Thursday 5th March, Castries, St Lucia, 25 degrees, sunny with brisk breeze

We were booked on a foodie tour which did not leave until 10.00 so our start to the day was a bit ‘lounge-y’ and laid back – a bit like St Lucia really!! The sun was shining when we looked out on the way to breakfast.

I had my usual breakfast but Keith, always adventurous in all things gastronomic, saw a fish dish on offer that we had not seen before – green figs and salted fish – and decided to to for that. We found out later it was one of the national dishes of the Island! (It was a wonderful thing! I must try to find a recipe. Ed)

There were supposed to be four of us on the trip, but the fourth did not materialise, so there was just, Keith, me and a nice chap called Mike who is travelling on his own. We originally thought our walking tour would be around Castries, but we were wrong! The trip was around a place called Rodney Bay further to the north. This seemed quite a small town, just 20 minutes away from Castries, but it took about 45 minutes in the traffic. It gave us the opportunity to view some of the surroundings.

St Lucia is another of the islands that has turned to tourism as its main source of income. Unlike a number of the other islands, it has a large number of expensive hotels and Sandals, the well known all inclusive Resort Hotels chain, have a number on the island.

Having abandoned the idea of the 4th member of the party, we set off for Rodney Bay.

The terrain was very much as I remembered it from my visit nearly 30 years ago. Quite hilly, even mountainous but heavily wooded.

Reaching Rodney Bay we were met by Silma, our Lucian Culinary Quest guide and off we toddled to sample the food of St Lucia – and jolly nice it was too.

We started with a traditional breakfast but not before we had seen a poor chap having trouble with his wheelbarrow load of bananas! Sometimes you have days like that don’t you? One day you are a statue and another day you are a pigeon – I think he was having a statue day.

Anyway – back to breakfast (Keith having unwittingly been ahead of the game!). It comprised of a warm salt fish sort of sandwich and a cup of Cocoa Tea. The sandwich was very nice and savoury and not salty at all which I thought it might be. The fish they use is a salted cod imported from Canada. (Silma asked us to guess where the salted cod came from as it isn’t indigenous to the Caribbean. I said Nova Scotia. She said no, it’s from Canada. I didn’t say anything…🤪Ed)

Cocoa Tea is made using something called a cocoa stick with herbs and spices – cinnamon, bay leaf, star anise, clove and nutmeg – to this is added either custard powder or flour to thicken it. St Lucian’s have it with sugar. I preferred it with a bit of sugar! (I preferred it neat. Ed)

An alternative to this for breakfast is a porridge made from flour or custard with the same combination of herbs and spices.

We had the breakfast in a cafe served by two lovely ladies!

Next stop was a street vendor serving something known as ‘Abi’s Doubles’ .

It was basically two small flat bread type pancakes filled with shredded cucumber, shado beni (a local herb a bit like coriander), tamarind, golden apple (another local item a bit like a plum) chickpeas and pepper sauce. It was absolutely delicious – but very tricky to eat! Looking back it definitely earned 1st prize for the day!

Having unscrambled ourselves from that challenge we moved on a couple of blocks. Rodney Bay was beautifully clean and had very colourful houses.

Our next stop was equally colourful but we wondered what the plastic bag of water was doing on the table – it apparently deters flies! Another ‘who knew’ moment! In fact we have seen very few flies on the whole of our journey – but have never seen the plastic bag of water device used before!!

Here we had what constituted our ‘lunch stop’.

This comprised of something called taro, plantain, green fig and chicken. The green fig was mixed with mayonnaise and chopped up like a salad. Once again it tasted good – but a very different selection of vegetables. These are known as ‘provisions’ in St Lucia.

We were then off again. Our next stop was a bar where we were offered either rum punch or a beer. Discretion being the better part of valour, I decided on the Piton Beer, after my St, Vincent experiences, Keith however opted for the Rum Punch. I think this picture speaks for itself!!

The rum punch here was made up of pineapple juice, orange juice, the local Denros white rum (84% proof!), cinnamon and nutmeg. (The pineapple juice was a lovely addition. Ed)

Once again we moved on out into the sunshine. We passed the Marina with some very expensive looking boats on it.

Our last stop was for our pudding. It was a coconut turnover. It was a sort of bread like sponge filled with a very cinnamon flavoured coconut.

So another good day of sampling the food of the West Indies. St Lucia moved between French and British rule 14m times during the 17th and 18th centuries ending up in British hands. Slavery was a key part of its plantation economy, but when slavery was abolished, Indians were brought over to St Lucia to shore up the gap left by the slaves. This influence has added to the creole flavours in the food and is reflected in the spices used in their cooking.

Within minutes our driver arrived to take us back to Castries. All three of us agreed the morning had provided a very interesting insight into the local food and that young Silma had done a good job.

The traffic was not so bad on the way back. One useful stoppage allowed me to take a photograph of a wonderful piece of sculpture on an island in the middle of the road in Castries.

After a bit of a rest we took off again to see the Cathedral in Castries which is the biggest in the whole of the Caribbean – and it was well worth seeing!

It is not that large compared with European Cathedrals but is certainly light, bright and attractive. It has amazing murals by a St Lucian artist, Dunstan St Omer.

St Lucia has two Nobel prize winners and both are commemorated in the town square near the cathedral.

And then it was time to get back to the ship.

We watched the Aurora turn around to enable her to head out of the bay.

The sun was setting as we headed northwards. Tomorrow is a sea day but tomorrow evening we will arrive in Antigua.