Sailing, Mud and Dancing

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The last couple of days have been fairly quiet beach days. The days tend start with some rain, wind and overcast skies, but gradually brighten up to be warm and sunny. In never drops below 26C, even in the evenings, so we’ve spent most of our time on the beach, and eaten dinner outside everyday.

On Tuesday however the weather was fab and we headed out on an excellent trip, as follows.

After an early pick up we joined a catamaran for a 2 hour cruise down the West coast to Soufriere. We were with a lively crowd of Americans, Canadians and a few others, mainly our age group but some families with kids. Then by bus up into the hills for a drenching under a waterfall (Cj: the waterfall wasn’t huge, but by heck it came down hard!) ...then on to a hot spring and mud bath next to the local volcano. The pictures tell the story. Lunch at a cocoa plantation (Cj: plus an interesting lecture on how chocolate is made, including a taste of the raw bean to get the ’slime’ off it - tastes just like lychees - and a demo of the ‘dance’ - chap climbs into a huge copper vat and flails around energetically ... fascinating) followed, and then we got back on the boat. We stopped on the return journey for half an hour’s very good snorkelling - just wading out a few yards from the beach to find hundreds of the most gorgeous and varied fish nibbling at the algae on the rocks. As if that wasn’t enough the voyage home was in lovely sunny conditions, with free beers and rum punches and much dancing. Cathy absolutely loved it as you will see.

Overall it was a great day out and the highlight of our trip. We’re winding down now though, but looking forward to the weekly street party tonight in Gros Islet...

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Photos

Cathy the intrepid sails forth
Clearly caught me at a bad angle: I’m sure I’m not that shape really ...

Steve pummelled under waterfall
Unfortunately you can’t hear him howl ...

Muddy hot springs
Not quite an Onsen but enjoyable

Dancing the afternoon away... Cathy gets in the swing
Steve joined in too..it was pretty wild party for the last hour.

Comments

[Andy Lambert]

Give my regards
Sally and I spent our honeymoon in St Lucia - Soufriere was, er, interesting!! Enjoy.