Unknown Territory Explored

It’s Monday and I need to be in Castries by 7:00 p.m. I’ve cleaned the house and prepared as much as I can. At 5:00 I head downstairs and toward the main road to catch a bus for the 45 minute ride. It should be easy to catch a bus because it’s the end of the day and drivers will be out in force looking to fill their buses to maximize their earnings.

I arrived a little before seven. Ah, enough time to go to Super J to buy a couple of bottles of wine. I pick two bottles of red and head for the Taxi Stand where I will meet Lenny. I am using this opportunity to stock up on some things I need – Mega J, here I come! Paper towels, toilet paper, large bags of coffee and drinks; oh, and two new pillows and a cucumber so large that Lenny and another man are making jokes about it. I leave them behind and go about my shopping.

The shopping spree empties out my pockets, but I have enough of some things to carry me to close of service. We pack up his taxi and head to Vigi where my sister, Janyn, will arrive at 9 p.m. She will be here for five full days and I have a packed schedule ahead. I know I will be exhausted at the end of her trip and I can only assume she will need a vacation after this vacation as well.

Her plane arrives and we wait more than an hour for her to get through customs. I’ve learned by now that nothing is easy and patience makes life seem easier. We pile into Lenny’s van and he drives through the Morne stopping at Dennery to look at the lovely view. Janyn is very photogenic, isn’t she? After an hour we arrived home and brought the bounty of goods acquired at Mega J up the stairs and into the house, along with the backpack she brought. Inside her bag were so many goodies; a new pair of flipflops, Lemon Luna Bars, Bagels, Mounting Tape to hang a new picture of my granddaughter – and a New York Pizza. Yum!

We opened a bottle of wine and stayed up late talking about what we would do while she was here. The days are packed and will go by fast.

A village tour which included Vierge Point and Sandy Beach with drinks at the Reef were on the agenda. The banana daiquiri was so good, it sent us searching for a blender to replicate the frosty drink at home.

Bus rides are an experience that most Peace Corps Volunteers like to share with guests. Loud music is a constant and swerving around vehicles can be nerve-wracking. One of the biggest surprises on the island is that Country Western is extremely popular. One explanation is that the culture is "story-telling" and so that explains their love for the stories told in this type of music. It's unfortunate that the wind overtook the sound in the video and the Country Western Music cannot be heard.

The Ziplines in Dennery were at the top of our list and we weren’t sorry. Zipping through the forest high above the trees at 30 MPH was great fun and walking up to the waterfall topped it off.

(If you are at work, I'd advise you to turn the sound down before starting this video).

After cooling off we hiked back to the road and waited…and waited for a bus. Catching a bus in Dennery is challenging and not a sport that I like to participate in. Finally, after some time, an empty taxi took pity on us and stopped, charging us only bus fare. It was there that Janyn left her camera; lost forever in the backseat of an unknown taxi.

Another volunteer had family visiting and we went along for an arts and crafts tour of the island they had planned. We stopped at Choiseul, a village known for its crafts where I purchased a doll made by a blind person for my granddaughter. After a leisurely drink at Ladera Resort and a quick purchase of purses made of wood, we stopped at Zaka Totum and Mask Studio where the artist creates amazing masks using recycled wood. Of course I couldn’t resist and picked up a simply designed mask made of Blue Mahoe, Jamaica's National Tree. Later we stopped for a taste of Cassava Bread before we headed up north to the art gallery in Castries and then to the batik and wood carving studios on the Morne.

Finally, we went to Llewellyn Xavier’s home in Cap Estate. Sometimes it amazes me how much access a Peace Corps Volunteer has. Among the locations of Llewellyn’s permanent collections are the Smithsonian and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He’s worked with John Lennon, Yoko Ono, Jean Genet and others. His work is amazing. This is one stop where I did not make a purchase.

We sipped Rum Punch and ate fish cake while listening to him tell stories. Later we drank the juice from chilled coconuts that were picked that day in our honor. His current project is to conceptualize the environment to awaken world consciousness of the destruction the earth is experiencing. He had a box brought out with t-shirts with environmental messages that he designed. We each picked one and then signed his guest book.

The next day we attended the July 4^th BBQ at the Peace Corps Country Director’s home where we met a group of Saint Lucia Volunteers who served in the late 1960s. This was their forty year reunion.

We went to Pigeon Point and hiked to Fort Rodney to enjoy the amazing view that pans the Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea. It’s an old lookout complete with cannons that the English used to fight the French. The island changed hands fourteen times before the English prevailed. Saint Lucia gained independence in 1979 and just celebrated its thirty year anniversary.

Janyn left, more than likely exhausted from the packed days. I watched her plane take off while sitting on the beach nearby. Oh, the camera? Well, the driver of the taxi figured out that it belonged to the two white women he rescued on the side of the road in Dennery. He remembered the village where he dropped us off. He has a friend in my village. We are easily described and that friend knows me. The camera has been returned and is ready to ship back to my sister. Humm, do you think that would happen in Los Angeles?