I don’t even have to step into my golf cart to trip next door to Rock House, as brash, bright and Versace as The Landing is cool, crisp and mono. Now in its second year, this is mini-Miami (very mini, with only nine rooms) for well-heeled Statesiders. I don’t feel Ocean’s Eleven enough for the hilarious poolside cabanas but my American pal squeals at all the glitz, the marble bathrooms and the jewel of a pool — and both of us like the monster martini menu, so popular with guests that Rock House is to make the bar bigger, air-conditioned and open after hours.

When I was last here, Valentine’s Marina was a pier, a dive-shack and a few ropey rooms. Now it’s fancied up its waterfront and unveiled new plans for 50 suites in two years, modelled shamelessly on The Landing/Hicks style.

"We’ve got the Beautiful People here on the island now but at Valentine’s we’re going to give ‘em a Yankee lick of colour and glitz," admits the boss, Harper Sibley. It’s an ambitious project that will swell Harbour Island’s hotel room total by a third.

But can Harbour Island support this influx, or will its charm, history and God-given advantages of nature be suffocated? Around the island are rubbish bins, marked with the stern legend, "Keep Harbour Island Beautiful”. Uncle Ralph’s Aura Corner, which used to be a street corner peppered with scraps of wood painted with pithy adages such as “Never argue with a woman. People will think you are drunk", is now filling up with charmless American licence plates.

Down on the waterfront, there is now a John Bull Duty Free jewellery shop, housed in an old colonial-era house but glaringly inappropriate compared with the relaxed feel of the island.

Robert Arthur, Jehovah’s Witness and popular young owner of Arthur’s Bakery, allays my fears. "No one can do to us what we don’t do to ourselves," he smiles. "There’s no 'us and them' issue between native locals and developers, that’s the thing about Harbour Island — we’re all thrown in together. We threw out a development planned for the north end of the island last year because we didn’t think it was going to be right for the island and it can only get so busy here: we don’t have the deep water for the cruise ships, we don’t have the space for the all-inclusives and we don’t have the water supply for a whole ton more tourists to actually stay and shower here."

He holds up his finger and thumb about two inches apart. "That’s the size of the water pipe serving this island, and you know how much Americans shower. There’s no way our supply can stand that. So don’t worry, we’re not going to change that much." And with that, he goes back to his other job, writing a screenplay.

In a place as small as Harbour Island, schoolchildren still hitch lifts on the back of golf carts, no matter how rich or famous the driver. The rickety Queen Conch food-shack at the north end of the island is still the best place I’ve been throughout the Caribbean for conch salad. But nevertheless, I would come to Harbour Island now, while it’s still firmly pitched at The Landing, Pink Sands and Rock House intimacy.

As it says in a handwritten scrawl up at Uncle Ralph’s Aura Corner: "The last step before you get to Heaven is Harbour Island." I rather agree.

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