Hamilton Culture: Bermuda Shorts Business Dress, Scooter Transport, Fish Chowder and the Dark and Stormy, Cahow Conservation, the Railway Trail Walk, and the Cottage Colony Resort Tradition
The Hamilton cultural character encompasses the Bermuda shorts formal business dress code, the mandatory scooter visitor transport, the fish chowder and Dark and Stormy culinary signature, the remarkable cahow bird rediscovery, the 34-kilometer Railway Trail island traverse, and the cottage colony resort style that has hosted East Coast American society for a century.
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Bermuda Shorts: The Business Dress Code
Bermuda shorts, the knee-length tailored shorts worn with dress socks, blazers, and ties that constitute the formal business attire of the Bermuda business community, are the most internationally recognized sartorial innovation of any island in the Atlantic. The Bermuda businessman wearing the formal jacket and the khaki shorts in the Hamilton financial district is the most distinctive visual expression of the island business culture and the most commonly cited example of the adaptation of formal European dress codes to the subtropical climate.
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Scooter Culture: The Bermuda Transport
The motorized scooter is the primary private transport in Bermuda, where rental cars are not available to visitors by law and the scooter provides the most independent access to the island's attractions. The scooter rental shops in Hamilton and at the major hotels provide the 50cc and 150cc models for the day or week hire, with the requirement for the 30-minute safety briefing that familiarizes the visitor with the left-hand traffic of the British Bermuda road system before the South Shore road ride to Horseshoe Bay.
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Bermuda Cuisine: Fish Chowder and the Dark and Stormy
Bermuda fish chowder, the thick dark chowder enriched with the Gosling's Black Seal rum and the Outerbridge's Original Sherry Pepper Sauce in a preparation unique to the island, and the Dark and Stormy cocktail of the Gosling's Black Seal rum and the ginger beer that is the official national cocktail of Bermuda by trademark registration, are the two most internationally recognized Bermuda food and drink creations and the most reliably available food experience across the spectrum from the Hamilton restaurant to the beach club.
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Bermuda Aquarium and Zoo: The Natural History
The Bermuda Aquarium, Museum and Zoo in Flatts Village, the only institution of its type on the island and the primary natural history education facility, houses the living coral exhibit, the endemic Bermuda species including the cahow bird, and the Caribbean and Atlantic fish species in the most comprehensive natural history presentation in the Atlantic island chain. The cahow, the Bermuda petrel that was believed extinct for 300 years before its rediscovery in 1951 by ornithologist Robert Cushman Murphy, is the most significant conservation success story in Bermuda.
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Bermuda Railway Trail: The Island Walk
The Bermuda Railway Trail, the 34-kilometer walking and cycling trail that follows the route of the old Bermuda Railway dismantled in 1948, runs the length of the main island from St. George's in the east to Somerset in the west through the inland landscape of the cedar forest remnants, the wetland reserves, and the residential neighborhoods of the island interior, providing the most complete land-based exploration of the island without the scooter transport.
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The Reefs and the Club: The Bermuda Hotel Tradition
The Reefs Club on Christian Bay and the Cambridge Beaches Resort on Somerset Island, both long-established Bermuda resort properties with the cliff-top pool, the private cove beaches, and the cottage colony accommodation style that is the distinctive Bermuda hotel format of multiple small cottages in the garden landscape rather than the Caribbean high-rise hotel block, represent the finest expression of the Bermuda resort tradition that has accommodated the East Coast American upper class for a century.