It was nice to sleep in after our early start for birdwatching yesterday.
We had a leisurely breakfast. It looked to be another sunny day on the island. There was less haze than previous days - we could see St Vincent, about 45km to the south.
We planned out a little day trip to Cap Moule-à-Chique, the southernmost tip of St Lucia, just south of the airport in Vieux Fort.
Vieux Fort has been anglicized into ‘View Fort’ by both locals and tourists, which confused me at first. I thought there was a fort somewhere with a nice view, which sounded like a cool thing to see.
Anyways headed down to Vieux Fort, the same route we took to meet our bird guide. We turned south at the airport, and wound our way up to the lighthouse. Sitting at an elevation of 225m, it's supposedly the 2nd highest lighthouse in the world. [citation needed]
St Lucia (and most of the Caribbean countries) have only officially adopted the metric system since the 2000s. The latest push in St Lucia came in 2010 from a EU deadline to secure funding and trading. The Brussels effect in action :) Currently this means a mix of both imperial and metric signage. Speed limits are posted in km/h and mph, although some are mph only. Directions from locals are in miles and yards, like the restaurant is about 300 yards down the street.
We had read reviews of the lighthouse that said the road was in bad condition on the last stretch, so we parked before we got to the top and walked the rest. Looks like the road was recently paved as it was in great shape. We wanted to walk anyways so it didn’t matter.
There’s a good view from the top. The pitons aren’t as recognizable from this angle but they are visible. Took some pics, trying to avoid all the communication towers also at the top.
The lighthouse is in need of restoration, with boarded up windows and doors. The weather vane was sitting on the ground, I’m not sure if removed to restore it or if it was knocked off by a hurricane. Most pics show it sitting on top of the lighthouse, so it’s a recent decapitation. The weather vane is pretty photogenic, with varying shades of yellow, orange, and red.
Walked back down to our car, and drove down to the fishing pier. Took some pics of the boats. The fishing folk were wrapping up their day, washing out the fish market.
We were hoping for a nice seafood restaurant nearby, but didn’t see anything. We asked a shopkeeper and they directed us to a Chinese restaurant. It wasn’t what we were looking for, so looked up places on Google maps.
Ended up at Tones Front Yard, a very local place just outside the centre of Vieux Fort. We had to ask directions to find the entrance - the former sign is no more, and it’s down an alley between houses. The person we asked for help first thought about trying to give us directions, and then ended up just walking us there.
It was exactly the kind of local place we were looking for. The food was delicious, as was their local juice.
That was it for our day. Drove back to our hotel (about 45 minutes) and relaxed for the rest of the afternoon.
It was a beautiful sunset, with a clear horizon. It's the first time in years that I've seen the sun disappear into the ocean. We were still somewhat full from lunch, so ordered a lighter meal for dinner. Heather went off-menu and had the tuna ceviche as a main; I had the tuna catch-of-the-day.
Tuesday, September 30, 2025
Monday, September 29, 2025
Quilesse Forest Reserve, St Lucia
We were meeting our bird watching guide at 6am in Vieux Fort, so set our alarms for 5am. It was still dark when we woke, but had lightened enough for me to drive by 5:30.
It’s a beautiful drive along the coast from our hotel. Our first time in after arriving I was too focused on adapting to the new car, and couldn’t take in the view. There were quite a few locals waiting roadside for buses to get to work.
We met up with our guide, Nestor, in the Massy parking lot in Vieux Fort (Massy is main grocery chain in St Lucia). We joined him in his vehicle and drove north along the east coast towards Dennery. The water is much rougher on the Atlantic side than the Caribbean side we’d seen thus far in St Lucia.
There’s seven birds endemic to St Lucia (five species and two sub-species). On our excursion we were hoping to see six; with the highlight hopefully being the St Lucia parrot.
We made a couple stops at seemingly random places along the highway, but were actually access paths for workers to maintain electrical towers. We managed to spot four of the endemics, so a good start to the day!
The second stop was also the habitat of the St Lucia pit viper, a poisonous snake. Our guide had a long stick to beat the grass before we got through to the access path. We were glad to be done with that part.
Finally we drove 30 minutes inland towards Quilesse Forest Reserve, over roads in pretty bad shape. We would have turned around (not that there was anywhere to turn) if we had tried to do this independently.
