St. Lucia

We're back from St. Lucia! It was absolutely gorgeous there and we had a great time to say the least. The Renewal Ceremony was beautiful and we were so lucky to have some FANTASTIC photographers. My photos from that aren't downloaded onto the computer yet, but these are a couple pictures we took while out exploring the island. We visited the Piton Falls and took a dip in the water, and took in some amazing views of the Piton Mountains & the awesome blue ocean below. I've never seen such beautiful sites.
We stayed at the Coconut Bay Resort on the southern part of the island. It's the only resort on this half of the island at the moment. The busiest part of the island is in the city of Castries in the north. When we first arrived, it was a rainy & dreary day, and I was second-guessing my choice of resort. Everyone we'd met on the plane was staying at Sandals, Windjammer, or another resort in Castries. No one we spoke to was going to our resort. I was starting to worry about this trip. Needless to say, I was making stupid assumptions WAY too early. It was great. We ended up making friends with the only other American couple there. They were on their honeymoon. The majority of folks staying at our resort were from England. We made friends with a man named Amin & his wife, as well as Mark & Paula...all from England. I enjoyed getting to know them and hearing everyone's thoughts on americans, lol. On Monday the rain left and the sun came out, and with that brought some pool volleyball. We joined in the fun pretty much every day. Our team consisted of the people mentioned above. It was quite funny by the end of the week....we'd gotten fairly good and were hard to beat. ;)
Tuesday was the vow renewal (I will go into that more in another post) and on Wednesday we rented a car with our american friends Jesse & Heather to explore the island on our own. It was a fun experience driving on the other side of the road (happy to say JON did that for us). I sat in the passenger side which is normally our driver's side, and I caught myself a few times reaching for a wheel. The roads there are SO windy and hilly. I managed to get very motionsick but tried to enjoy the view along the way. The ocean had the most gorgeous shades of blue. We drove through a couple towns, visited the Piton Falls for a dip in the water, saw the world's only drive-in volcano (where it STUNK like no other! The sulfur made it smell like rotten eggs), and visited the Botanical Gardens. It was fun to speak with some of the locals and see how they live. Quite a big difference from America.


The rest of the week??? We soaked up some rays :) Oh, and I can't forget the couple's massage we received under the palm trees next to the ocean. It was awesome, I loved hearing the waves crashing. I need to get massages more often I tell ya. It was great. So that's about it in a nutshell! So if you're looking for a trip to the caribbean, St. Lucia is a beautiful island. The northern resorts are a bit pricey for my liking. Our resort was honestly about 1/2 the price since they have only been open a year and they're trying to draw in more visitors. Looking back, I'm glad we weren't at Sandals or any of the others b/c we were able to experience a much different atmosphere with different cultures. Overall, a wonderful trip.