Saint Lucia, XtremesPaul and BodyHoliday
XtremesPaul has just been away for a sneaky 10 days to St. Lucia at BodyHoloday, my partner is crime for this trip was Trina Forte. The trip was to celebrate her 46th birthday.
We had originally booked Destinology to travel through Thailand and Asia over the Xmas/New year period of 2014. Following the declaration of marshal law in May 2014, we postponed the holiday and therefore had a credit to use. Thank you to Amy for looking after us and booking this trip. We actually flew on Trina’s birthday with Virgin Atlantic, the flight was OK, but nothing special. However given that Trina is a Virgin frequent flyer, I was surprised that they did not acknowledge this during the flight.
The transit from airport to resort was uneventful with a great driver called Biggin.. It is amazing how much you can learn about a country from chatting with a taxi driver, this is the same the world over. All the drivers we met were great ambassadors for the island. Biggin was also kind enough to act as tour guide and take us to Carnival (more on that later)
The bodyholiday, is a French owned and run all inclusive resort in the north of the Island. This is not my normal type of holiday, but for 9 nights it was great. The resort runs a WellFit families programme during the summer, with visiting GB Olympians. The first week it was Gail Emms and the 2nd week Jamie Baulch. What a brilliant concept, you get to meet and train with these superhero’s, beach fit at 7am then a healthy breakfast. OK I did not actually make any of these sessions. Then on the Wednesday evening the Olympians hosted a dinner and delivered an after dinner speech.
On 1st Wednesday, I spent the morning paddle boarding with Gail and few others. It was supposed to be a 5mile open water paddle, but given the high winds, that was cancelled and we played paddleboard “Tag” around the bay. It’s great fun and see the improvement is everyone’s paddling in just a couple of hours was brilliant.
The all-inclusive not only included all your food and vittles, but also it included most sports. For me that meant; mountain biking, wakeboarding, stand up paddleboarding, hobie cat and diving, just as well there was also a daily spa treatment, so a free massage is not to be turned down.
On the island they do say wait 5 minutes and it will be alright!! On Thursday we had booked a snorkelling trip, this had to be cancelled due to the horizontal rain.
24 hours later at the Pitons
Just to prove we did see some fish
Day trips:
1st Day Trip Carnival: The official Carnival Website
A rich display of Saint Lucian culture, Lucian Carnival pays homage to the island’s African and Catholic heritage. Once held to mark the end of the Lenten season, the festival was relocated in the late 90’s to accommodate the island’s thriving tourism industry, and to eliminate competition with Carnival gargantuan Trinidad & Tobago.
Today, Lucian Carnival is widely lauded as one of the Caribbean’s most exciting festivals. In keeping with the island’s reputation for exclusive world class entertainment, Lucian Carnival continues to produce spectacular visual and auditory displays.
Biggin collected us at 10:30 from the resort and drove us into town, in time to grab a couple of cold Piton’s before the event started. The beers help you get into the Caribbean timing a 12:00 start, really means 12:45ish… Sat on the balcony watching the world go by we did not mind.
I’ve been to Notting Hill carnival, where it’s crazy busy and a little intimidating. You don’t feel like that here and I’m not sure why. Trina and I did stand out, but only because we are the only Europeans. To give you some idea of the size of the event the first competing band/truck had a dance troop of 1,200 people, it took 45 minutes for them to pass us.
A great experience and so much fun, its beats the Swanage Carnival.. hehe..
The 2nd day trip was to Rain Forest Tree Top Adventures
Well worth the trek, the guides are barking mad and keep you smiling, the whole thing is very well organised and super safe. We booked directly online with the company rather than through the hotel and saved 50%, due to a special offer.
You get to see the island from a very different view point, whether it is traveling in the happy bus, to get to the site or the views from the zip wires.
I know other people that have been on zip lines with this company in Costa Rica and they rave about the experience as much as we do. So well worth a day out, if you have the time.
So it’s bye bye, St Lucia you have been a great host and thank you for a great holiday. Back to work we go..
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