March 25th-St. Lucia

Christopher Columbus had traditionally been given credit for discovering St. Lucia in 1502, but some relatively new theories challenge this view. St. Lucia was alternately occupied by British and French forces as they battled for control of the West Indies. In 1802, the Treaty of Paris established France’s sovereignty over the island, but by the following year, the two nations were at war again. The 1814 Treaty of Paris ceded St. Lucia to Britain, and the island remained a British possession until 1967, when it became a self-governing associate state of Great Britain. In February 1979, St. Lucia became an independent nation within the British Commonwealth. The island is 238 square miles with 160,000 population. The main language is English.

This morning we woke up and watch our arrival into St. Lucia. It was pouring rain and didn’t look like it was going to stop anytime soon. It was 7:00am and we were planning on doing a Zipline tour today. We ate breakfast and then had to meet on the dock. We met our tour guide in the pouring rain and got into a van which drove us up the mountain on windy roads for about ½ hour. We got up to the Rain Forest Sky Ride Park and the guides put our equipment on us. I think we got the best guides; their names were LaToya and Akim. We boarded a gondola which took us through the Rain Forest for about ½ hour and it was beautiful. It rained on us but we put rain ponchos on and made it to the top. We hiked for about 20 minutes through the rain forest and got onto the first platform for the zipline. It was so much fun.  We did 11 ziplines and then hiked back up to the drop off spot to take the gondola down. After our ride back to town we walked around and shopped a bit but didn’t buy anything. It was still raining and we were getting hungry for lunch (it was about 2pm). We got back on the ship and went up for lunch where we played cards. After Mike whipped my butt in “Nickels” we came back up to the room and Mike napped while I went to the gym. I decided after he slept for 2 hours that I would wake him up and have him walk around the ship on the walking track. It stopped raining and was nice out. We took some more pictures and walked around the ship until the ship left St. Lucia heading for Barbados.

Tonight was our dinner at “Sabatini’s” and OMG my tummy hurts. It was a 17 course meal (which of course I didn’t eat) but Mikey liked it. I did however eat more than I should have. It was so delicious.
Our reservations were at 7:00pm and we didn’t get done until 10:00pm. Now I just want to curl up and cry! The menu was so extensive I was going to post some of it but the thought right now is just too much.

I must go lay down now and stretch out my stomach so that I can get to sleep.
We only have a couple more days left. It actually seems like a long time away from home but it’s been wonderful too.

Until tomorrow,
Mike and Cathy