St. Lucia

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St Lucia was another island I was looking forward to. We docked in the Capital Castries and I had arranged a tour prior to leaving England to take us around the island. St. Lucia is a volcanic Island still with an active drive through volcano down in the south of the island at Soufriere. Behind that is the national forest and park which contains the famous twin peaks of Le Petit Piton and Le grand Piton for which St Lucia is so well known. We drove right down to this area to see the drive through volcano. The smell of sulphur hung heavily in the air as bubbling mud pools released pockets of steam and gas. Imagine it smelt like rotton eggs. Not a nice smell but after a while we got used to it. It was very warm here in fact steaming and humid. The temperature of the water here is 340F or 170C. This area is called Gabriels hole for reasons I will explain. The guy who was taking us on the tour was very pleasant and told us many stories including the story of one man who was guiding a group of tourists around the volcano, Gabriel and stood on the area where the mud pools were. Sadly, the crust cracked and he fell through the thin crust up to his chest. He was badly burnt by the scolding water and spent several months in hospital recovering from his burns. Luckily he was able to go on and father two children. The Island was discovered by the Dutch but it changed hands several times to the British and the French in fact seven times each. Many of the small towns have French names and there is a local patois spoken that is based on French with a mixture of English. The drive back to Castries took quite a long time and although at one point we could see Castries the terrain is very mountainous so you can imagine it was not a straight road. The minibus had to negotiate some very steep gradients especially when we started the trip from the port. Climbing higher and higher via snaking roads. The view from the top of the hills around Castries was breathtaking. The photo is of The Pitons and the small town in the valley is Soufriere where we stopped to have lunch. I have never seen so many different kinds of vegetables on the plate. Most of which I had never tried before. Some were delcious whereas some were quite bland and unremarkable. To be honest,I could not really identify them but our guide did. The one thing that did stand out in my mind was plaintain which was delicious probably the only vegetable on the plate I could identify! We sailed away from the island in the cover of darkness but watched from our cabin as we passed the Pitons sillouetting the sky with the moon behind it as we sailed away to our last and final destination!