is through Parc National la Visite, from Furcy, high above Port-au-Prince, down to Seguin. The park still has plenty of Haiti’s original pine forest, as well as weird broken rock formations, and as the scenery opens up, great views out to the Caribbean Sea. A long day’s walk on a path shared with local farmers, it’s the perfect leg-stretching antidote to the buzz of the big city.

If ever a country settled on making a statement of intent on winning its independence, Haiti found it in the mighty Citadelle la Ferrière. A giant battleship of a fortress sitting atop a mountain crag, with a Versailles-like ruined palace at its base, it commands its landscape as a proud symbol of the world’s first black republic. Epic in concept and execution and largely hidden from the world’s gaze, it easily holds its own against the best historical sites the Americas can offer.

If you’re thinking zombies and dolls with pins in them, you need to disconnect from Hollywood. Vodou is the wellspring of the Haitian character, a spiritual religion borne of the country’s African roots, but which took adopted practices from both the island’s original Indian inhabitants and French colonial masters. Heading out from Gonaïves to attend a Vodou ceremony, with its drums and sung prayers, bright imagery and often-healing nature is the best way to plug yourself in to Haiti’s subconscious.