We got to the park gates and the start of the trail through the rainforest. The trail goes through the heart of the rainforest to the west coast; we were only going in about 2km. The mosquitoes were bad, but our bug spray worked fine. It’s the only time we’ve had to use bug spray on this trip - in the evenings at dinner, it’s been mostly bug-free.
We enjoyed the walk through the rainforest, over a roughly maintained path. It was a nice temperature under all the trees, we were also at about 500m. After about 30 minutes we arrived at the lookout with a view across the valley.
Less than a minute after arriving, we saw a St Lucia parrot! It’s a really colourful bird, with blue, black, white and splashes of red, yellow, and green. Nestor hadn’t even set up his scope yet :) It's the national bird of St Lucia, and its flag also incorporates its colours.
We watched for another 45 minutes or so, and saw around 8-9 parrots in total. You hear the parrots squawking as the fly through the valley, waiting for them to appear and then hopefully track them until they land. It was too far across the valley to see their colour without binoculars or a zoom lens, we were lucky to track a few. I got a very blurry pic of one.
Finally we started the trek back to the vehicle, and then drove back to Vieux Fort to our car. Overall it was cool to see the St Lucia parrot and walk through the rainforest.
We had planned to have lunch at Mamma Tilly’s, a popular St Lucia seafood place, but it was closed Mondays. So picked a random place from Google maps and had a local lunch, which was okay.
Our dinner was excellent, we both had the catch of the day which was tuna today. (In some other places, the ‘catch-of-the-day’ is the same every day, like the wahoo in Fiji). It was super fresh and was served with the usual assortment of vegetable sides. Very yummy :)
It’s a beautiful drive along the coast from our hotel. Our first time in after arriving I was too focused on adapting to the new car, and couldn’t take in the view. There were quite a few locals waiting roadside for buses to get to work.
We met up with our guide, Nestor, in the Massy parking lot in Vieux Fort (Massy is main grocery chain in St Lucia). We joined him in his vehicle and drove north along the east coast towards Dennery. The water is much rougher on the Atlantic side than the Caribbean side we’d seen thus far in St Lucia.
There’s seven birds endemic to St Lucia (five species and two sub-species). On our excursion we were hoping to see six; with the highlight hopefully being the St Lucia parrot.
We made a couple stops at seemingly random places along the highway, but were actually access paths for workers to maintain electrical towers. We managed to spot four of the endemics, so a good start to the day!
The second stop was also the habitat of the St Lucia pit viper, a poisonous snake. Our guide had a long stick to beat the grass before we got through to the access path. We were glad to be done with that part.
Finally we drove 30 minutes inland towards Quilesse Forest Reserve, over roads in pretty bad shape. We would have turned around (not that there was anywhere to turn) if we had tried to do this independently.
We got to the park gates and the start of the trail through the rainforest. The trail goes through the heart of the rainforest to the west coast; we were only going in about 2km. The mosquitoes were bad, but our bug spray worked fine. It’s the only time we’ve had to use bug spray on this trip - in the evenings at dinner, it’s been mostly bug-free.
We enjoyed the walk through the rainforest, over a roughly maintained path. It was a nice temperature under all the trees, we were also at about 500m. After about 30 minutes we arrived at the lookout with a view across the valley.
Less than a minute after arriving, we saw a St Lucia parrot! It’s a really colourful bird, with blue, black, white and splashes of red, yellow, and green. Nestor hadn’t even set up his scope yet :) It's the national bird of St Lucia, and its flag also incorporates its colours.
We watched for another 45 minutes or so, and saw around 8-9 parrots in total. You hear the parrots squawking as the fly through the valley, waiting for them to appear and then hopefully track them until they land. It was too far across the valley to see their colour without binoculars or a zoom lens, we were lucky to track a few. I got a very blurry pic of one.
Finally we started the trek back to the vehicle, and then drove back to Vieux Fort to our car. Overall it was cool to see the St Lucia parrot and walk through the rainforest.
We had planned to have lunch at Mamma Tilly’s, a popular St Lucia seafood place, but it was closed Mondays. So picked a random place from Google maps and had a local lunch, which was okay.
