Blogs from Castries, Saint Lucia, Central America Caribbean

My favorite island in the Caribbean by far is St Lucia, there is just something about it. Even though I have been here quite a few times before, only at the beginning of this year I had the chance to explore more places in this beautiful country. In March this year I got to take a Rainforest Adventure to go ziplining. One of the best ziplines I've done so far, because the views from the top of the mountain into the rainforest are just spectacular. After putting on our safety equipment, we hopped into a small open cable car gondola that took us up the mountain, the ride felt very long, but the views were breathtaking. The guides were fantastic, they explained a lot of things about the forest and we also got a glimpse into ... read more

One of my favorite Caribbean Islands is definitely St Lucia. Even though most days I did not have enough time to explore I did find a nice place to chill out when even I am here. When ever we dock in Castries I will go to the Auberge Seraphine Hotel . Even if I just have an hour to spare I like to come here to grab a drink or some food. The hotel is a little hidden from the port, but it is only a five minute walk from the ship. I just love to sit on the upper deck with a cold beer or a cocktail in hand and just enjoy the views. There is a little pond just in front of the property, where you will find a lot of egrets chilling in ... read more

Only 2 weeks left! I'm actually really looking forward to going home. 8 weeks is a long time. There haven't been that many exciting cases in the hospital this week, and no really exciting news. Friday the girls and I went to the Gros Islet street party, but we only really went there for the food. We had our lovely BBQ grilled fish, had some drinks on the beach, and then went home. Yesterday, we spent the day at Windjammers resort. I got even more tanned and swam a lot. There was a big inflatable trampoline in the sea, so I swam out to that and climbed on for a bit. Alex and Liv didn't want to because it was quite far out, quite deep and there was a lot of seaweed out there. It was ... read more

So Monday and Tuesday this week were carnival. There have been, and still are lots of parties going on for carnival, but Monday and Tuesday were bank holidays and it was when the people got in their costumes and did the parade. There's not much to say, but I got a lot of photos. The costumes were pretty cool, although they are around £800 each for a bikini and feathers really. It was fun to watch and the crowds weren't too bad, so we got a really good view. Monday was really good, and that's where all the pictures are from. The whole thing was meant to start around 11am, but nothing happened until about 1pm. That's just St Lucia time. Tuesday wasn't as good. I think all the people must have been very tired or ... read more

So I have started my placement on internal medicine now. There are a lot more patients and a wider variety of conditions, so it's been really interesting. This will probably just be a really long post about the most interesting things I've seen and learned in the last two days. I saw a man with elephantiasis. Both of his legs were extremely swollen and his skin was scaly with lots of nodules. He was in because his skin breaks down a lot and gets infected. If you do a google image search for 'elephantiasis' you'll see lots of examples of the swelling. if you google 'elephantiasis hyperkeratosis' you'll see how their skin can look as well. It's caused by a parasite, a type of worm, which I knew. But I didn't know the worm was transmitted ... read more