Kayaking the Caribbean

One of the things we'd planned to do in St. Lucia was take a sunset cruise to see Les Pitons.  We didn't exactly do that....

Instead we went on a sunset kayak tour.  A private tour, just the 2 of us with the guide/instructor, Garfield.  He made sure we understood the basics -- safety, parts of the paddle, basic strokes, what to do if you tip over -- and then we entered the water. Garfield was amused when I referred to the PFDs  by name and said it was about the second time in his 17 years working for the hotel that someone correctly called them PFDs (personal flotation devices). 

We kayaked away from the beach (west), rounded a point, continued south, rounded another point and headed east toward the town of Soufriere.  Some birds (brown boobys, if I remember correctly) were soaring above us.  We could see the coral reef from the top.  We then went to a large vertical crack in the cliff and heard a squeaky noise.  For some reason the guidebooks fail to mention that 75% of the bats on St. Lucia live in that crack; we were able to see a few of them.  We then visited a place where the volcano vents from the bottom of the ocean -- it was smaller but not unlike a place we snorkeled in Dominica.  And we saw Les Pitons from the ocean....spectacular!

We reversed course and had a leisurely paddle to a buoy just outside the first point.  Jeff smugly touched the buoy -- an action I would have predicted but not one the guide expected.  He then turned his body to get a better view of the nearly setting sun.  Alas, gravity works in the water and he capsized, cleverly introducing his newly-purchased St, Lucia t-shirt to the salt water.  If one is going to capsize, the Caribbean Sea is an excellent choice of location as it's quite warm and mostly gentle.  And of course we'd practiced getting back into the boat on the beach -- an action that turns out to be extremely different from getting back into the boat on the water.  Garfield was calm, competent, and supportive and soon the boat was right-side-up and Jeff was safely back on board.

We enjoyed the sunset, though no green flash today.  We then paddled just a few minutes to return to the beach by which time it was nearly dark.  All in all a satisfying way to see Les Pitons from the water!