Our dinner was excellent, we both had the catch of the day which was tuna today. (In some other places, the ‘catch-of-the-day’ is the same every day, like the wahoo in Fiji). It was super fresh and was served with the usual assortment of vegetable sides. Very yummy :)
Sunday, September 28, 2025
Anse Chastenet & Sugar Beach, St Lucia
We had arranged through our hotel for a snorkeling excursion today. We were meeting the boat at the dock in Soufriere at 10am, so had plenty of time for breakfast and getting our snorkeling gear together.
Had the same breakfast as yesterday, it’s really good. I think we had read in the reviews where someone complained about the lack of variety at breakfast. We don’t actually vary our breakfast much, even at home, so that didn’t matter to us. I’ll have fresh fruit, freshly baked bread, eggs and bacon, and coffee every day, thank you very much.
We changed into our snorkel gear and then drove into town. The hotel had shown us on google maps exactly where to park (at the bus station) and airdropped a pic of the boat, so it was pretty easy to find our way.
It was just the two us on the excursion. We chatted with the boat guy about what we wanted to do, and then we were off. The waters were really calm - no bumping at all.
First stopped off at a crevice in the rock cliff where bats make their home. We could see some of them flitting about, even though it was day.
Our first snorkel site was off Anse Chastenet, about five minutes by boat north of Soufriere. We were the only snorkelers which was cool. The water was super clear, and very still, which made for great pics. On other trips there’s slight bobbing about which makes it harder to focus the camera, especially zoomed in. Saw lots of trumpet fish and fan coral. Supposedly it’s a good place to see turtles, although we didn’t see any.
Next was Sugar Beach, one of the most popular snorkeling sites in the south end of St Lucia. It’s at the base of Petit Piton, and we actually saw the activity from our little trek yesterday. There’s a snorkeling area marked out with buoys.
We docked at the beach, which is surrounded by resorts. We were glad we hadn’t booked into any of these, it was really busy with tourists. Dodged our way through the tourists on the beach to the snorkeling area, put on our fins and away we went.
It wasn’t too busy once we got away from shore. The visibility was excellent, even better than Anse Chastenet. Saw lots of parrotfish and eels, as well as schools of Seargeant Majors. Our boat guy said that tourists feed the fish, and that’s why they are so tame here. We snorkeled out to the far end of the buoys and back, about 800m round trip.
Our last stop was around the ocean side of Petit Piton. My camera battery had died (I think our first two snorkels were 30m and 45m) so just left it on the boat. There was a bit of a current, and we were getting tired, so called it a day after about 20 minutes. It was a good site for snorkeling, not much coral but lots of boulders and crevices for fishies to swim in and about.
Overall it was great snorkeling excursion. It’s possible to drive to these and snorkel out from the beach (no need for a boat) but we had nice views of the pitons and of Soufriere from the ocean. The water temperature was the warmest we’ve been in. Great for snorkeling, although maybe not as good for the environment.
Our boat guy suggested Stone Yard for lunch, and called ahead to reserve a table for us. It’s geared to tourists, with lots of other groups ending their excursions here. It fit the bill though, as we weren’t out of place in our wet snorkel gear, and they had a good bathroom. The food was okay, we liked Belle Vue better.
Drove back to our hotel, the road now familiar to us the 4th time through. Rinsed and hung to dry our snorkel gear, and then relaxed the rest of the afternoon.
The temperature has been consistent every day, high of 30C and low of 27C. It felt cooler this evening at dinner, so maybe we’re adjusting to the heat and humidity.
Tomorrow we’re on a birding excursion, we have to meet our guide at 6am :( I guess it’s like safari time. We’re hoping to see the elusive St Lucia parrot!
Had the same breakfast as yesterday, it’s really good. I think we had read in the reviews where someone complained about the lack of variety at breakfast. We don’t actually vary our breakfast much, even at home, so that didn’t matter to us. I’ll have fresh fruit, freshly baked bread, eggs and bacon, and coffee every day, thank you very much.
We changed into our snorkel gear and then drove into town. The hotel had shown us on google maps exactly where to park (at the bus station) and airdropped a pic of the boat, so it was pretty easy to find our way.
It was just the two us on the excursion. We chatted with the boat guy about what we wanted to do, and then we were off. The waters were really calm - no bumping at all.
