03 May 2024

 

St Lucia

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Heaven,
no news for a week

Magazine February 2009

Phone-less, radio-less, TV and net-less. Could headline junkie Ray Connolly survive being incommunicado on St Lucia, a Paradise of pure peace?

St Lucia - The famous Pitons and flawless beach St Lucia - Endless watersports St Lucia - Chase your rainbow on your bike

1 The famous Pitons and flawless beach 2 Endless watersports 3 Chase your rainbow on your bike

THE PROSPECT OF SEVEN DAYS without a television, a radio, an internet connection or a phone may be enough to get many prospective tourists salivating. But to a news junkie like me, it sounded like a living nightmare. It would be like going on holiday in a hole.

How wrong I was. Despite my reservations, it turned out to be the basis of one of the best holidays I’ve ever had.

To my astonishment, I missed the outside world just once during my seven-day confinement in a resort on the Caribbean Windward Island of St Lucia. Only when I just had to know the result of a Liverpool match did I find myself literally begging for news from the outside world.

For decades, the only thing most of us knew about St Lucia was that it was where the bananas came from.

And in the Nineties, when EU rules demanded that the UK’s cosy banana deal with its ex-colony be abandoned, even that stopped. It was time for the St Lucians to do something about their image.

Sunny Days Gone By

It wasn’t difficult. This small island – measuring 27 miles by 14 – boasts coconut palms swaying over almost empty sandy beaches, misty mountains covered in rainforest, and warm, clear waters lapping over paint palette coral reefs. With raw materials such as these, tourism was a natural substitute for an ailing banana business.

Quite why the St Lucians didn’t realise this a long time ago, I don’t know. But I’m glad they didn’t. Because apart from the capital, Castries, which is now a day-tripper harbour for cruise ships, there’s a tranquil sense of sunny days-gone-by.


For our visit, we chose Soufriere, on the south-west coast. Soufriere is the oldest town on the island, a quiet little place of wooden, pastel-coloured houses scattered around a large bay.

Actually, with a history stretching back to the 18th century, Soufriere is a sparkling nugget of Caribbean history. For centuries the island was, when the British weren’t claiming it, a French possession, and the islanders still speak a French patois.

There was even a guillotine, long since dismantled, overlooked by pretty verandahs with filigree friezes, in the town square. The remains of an old sugar plantation called Mal Maison, in the woods just north of town, is also heavy with history. This is where the Empress Josephine, Napoleon’s first wife, lived as a girl.

Then known as Marie-Josephe-Rose de Tascher de la Pagerie, she may even have been born here, although the nearby island of Martinique disputes this. Whoever is right, Mal Maison was the name she gave to the home she shared with Napoleon in Paris.

There are several hotels dotted through the lush, green foliage of this mountainous stretch of coastline, and as there’s a languid sense of romance at play in these resorts, it’s probably best to go as a couple.

Although I like the beach, I’m not a snorkeller or scuba diver, and not even the famed coral reefs of the St Lucia Marine Reserve, where Harrison Ford has been seen, could tempt me into the sea.

Besides, there was so much to do on land, including my new hobby of jungle-biking. The mountain bikes are so light and manoeuvrable on the jungle trails of the Anse Mamin plantation that I immediately felt 15 again.


St Lucia doesn’t use the natural energy being released by its volcano, other than to warm the hot baths in the Diamond Botanical Gardens. But the volcano has given St Lucia its distinct appearance among the Windward Islands; a landscape of soaring mountains and lush rainforest.

The Food is Exceptional

And although it was a more difficult three-hour trek than the guide books had warned, it was a trip to Malgretoute Waterfall in a rainforest in the middle of the island which made our holiday.

St Lucia’s famous reclusive blue-and-green parrot escaped our view, but the luminous swathe of green around us was awesome. It was hard work, though, and if we hadn’t booked a hot stone massage for when we got back to the hotel, our legs would have hurt for days.

Fitter souls climb Gros Piton – we settled for a sunset cruise on a yacht up the coast. And as we returned home on that cloudless, balmy evening, the crescent moon was lying horizontally like a cradle in the sky, something I’d never witnessed before.

You don’t go to Soufriere seeking romance, you take it with you. Nor do you go there for the nightlife – the same half-dozen local bands follow each other from hotel to hotel and play their own versions of Hotel California and the best known Bob Marley hits. Everyone is in bed by 11pm.

The Caribbean-Creole food, with its blend of French and African influences, is exceptional. Heaven knows what was in my voodoo soup, but it was very good.

Considering St Lucia’s long association with France, it was surprising to be told that the French don’t holiday there. As for the Brits – virtually everyone we spoke to had a British relative.

For once, the French don’t know what they’re missing.

This article was featured in the February 2009 DialAFlight magazine. All information was correct at time of going to print.

0330·100·2220i 0330 calls are included within inclusive minutes package on mobiles, otherwise standard rates apply. X 0330 calls are included within inclusive minutes package on mobiles, otherwise standard rates apply. X
 
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