I didn't have any specific plans for the day and Lorraine, the owner, and had several errands to run today so I decided to tag along with her to get my bearings on the island. We drove over to Caribbean side of the island and stopped at various big tourist hotels along the way with whom she does business. We cruised through Castries which is the major city in St. Lucia and eventually worked our way north to Pigeon Island where I was dropped off for a few hours.
First some background history on St. Lucia and Pigeon Island. Pigeon Island is a small island just off the coast of St. Lucia that was coveted by the French and British primarily as a military outpost in the Caribbean. The island has a couple very tall hills that provide excellent visibility of approach ships and even other islands on a clear day. Control of St. Lucia and Pigeon Island traded hands over a dozen times as a result of military action and I was excited to see what this island was all about.
I started by walking around the perimeter of Pigeon Island and admiring the beautiful beaches where people were swimming, sunbathing, sailing, and generally taking in the beautiful water and views of the southern caribbean. There was actually a local restaurant overlooking the beach where I stopped for a sandwich and some delicious fresh fruit juice.
Continuing hiking around the island I saw some of the old military installations that were used in the various battles between the French and the English. Below are some remains of a military barracks with quite an ocean view.
Hiking up a pretty steep hill on the western tip of the island was a British military outpost with several cannons to lay waste to any unfriendly approaching ships. The view from here was amazing and see could see miles in every direction. It was clear why there were so many battles for control of the island and by extension the southern Caribbean.
To the east was a much steeper hill and on the summit of this hill was the lookout for the entire island. I met a British couple who was hiking down the hill and based on the expression on their face this was a much tougher climb than it looked. They said it was difficult but the view was worth it; so I embarked on a series of switchbacks toward the looking point. Here are some of the views that awaited me.
After taking a few hundred pictures I hiked back down to the beach on pigeon island and decided to stop at the restaurant / bar overlooking the beach. Since it's incredibly hot and humid on most Caribbean islands including St. Lucia, shocking revelation I know, it seemed like a good idea to replace some fluids with a couple liters of fresh fruit juice. After some delicious pineapple and passion fruit juice, I met back up with Lorraine and headed down the western coast of St. Lucia. We eventually stopped at Marigot Bay which is famous for a couple of reasons. First, it was the setting of the 1967 Doctor Dolittle film staring Rex Harrison. Second, American author James Michener famously called it the “The Most Beautiful Bay in the Caribbean”.
Unfortunately, we were only planning to stay in Marigot Bay for 10 minutes before heading back to the eastern side of the island and Lorraine's house for the evening. I decided this place was worth sticking aroun and arranged for a taxi to pick me up later that night at 7:30. Once I made transportation arrangements for later that night I wanted to take some photographs of the sunset and beach at Marigot Bay along with enjoy some nice local food for dinner.
The beach at Marigot Bay is very small and you actually have to take a water taxi across the bay to reach it along with a couple restaurants. I took the water taxi across the bay and grabbed a table at Dolittles for dinner. I set up my tripod and snapped off shots as the sun slowly fell toward the horizon. Eventually it disappeared behind the crystal clear blue water of the Caribbean and I enjoyed a delicious creole Mahi Mahi for dinner. Pictures of Marigot Bay and the associated sunset are below.
Later that evening I met my cab driver Peter and took a long drive through the rain forest and back to Lorraine's on the eastern / atlantic side of the island. Spent the evening laying in the hammock on her patio reading a book and listening the sounds of the jungle before ending the night early. Thank you for reading this blog post and as always if you have any questions / comments please post below or email me at chris@pricelessperspectives.com
Sounds so beautiful there. If you need a book to read let me know....mine is available on Amazon.com both in print and via Kindle (but under my pen name Susan Rushmore).
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