First stopped off at a crevice in the rock cliff where bats make their home. We could see some of them flitting about, even though it was day.
Our first snorkel site was off Anse Chastenet, about five minutes by boat north of Soufriere. We were the only snorkelers which was cool. The water was super clear, and very still, which made for great pics. On other trips there’s slight bobbing about which makes it harder to focus the camera, especially zoomed in. Saw lots of trumpet fish and fan coral. Supposedly it’s a good place to see turtles, although we didn’t see any.
Next was Sugar Beach, one of the most popular snorkeling sites in the south end of St Lucia. It’s at the base of Petit Piton, and we actually saw the activity from our little trek yesterday. There’s a snorkeling area marked out with buoys.
We docked at the beach, which is surrounded by resorts. We were glad we hadn’t booked into any of these, it was really busy with tourists. Dodged our way through the tourists on the beach to the snorkeling area, put on our fins and away we went.
It wasn’t too busy once we got away from shore. The visibility was excellent, even better than Anse Chastenet. Saw lots of parrotfish and eels, as well as schools of Seargeant Majors. Our boat guy said that tourists feed the fish, and that’s why they are so tame here. We snorkeled out to the far end of the buoys and back, about 800m round trip.
Our last stop was around the ocean side of Petit Piton. My camera battery had died (I think our first two snorkels were 30m and 45m) so just left it on the boat. There was a bit of a current, and we were getting tired, so called it a day after about 20 minutes. It was a good site for snorkeling, not much coral but lots of boulders and crevices for fishies to swim in and about.
Overall it was great snorkeling excursion. It’s possible to drive to these and snorkel out from the beach (no need for a boat) but we had nice views of the pitons and of Soufriere from the ocean. The water temperature was the warmest we’ve been in. Great for snorkeling, although maybe not as good for the environment.
Our boat guy suggested Stone Yard for lunch, and called ahead to reserve a table for us. It’s geared to tourists, with lots of other groups ending their excursions here. It fit the bill though, as we weren’t out of place in our wet snorkel gear, and they had a good bathroom. The food was okay, we liked Belle Vue better.
Drove back to our hotel, the road now familiar to us the 4th time through. Rinsed and hung to dry our snorkel gear, and then relaxed the rest of the afternoon.
The temperature has been consistent every day, high of 30C and low of 27C. It felt cooler this evening at dinner, so maybe we’re adjusting to the heat and humidity.
Tomorrow we’re on a birding excursion, we have to meet our guide at 6am :( I guess it’s like safari time. We’re hoping to see the elusive St Lucia parrot!
Saturday, September 27, 2025
Têt Paul Nature Trail, St Lucia
We fell asleep last night to the sounds of frogs croaking and other creatures of the night. It’s a natural white noise machine here :)
We were up for breakfast pretty early (for vacation) at 7:30, partly cause we were in bed by 7pm last night, and also cause the large transoms in the room let in the morning light.
Had an excellent breakfast, local (homemade) lemonade, scrambled eggs with herbs and crispy bacon, fresh bread and seasonal fruit (mango, melon, watermelon).
Planned out our next couple days with the hotel staff. Today we planned a short one-hike along the Têt Paul Nature Trail and lunch at a local restaurant in Soufriere. We also booked a snorkeling excursion for tomorrow.
Sorted ourselves out in the room (we hadn’t done much reorganizing from airplane mode yesterday), and then headed out.
Now that we were familiar with the road conditions we had more confidence in determining if Google maps was taking us on a ‘shortcut’ or if it was indeed the normal state of the road.
The trailhead for Têt Paul Nature Trail was about 20 minutes from our hotel. We got there around 10:30am, there was just a trickle of other tourist groups. A friendly driver for another group helped us pointing out the best road-side place to park to get the future shade.
Paid our 15 CAD each at the trail ticket booth (they took ApplePay!), which included a guide. A guide’s not really needed, and it would have meant joining other folks, so we just went on our own.
The path is well-maintained, with stairs and boardwalks over possible muddy areas. We took our time admiring the lookouts along the way. At the top are great views of the pitons, two volcanic plugs which are the symbols of St Lucia (they appear on the flag), and are also a UNESCO world heritage site. There’s a couple side trails near the top for alternate views. Took our pics and then headed back down; round trip was about 35 minutes.
