And we’re back!

Now wasn’t that quick! After all that extensive planning and debate, our vacation week just flew by, and is rapidly becoming but a warm distant memory, as the snow banks around our house climb higher and higher.

What a beautiful island St. Lucia (West Indies) is! Lush with a well-protected rainforest, lovely beaches, and a sedate but still actively bubbling smelly volcano, it is an interesting place to visit. Easy to get around for English-speaking vacationers, as that is the language of schools and commerce, but quaint with the local French Patios that is still spoken and taught at home, and totally not understood by anyone but the locals!

If we had any complaint it was the rampant contamination of local culture created by catering to tourists, myself included, but particularly to the cruise ships that dock at Castries, the main port. Sadly there was little or no locally made goods to be found, most being imported from the Asian Pacific. Key-chains, magnets, straw bags, T-shirts and all the crap that goes with it, and unbelievably expensive emerald jewellery from Venezuela all imported for the tourist trade. Boring!

Bolts of Batik, a hand dyed fabric usually found with patterns or pictures incorporated in the dyeing process which the West Indies was once known world wide for, was relegated to a few small samples in commercial gift shops, and although I did purchase two very small panels under the premise it was locally created, it is hard to authenticate its origin.

One other thing we brought home was this hand carved wooden game board (we saw them being made at the carvers studio, so this I know was local) for the game known on the islands as Wa-wee, also called Mancala or Oware in West Africa. A holdover from the days of slave trading, the game remains popular around the world under various names and a variety of game rules. I hope to learn the game, which is often used in teaching mathematics worldwide. If I don’t master the game (since math is definitely not a strong point!) it is still a lovely piece to add to the décor in our home.

And we heard little Caribbean music, and were sadly subjected to the constant twanging of American Country and Western music, which the locals are completely mad for (go figure?)!!

Still we did hear one really great West Indies style band one day at lunch in another resort, which featured the most un-likely looking female lead singer, who in complete contradiction to her homeless Gramma groupie appearance, had a stunning and captivating voice. And on another occasion, a visiting steel drum group of young high school students and their band teacher entertained us for several hours with their un-flagging energy and talents. So perhaps tourists like ourselves need to better communicate our desire the see and hear more local talent if we expect these cultural experiences to be continued.

But the food – oh, the food was incredible, whether we ate on the resorts or in the local market (where we had probably our best meal on the island as you can see !). With all that wonderful Creole-style food and darn tasty locally produced Piton beer (pronounced Pee-tawn by the locals) it is remarkable I didn’t gain a ton, and can only credit all the walking we did.

I had breadfruit for the first time, in a variety of manners, my favourite being served cold like sliced boiled potatoes (as seen in our market lunch above) and tasting very similar.

In light of the busy sight-seeing schedule we imposed on ourselves, and then collapsing on the beach in our down time for some sun accompanied by lovely little naps, pathetically little knitting was accomplished. I had big plans and took 3 projects, but really only one was worked on, and that was the Koigu Wrap Shawl in Aerquipa, since the pattern was long, easy and repetitious, and well suited to airport or airplane knitting.

So next year, we will try again for a two week break from reality – I need more beach time, and definitely more knitting time! But it was good while it lasted.

Knit on….