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Published: April 16th 2016
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Monday 14th March, 2016. Castries & Marigot Bay, St Lucia
We woke up this morning and M found that she had a few lovely bruises after her fall last night. However the worse thing was her fingernails. Two of them had broken quite a long way down the shaft - too far to tear them off (like she had with the others) as it would be too painful. We decided that the incident needed to be reported so that hopefully M could get her damaged nails sorted out. We went to see Olga and explained what had happened last night. We were taken into Olga's office (which was very nice indeed) and Marco was summoned. We explained again what had happened last night and explained who was there at the time. Olga arranged for M to have her broken nails repaired by the Jade Wellness centre. After the repairs were completed we disembarked the ship at about 11.00 am.
D had read the book and decided that it would be nice to get a number 3 bus to Marigot Bay. We asked a local and were directed to the correct bus stop. The first bus
was full so we were first on the next one while we waited for it to fill up (which took about 10 minutes). The journey across town took longer than expected (about 45 minutes) because of roadworks in the tunnel just outside of Castreis. We paid an extra couple of $EC to be taken down to the bay rather than being dumped at the top of the hill.
Marigot Bay is a lovely sheltered bay surrounded by green hillsides. The inner harbour is so long and deep that an entire British fleet is said to have once escaped French warships by ducking inside and covering their masts with coconut fronds. The bay was also the setting for the 1967 musical "Doctor Doolittle" starring Rex Harrison. We walked down to the marina which is a popular anchorage for yachters. There was a posh hotel here too.
We caught the little pontoon ferry boat to La Bas Beach($5 EC each return). We hired a sunbed each for the day (very reasonable at £3.00). We positioned ourselves in the shade fairly close to Doolittles Restaurant and Bar. I guy called Ethiopia came over and served
us some beers. We both had a swim and sat on the sunbeds and read our books. We thought we had, once again, achieved our goal of escaping from the ship's passengers but were quite surprised to see the lady from the Jade Wellness Centre and her colleagues there with the Financial Controller. We went and said "Hi" though and m confirmed that here new nails were still OK.
We went to Ethiopia's shack for lunch of yams, sweet potato, macaroni cheese, BBQ chicken and rice and peas. We spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach. We explored the beach a bit more. There were plenty of American tourists around and food stalls and Yachts. There was also a guy in a funny little rowing boat called The Jah Come. At about 4 pm we decided to make our way back to Castries. We caught the little ferry back to the other side and then walked up the fairly steep hill in the direction of the bus stop. There was a bar called 'The Good View Bar' where we took some photos of Marigot Bay from above. We continued on and flagged down
a number 3 bus back to town. The route back was completely different. We would our way through endless banana plantations dropping off and picking up passengers. We didn't get caught in the traffic jam on the way back as we came in from the opposite end of town.
Once back on board we took some photos from the ship before going to the show lounge to watch a school steel band that was onboard to entertain us. The school is sponsored by the Amy Winehouse foundation. Amy and her music touched the lives of millions, and when she tragically passed away on July 23rd 2011, aged only 27, it didn’t just break the hearts of her family and close friends – it had a huge impact all over the world. Her family felt it was important to keep her memory alive. On the 14th September of that year, they set up the Amy Winehouse Foundation – on what would have been Amy’s 28th birthday. Amy was passionate about helping young people, and fully understood the problems that many of them face. The Foundation works to prevent the effects of drug and alcohol misuse on young people.
It also aims to support, inform and inspire vulnerable and disadvantaged young people to help them reach their full potential, which is the case with our steel band which is from Dunnottar School. This school supports disadvantaged young people, suffering with autism and other problems through a music education program funded by the Foundation; the aim being to support the personal development of disadvantaged young people through music. We listened to the band and watched a very small boy play "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star". It was magical. We were in the front row so had to wait for the show to finish before we could go to dinner - so we were late. D donated very generously on the way out.
After dinner there was a tropical deck party which was quite good fun.
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