We had expected a longer walk (we were told 60-90 minutes), it was still too early for lunch, as most places only open at noon. So decided to stop in at Project Chocolate along the way. They only did scheduled tours, so chatted with the friendly security guard about the schedule for later in the week.
Carried on towards the sulphur springs. We’re not keen on mud baths or hot springs, but figured to check out the bubbling mud. At the entrance, and enterprising guy (Tim) asked if we preferred a short walk to see Superman Falls. That sounded more picturesque than a dull grey mud puddle, so we were in :)
Followed Tim down a dirt road for about five minutes, and then walked down a rustic path to get to falls. These were really cool to see, with the contrast of the sulphur-tinged rocks behind the falls and the ash-coloured pool at the bottom from the lava granules. Plus we were the only ones there. It’s possible to swim under the falls, and there’s mud and ash buckets for skin cleansing, but we were just there for the view. The falls featured in Superman II, thus the nickname, and also in Romancing the Stone. It was well worth the side trip.
We asked Tim about our lunch plans at Martha’s Tables. He thought they might be closed for lunch and suggested Belle Vue Restaurant as a backup.
Tim was right on both counts - Martha’s Tables were closed, and Belle Vue was an excellent spot. It was in the centre of Soufriere, with a nice view of the harbour, as its name suggests.
Had a local juice to start which was refreshing. We had the jerk chicken and Creole chicken. Both came with an assortment of the usual provisions, banana pie (sort of like a potato dish my Mom used to make, but with plantains), baked mac and cheese, coleslaw, mmm good. It was exactly what we were looking for.
We had ideas to walk around town but it was midday sun and probably not recommended. So headed back home to relax for the rest of the afternoon.
Dinner was again excellent at our hotel. It’s Saturday night so a few locals were gathered at the bar adding to the ambience.
We were up for breakfast pretty early (for vacation) at 7:30, partly cause we were in bed by 7pm last night, and also cause the large transoms in the room let in the morning light.
Had an excellent breakfast, local (homemade) lemonade, scrambled eggs with herbs and crispy bacon, fresh bread and seasonal fruit (mango, melon, watermelon).
Planned out our next couple days with the hotel staff. Today we planned a short one-hike along the Têt Paul Nature Trail and lunch at a local restaurant in Soufriere. We also booked a snorkeling excursion for tomorrow.
Sorted ourselves out in the room (we hadn’t done much reorganizing from airplane mode yesterday), and then headed out.
Now that we were familiar with the road conditions we had more confidence in determining if Google maps was taking us on a ‘shortcut’ or if it was indeed the normal state of the road.
The trailhead for Têt Paul Nature Trail was about 20 minutes from our hotel. We got there around 10:30am, there was just a trickle of other tourist groups. A friendly driver for another group helped us pointing out the best road-side place to park to get the future shade.
Paid our 15 CAD each at the trail ticket booth (they took ApplePay!), which included a guide. A guide’s not really needed, and it would have meant joining other folks, so we just went on our own.
The path is well-maintained, with stairs and boardwalks over possible muddy areas. We took our time admiring the lookouts along the way. At the top are great views of the pitons, two volcanic plugs which are the symbols of St Lucia (they appear on the flag), and are also a UNESCO world heritage site. There’s a couple side trails near the top for alternate views. Took our pics and then headed back down; round trip was about 35 minutes.
We had expected a longer walk (we were told 60-90 minutes), it was still too early for lunch, as most places only open at noon. So decided to stop in at Project Chocolate along the way. They only did scheduled tours, so chatted with the friendly security guard about the schedule for later in the week.
Carried on towards the sulphur springs. We’re not keen on mud baths or hot springs, but figured to check out the bubbling mud. At the entrance, and enterprising guy (Tim) asked if we preferred a short walk to see Superman Falls. That sounded more picturesque than a dull grey mud puddle, so we were in :)
Followed Tim down a dirt road for about five minutes, and then walked down a rustic path to get to falls. These were really cool to see, with the contrast of the sulphur-tinged rocks behind the falls and the ash-coloured pool at the bottom from the lava granules. Plus we were the only ones there. It’s possible to swim under the falls, and there’s mud and ash buckets for skin cleansing, but we were just there for the view. The falls featured in Superman II, thus the nickname, and also in Romancing the Stone. It was well worth the side trip.
