CAPTAIN SLOG STAR DATE 76.13

So, yes, I did go. You actually expect better food on a formal night, not last night Josephine! I had salmon rillette, corn soup and beef tournedos. The first two were OK, the beef tasted of nothing so was abandoned. This caused much consternation amongst our waiters as they tried to persuade me to make another choice. To be honest, I don't eat a lot and felt full enough, so declined. They thought by this that I was about to complain and the maitre d was summoned and he practically begged me not to make any adverse comments on the comment sheet provided to us on our final day!

Then, to top it all they ran out of my choice of dessert, so I changed my choice, which appeared straightaway. Two minutes later I am being given my 'not available' choice as well. All very strange but maybe worth exploiting.....

So, before bed I wandered up to the library to see if anyone had returned any books. I spied number 3 in the 50 Shades trilogy and thought I'd see what all the fuss was about. By the time her inner goddess had done the opening steps of Ravel's Bolero on ice, I had had enough and consigned it to the bin. Those of you who have read the whole thing will know what I mean, how tedious are these books??

Anyway, we arrived in Castries, St Lucia this morning around 7am. From the sea it is a pretty island, very green and lush. This is not my first visit, having stayed here in 2002 on the northern tip of the island. 10 years on, I am a changed person, for the better I hope. Yes, I am on my own, but I now have a new found self confidence in my own abilities. Being on my own on holiday is very self indulgent. At the same time, I love being away with the girls, that is very special and I hope they will always want to spend some of their precious time with me.

I digress.

It was to be the aerial tram ride today. Having been here before, I have already done a lot of the sights, The Pitons, Pigeon Island, Soufriere, Castries. I don't swim well enough to enjoy snorkelling and have done the round the island boat trip. So the tram was the only thing left to do.

On the pier, I think one of the crew must have displeased the captain. Some poor soul was dressed up in a furry dolphin suit and was dancing around and having his photo taken with the passengers, it was 87º for goodness sake!

As you can see from the photo, he threw off his head,sit down in the shade and rehydrate, poor b*****.

I was directed to the bus by yet another Rasta who was fascinated by my hair, there's a theme going on here ... weird. 

It was quite a long bus trip and we were told that any of the houses we saw that were on blocks, they were little more than large sheds really, were erected on land that they didn't own. So they are able to move house, literally, in one day, by dismantling it and re-erecting at a new site, again that they don't own.

It wasn't a cheap choice and not a good one. The aerial tram was in fact a six seater chair lift that glided through the treetops of the rain forest, oh and rain it did, on the way down.

Everyone spoke softly as it seemed irreverent to speak any louder. 

Not so the zipliners further out in the forest who whooped and screamed their way over 9 or 10 zip lines!

I saw two ruby throated humming birds and loads of vines and trees. 

What the humming bird saw was one very fed up Jill sporting a yellow plastic cape and hood, known in the trade as a slicker, I think. Straight out of a Disney park, what a Dork I looked. 

Crap. I would have gone zip lining but I couldn't do all the climbing of steps etc in between lines.

Back to Castries and, guess what, it's Sunday and most of the shops are shut.  I managed to buy the obligatory tat and also a cocoa stick. Recipe as follows:-

Grate 1 tablespoon per cup, add boiling water, milk and brown sugar to taste. Add dash of cinnamon, a bay leaf and a dash of nutmeg and boil for 5 minutes, add one drop of vanilla essence, then enjoy!

Well, we'll see when I get home.

I had lunch on board and then wandered off to a Motown quiz where I met yet another English couple from Mesa, Arizona. This couple were older, named Brian and Anne and celebrating their 50th anniversary. They had already met up with Brian and Angela from the same town, turns out they live quite close to each other. Small world!!

We had a long chat about travelling and he told me about a place in Turkey called Derinkuyu which was an underground city, recently discovered, dating from early BC but with mind blowing technology. Can't wait to get home to my broadband and research further.

I have now had a look, as I couldn't wait and as I suspected it is in Capadoccia, in the middle of Turkey, the place with all the funny rock formations that people have converted to living accommodation, on the old caravan route. I shall investigare further but it seems it was discovered when someone knocked through a wall as he suspected there was a bit more to his house than met the eye. He measured outside and inside and the measurements didn't add up.

Down inside there was room for thousands of people underground and their animals and food stores, water came from aquifers and they even had a type of fan system, powered by donkeys to cool the place down. More ammo for the 'Aliens from Outer Space Helping Earthlings Develop' camp. I'm a strong believer in all that.

Dinner was  good fun. Phil the narcotics cop was telling us about his early days on patrol. His Dad had always wanted to be a cop, so one night Phil took him out with him on patrol. He pulled over a car suspecting DUI. He asked the woman driver to get out and told her she would need to walk along a straight line for him, like they do. She asked to change her high heels for a pair of flats, Phil agreed and she started rooting about in the trunk for a pair. He looked over at the police car and saw his Dad, who had been sat in the back seat, had his nose pressed to the inside of the windscreen of the cop car. He thought this odd and went round to the back of the suspect car to see why his Dad was acting this way. There was the suspect drunk, searching through her case in the back of the car, bent right over and clearly had forgotten to consult the underwear drawer that morning!

Antigua tomorrow.......