Joy's Adventure Tour - A Fantastic Day!

Last night, we ended the day with the Christmas menu prepared by Thor, the son of our landlord Keith. In Keith's former living room, he recently opened a restaurant with a friend after returning from Germany and Switzerland, where he learned and worked. You can directly look down into the bay from the open space without windows. Since everything is nice and small, you can even see wonderfully into the kitchen, which is only separated from the dining area by a counter. The 5-course menu was a real dream. Before we list everything, let us show you the menu. We definitely had a Christmas dinner at its finest and then fell tired into bed.

Today was our first big excursion - Joy's Adventure Tour. Conveniently, pick up and drop off were included, so a taxi honked at our door at 8 a.m. and took us to Rodney Bay marina. Since most of the tour participants were cruise ship guests, we started off privately alone as Captain Phil cruised along the coast towards Castries with his speedboat. He really stepped on the gas, which was incredibly fun. After picking up everyone in Castries, including our tour guide Vaughn, we set off, always along the west coast towards the south, passing rugged cliffs overgrown with jungle. Between the mountains, there were small and large, touristy and deserted beaches with palm trees and everything that goes with it.

In Soufrière, the second largest town on the island at the foot of Petit Piton, we switched to taxibuses, which took us to some island highlights. First, we went to the 'Drive-In Volcano,' an active volcano that you can drive to the crater by car. It continuously emits stinky sulfur fumes. The water flowing from the volcano is saturated with black iron-sulfur compounds, causing mud to settle everywhere. A little below the volcano, we took a bath in the muddy broth. It was wonderfully warm (from the hot volcano) and is supposed to make your skin beautiful. The mud was like a super peel and the skin afterwards was indeed as soft as a baby's bottom! A cool experience!

A short distance further, we stopped at the (admittedly quite busy with tourists) Toraille Waterfall, which plunges into the depths of the jungle and where we took another bath in the waterfall pool. After so much speed and water, we went to lunch with a big appetite, where there were all kinds of local dishes: (Of course) fish in a slightly spicy sauce, chicken, Asian noodles, curry rice, fried bananas, hearty banana mash (very popular here, as St. Lucia is a big banana producer), sweet potato mash, and much more. Freshly squeezed fruit juices from their own plantation were also served, and for dessert, mango and golden apple (no idea what that is in German, but it's not an apple!) and a coconut-ginger crush, which tasted great. With full bellies, we then had a short tour of the plantation, where various local plants (bananas, cocoa, cinnamon, nutmeg, etc.) were introduced.

An unexpected highlight for both of us was the subsequent snorkeling tour in the bay located between the two Pitons. These are the two steep mountains that are the landmarks of St. Lucia. Since neither of us had ever really snorkeled before, we weren't sure if it would work. But it worked perfectly right away, so we snorkeled for almost an hour and admired the many colorful fish, shells, and corals. It's really fantastic that the fish are not bothered by the snorkelers and simply swim right past you. Unfortunately, we don't have an underwater camera to capture that.

Back at the beach, we were showered by a little rain shower (not the first time today). But the amazing thing is that even though it rains for about 5 minutes several times a day now, you dry off quickly again in the sun and wind, and you don't really get cold because it's still over 20 degrees Celsius even in the rain. When the sun comes out, it's about 28 degrees Celsius, simply wonderfully pleasant!

We started the return journey with a round of delicious rum punch and Piton beer. The speedboat cruised back north and then in the middle of the sea in the open boat - a proper sluice-on-shower! We were absolutely soaking wet until the rain ended! But as always - the sun came out again! Along the way, we made a detour to Marigot Bay. It is a beautiful bay that became famous mainly because Dr. Dolittle 1 was filmed here. Another stop was made at the sea cave known to everyone from Pirates of the Caribbean, with three pirates hanging.

After dropping off our fellow passengers at the cruise ship again, Phil sped up again and brought us to the excursion center, where Joy, the boss, arranged a taxi back to the apartment for us. Now we are full of fantastic impressions that we need to sort out and enjoy the evening with bird chirping and cicada chirping again in Thor's restaurant (it was delicious again. Today a guest caught a barracuda and that was what we had for dinner, finely seasoned with ginger and bay leaves and served with sweet potato puree and vegetables).