We asked Tim about our lunch plans at Martha’s Tables. He thought they might be closed for lunch and suggested Belle Vue Restaurant as a backup.
Tim was right on both counts - Martha’s Tables were closed, and Belle Vue was an excellent spot. It was in the centre of Soufriere, with a nice view of the harbour, as its name suggests.
Had a local juice to start which was refreshing. We had the jerk chicken and Creole chicken. Both came with an assortment of the usual provisions, banana pie (sort of like a potato dish my Mom used to make, but with plantains), baked mac and cheese, coleslaw, mmm good. It was exactly what we were looking for.
We had ideas to walk around town but it was midday sun and probably not recommended. So headed back home to relax for the rest of the afternoon.
Dinner was again excellent at our hotel. It’s Saturday night so a few locals were gathered at the bar adding to the ambience.
Friday, September 26, 2025
Choiseul, St Lucia
We’re off for 6 days in St Lucia and then 3 days in Guyana, the Guyana part is mostly to see Kaiteur Falls. We booked back in March, based on it being just after rainy season in Guyana, so that in theory the falls will be full, but we’ll have good weather. We also planned the trip around direct flights from Toronto-St Lucia and St Lucia-Georgetown.
We were up at 4:45am to catch the flight to St Lucia. For some reason we both had viewed anything in the Caribbean as a ‘short’ flight, even though it’s 5.5 hours to St Lucia. We actually took off 20 minutes early!
Unfortunately most of the North American flights arrive in UVF around 2pm, so there’s a big spike in tourists and line ups for all the arrival stuff. We got through immigration really quickly cause we had filled out the online form earlier in the week. But then we waited about an hour for our luggage. Felt like we were at Pearson!
Picked up our car rental, a Suzuki Jimny from Sixt. Yet another country with left-hand drive where we’ve rented a car (now 10 out of 13). Set up my phone mount and then we were off on our adventure!
The main ring road in St Lucia is nicely paved. The secondary roads aren’t too bad, single width in some stretches, but least without sharp drop-offs like in Dominica. Our hotel was 45 minutes from the airport, in the SW corner of St Lucia, just south of the pitons.
We’re staying at Tet Rouge, a small place with 8 chalets. There’s only one other couple here right now so the hotel was expecting us as we drove up. Checked in, and then arranged for dinner in an hour, at 6:30pm. We hadn’t had lunch and were on very little sleep, so an early dinner suited us just fine.
Cleaned up and cooled down in our air conditioned room. The hotel has a cute little outdoor restaurant, with an excellent kitchen. We ordered a bit too much, although it was all delicious. My favourite was the tuna ceviche appetizer. We were in bed very early, the heat and lack of sleep getting to us.
We were up at 4:45am to catch the flight to St Lucia. For some reason we both had viewed anything in the Caribbean as a ‘short’ flight, even though it’s 5.5 hours to St Lucia. We actually took off 20 minutes early!
Unfortunately most of the North American flights arrive in UVF around 2pm, so there’s a big spike in tourists and line ups for all the arrival stuff. We got through immigration really quickly cause we had filled out the online form earlier in the week. But then we waited about an hour for our luggage. Felt like we were at Pearson!
Picked up our car rental, a Suzuki Jimny from Sixt. Yet another country with left-hand drive where we’ve rented a car (now 10 out of 13). Set up my phone mount and then we were off on our adventure!
The main ring road in St Lucia is nicely paved. The secondary roads aren’t too bad, single width in some stretches, but least without sharp drop-offs like in Dominica. Our hotel was 45 minutes from the airport, in the SW corner of St Lucia, just south of the pitons.
We’re staying at Tet Rouge, a small place with 8 chalets. There’s only one other couple here right now so the hotel was expecting us as we drove up. Checked in, and then arranged for dinner in an hour, at 6:30pm. We hadn’t had lunch and were on very little sleep, so an early dinner suited us just fine.
Cleaned up and cooled down in our air conditioned room. The hotel has a cute little outdoor restaurant, with an excellent kitchen. We ordered a bit too much, although it was all delicious. My favourite was the tuna ceviche appetizer. We were in bed very early, the heat and lack of sleep getting to us.
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