So
after two glorious weeks in St.Lucia, as promised here is a blogpost
about my holiday adventures. For those of you who are unfamiliar
with St.Lucia, it is a small volcanic island in the Caribbean off the
North coast of South America.
I
was lucky enough to travel there via Virgin Atlantic with my mother
and sister. The journey was very
long and very
tiring. The day we left we had to get up at half past two in the
morning and we were then collected by our taxi at four to take us to
Gatwick Airport. Because our suitcases were so big we had a minivan
to take us there! Living in southwest England, the car journey took
four hours to the airport, then the flight took just over seven
hours. I was extremely tired and even more so when we had an hour and
a half taxi journey across the windy landscape of St.Lucia to our
resort, East Winds Inn. St.Lucia was a very beautiful country to
look at, but the way people lived really created a new perspective
for me. There were many shacks where people lived, tethered goats and
stray dogs at the sides of the roads, but although I felt out
of my comfort zone, I realised that the friendliness of the people,
the mountainous landscape and luscious rainforest
made it totally worthwhile. It was a whole new experience which I am
still extremely grateful for.
Our
resort, East Winds Inn, was breathtaking. The tropical gardens were
full of exotic plants, birds, geckos, land crabs and hummingbirds. We
went during the low season therefore it wasn't very busy, which was
good because after a night in our first house where we shared a room,
we asked if we could be moved to another that wasn't so close to the
Bamboo Lounge which was quite a noisy socialising area in the
evening. Amazingly, they moved us to the deluxe cottage at the far
end of the resort where we were given two rooms with balconies, walk
in wardrobes, large double-sinks and sunken showers. We were very
lucky and we couldn't thank them enough.
We
dined in the resort's open air restaurant every day, and I miss the
staff very much because they were not only our waiters and
waitresses, but our friends. Every sunday lunch there was a steel
band who played reggae (which was brilliant) and on
Saturdays there were delicious barbecues. Every evening we
had various different entertainment, from saxophone to piano which
was lovely to listen to and soak up the atmosphere.
It
was very hot, almost twice the temperature here in England. But that
created the perfect excuse to dip into the sea and swim amongst the
fish, occasionally having a friendly chat with the locals. There
was also the hotel's pool with a swim-up self-service bar.
We
also did a fair amount of travelling across the country, visiting
nearby towns, botanical gardens, sulphur springs and being
carried across the rainforest canopy in a lift. It was a
truly mesmerising experience which I shall never forget.
