The flight to St. Lucia took about 6 hours (3 hours from BWI to Montego Bay, Jamaica and then another 3 hours to St. Lucia). We landed at Hewanorra Airport, at St Lucia's southern end, and took a pre-arranged taxi to Anse Chastenet resort near the town of Soufriere (a drive of about 25 miles which takes about 45 minutes). Yes, the roads are that bad.

Anse Chastenet hotel is situated on a hillside overlooking a small bay with a beautiful crescent of black sand beach. Our accommodations were in a private villa called "Cloud 9" which was located at the top of the hillside above the hotel. The villa "Cloud 9" was beyond our wildest dreams!. It was a 2 bedroom, 2 bath home with a stupendous, fabuloso 270 degree view of Soufriere Bay and the St. Lucia pitons (2 tall steep mountains that rise up out of the sea) and the Caribbean Sea. The living room had 3 walls, the fourth side was all open onto the deck. At night we would lay on cushions on the deck and stare up at the stars in the sky. The first night while we were laying on our backs on the deck, we were treated to two shooting stars (aahhh). We had a well equipped kitchen with a fridge, stove, microwave oven, toaster oven, blender, pots, pans, dishes, ... The master bedroom had a huge king size bed (with mosquito netting) and closets. The master bath had a vanity with two sinks, a large outdoor tiled shower and a beautiful view of the two pitons across the bay. Every night we were visited by two tiny frogs (Mutt and Jeff) in our bathroom. We'd find them on the vanity countertop or in the sinks. We always tried to not disturb them. They were so nice and cute. We also had visits from several lizards (about 8 inch long salamanders). They too were cute but they were also a bit more shy than the frogs. With the open living room wall and so many open windows in the house we also had many birds flying by and flying thru. The nicest birds were the yellow Bananaquits. There were also gobs of hummingbirds due to all the flowering trees. Being at the top of the hillside above all the hotel rooms gave us the utmost in total privacy in the house and on the deck. The only downside was the long downhill walk, about 300 steps (that's steps as in stairs), down to the beach. It provided us with a lot of exercise. (But that's OK, we're hikers!)

The hotel beach was a beautiful crescent of soft black sand. The snorkeling just off the two ends of the beach was great. That's where we spent a lot of our time. We also took two escorted snorkeling trips to other locations. The trips were offered by Scuba St. Lucia which based right on the beach at Anse Chastanet hotel. Having a guide snorkeling with you on the escorted trips proved very valuable as he pointed out things we'd probably never have seen, like a school of squid, an octopus, blowfish and a spotted drum fish. The guide we had was very good as he would make sure everyone saw his unusual finds, even the stragglers. The coral and fish were usually only 3 to 10 feet below us. The water was very clear.

One day we hired a guide (our airport taxi driver) and climbed Petit Piton which was the steepest and rockiest piton. The guide books said the government had closed Petit Piton to climbers due to the dangerous conditions but our guide said it was the only piton with a trail and it was the piton that everyone climbed. So we figured what the heck, the guide knows best !? The first 100 feet of hiking was level. After that it was 2 hours of continual climbing; grasping roots and rocks and branches to scramble up the side of the mountain (St. Lucia does not believe in switchbacks at all). In at least two spots you had to use ropes to climb up, over and under the large, smooth, wet, muddy rocks when the slope went straight up. We finally made it to the top and were treated to a fantastic view of the town of Soufriere, Soufriere Bay, the rain forest behind the town and the island to the south. Unfortunately it started to drizzle and the thought of being exposed on the top of the piton in a rain storm was not appealing to us. Also we knew we still had to get back down thru the jungley growth, over and under the rocks and down the rope sections. It took us another 2 hours to get back down the mountain. Knowing we had wanted to do the climb before we left home, we had brought along our hiking boots. Our guide however was not as well equipped. His Nike sneakers were about a size too small for his large feet so he couldn't put them on fully. Also, they were so worn out the soles were flopping in the breeze so he wrapped the shoelaces under the sneakers a few times and tied them on top to hold the soles on!

Since we were so sore from the climb, we decided to get his and her massages the next day. We hired two masseuses thru the hotel. They brought their massage tables up to our villa and we got simultaneous 1 hour massages on our living room deck. It was fairly soothing and enjoyable at the time but I can't say I felt less sore afterwards.

We ate most of our meals in our villa. The maid had pre-stocked the kitchen with some food before our arrival. We made our own breakfast every morning. We had fried eggs, bacon and toast, or a cheese omelet or cereal. One morning we ate at the hotel because we'd heard it was so great, but it was a major disappointment (especially at $18 each). Lunches we also usually made in our villa, except for one lunch in town in a small "local" dive of a restaurant. We had our best restaurant meal there! It had been recommended to us by the car rental attendant. We had one supper in the restaurant (very fancy, very pricey $45 each, and not very good) and one supper at "The Bang between the Pitons". It was located on the waterfront between the two pitons and the meal included a floor show of gymnasts, fire eaters and limbo dancers (I got a photo of Diane going under the bar!). The show was OK and the food so-so. The best supper we had was when we hired a private chef who came to the villa and prepared a fish dinner for us in our kitchen. He also served the meal and cleaned up after himself. The combination of the fantastic view of the setting sun from our personal romantic star lit dining room and the delicious 4 course meal were not to be beat (food and cook $21 each, and we had enough leftovers for a second meal!).

The last two days on the island we rented a jeep (4 wheel drive, 4 passenger, 2 door, 5 speed stick Suzuki Vitarra). Fortunately it was small, because the roads in St. Lucia are narrow (about 1 1/2 lanes wide). There are only 4 types of roads in St. Lucia; those that go STEEPLY up, those that go STEEPLY down, those that HAIRPIN turn to the right and those that HAIRPIN turn to the left. All St. Lucian roads are a combination of those four types combined with a very large sprinkling of bomb crater sized potholes and wash-outs. Speeding was never an issue as it was extremely difficult to find a stretch of road that was straight, level and smooth enough where one could drive faster than 35 mph! Driving thru their capitol city of Castries during mid day rush traffic on narrow streets crowded with parked cars and pedestrians everywhere while remembering to DRIVE ON THE LEFT! made for an enjoyable exciting adventurous afternoon. I noticed all the Police drove white 4 wheel drive Datsun/Toyota pickup trucks with large off road tires. On the last day, we were driving ourselves to the airport. We had to pass thru this small coastal town. I thought it would be nicer and more scenic to take the right fork in the road that lead along the waterfront. We ended up driving right into a funeral!. There were "hundreds"? of people all over the tiny town street along with the hearse and the preacher in his flowing white robes. Here we are driving thru this thick meandering sea of humanity dressed in all their "Sunday best" (us obviously tourists due to our white skin) trying not to cause another funeral while trying to be respectful of their ceremony. To top it off, in the middle of the mayhem, the "main" road had a construction detour which then sent us down an even narrower side alley! A block later we asked a small child by the side of the road where the "main" road was and he pointed us in the right direction. Diane had to make a "3 point turn" to turn right down another very narrow alley filled with parked cars and people hanging out their windows watching our every move (probably amused at the lost tourists trying to drive down their back alleys). I was glad Diane was driving this time!

All in all we had a great time and would love to go back to "Cloud 9". Next time we would take an organized trip into the rainforest, spend even more time at the beach snorkeling, lay on the deck every evening and watch the stars and hire the personal chef more often.