Monday 23rd November

Quite a slow day, we pottered up the east coast of St Lucia trying to find some of the landmarks noted on the map. There isn't much activity yet on the tourism front, so not much effort has been made to spruce things up yet. Or maybe that's just the general approach!

We walked part of the Des Cartiers trail - a pair of old roads built by the French and British at various points in the past. The drive up to the trail is a single-track road into the interior of the island; surrounded by banana plantations with blue plastic coated fruit hanging from the trees, dodging oncoming pick-up trucks, the occasional stray dog or banana picker. The walk itself is nice for the opportunity to stretch legs, but a little monotonous from a scenery perspective. We don't see any parrots, but do hear a number of suspicious sounds.

The Daih-shit-su is sounding even worse than previously and refused to go into gear at one point (bear in mind it's an automatic). Since it's on the way back to Balenbouche, we stop off at the Hire Center where we are assured after some discussion that they will bring a replacement 4x4 pick-up out to Balenbouche for us. And will then provide a waterproof cover for it later on. Why do I suspect they won't manage to hit their own deadline time of 9:30am?

After walking along Anse des Sables, a long beach with incredibly fine-grained white sand, we head back to Balenbouche to do a little more high intensity reading and relaxing before cooking dinner.