What’s a Rostafarian? – Rodney Bay, St. Lucia, May 15, 2023

On a boat, no luxury comes without a price. The good news is we spent 4 days basking in our air conditioning, however, somehow we now have a mystery water leak. Ron searched the boat and two good things:

1. It isn’t a big leak, so the bilge alarm doesn’t go off all that often
2. It’s fresh water so the boat isn’t sinking but, the fresh water pressure goes off every other hour

We think it is from our air conditioner and since we really have not used it all season, it would not surprise me.  Ron got to work unclogging the drain and for now it seems better.

We decided to rent a car to see a bit of the island as long as we had to wait til Tuesday to travel again anyway for the right weather. St. Lucia is supposed to be dangerous but really only in one of the southern anchorages Soufriere Bay which we have zero intention of going to. The poverty here is clear based on our drive around the island and the average Monthly salary is less than $1,100 USD.

St. Lucia was a British colony and the issue with many of these small islands is they have one main crop – bananas – and these plantations get wiped out every couple of years due to hurricanes.  This is also a dormant volcano and I have to say driving here is insane.  Sailing hubby did a great job considering the steering wheel is on the opposite side of the car, on the opposite side of the road, and the lanes are only about a lane and a half for what should be a two lane road.  Not to mention since it is a volcano, the roads are basically a cliff and windy as heck!

We had intended for to go hiking through the rainforest here today, however, when we got to our trail of choice (which wasn’t a full scale of Mount Piton – the volcano which requires a guide), it was closed and the gate chained shut.  Just our luck once again.  Well now what?

We started to drive back and tripped on another trail which also appeared to be a parrot sanctuary.  It looked open so we parked and when we walked up to it, it appeared to be someone’s house.  We were about to leave when a gentleman came out and invited us in and to show us the trail.  He ended up being our guide and his name was Ases, who owned the property, and his dream was to turn it into a park and sanctuary.  Only Ron and I would walk into the rainforest with a stranger, who handed us a couple hiking sticks, picked up his machete, and off we went up hill.

Along the way we got to know him a bit and he was a Rastafarian.  He had spent 12 years living and working as an architect in Canada before buying his father’s property to turn into a park.  He had built himself a house on the property, was a vegan (as most Rastafarian’s are) and his religion is all about we are all one and one with the planet. 

He was intelligent, articulate, and super interesting.  He showed us a cinnamon tree and apparently, we get cinnamon from the bark.  We also saw an incense tree and Frankincense is the sap from the tree – who knew?  He grew most of his own food and had bananas, citrus, yams, and a bunch more.  He was focused on planting a specific type of pear that attracts the parrots so they would come to nest on his land.  There is one type of parrot that only lives on St. Lucia, and he is trying to keep is from going extinct.  It’s no wonder these are called “the spice islands.”

By the time we reached the end of the path we had a spectacular view of the Piton Volcano, which is two peaks, and their national beer is named after these peaks.   He sent us home with fresh locally grown organic bananas and a sour orange.  It makes great smoothies with almond milk & bananas!

After our super interesting time with Ases, we headed over to Diamond Falls.  We had enjoyed our last botanical garden experience, and this was a nice end to our day.