Day 12 -- St Francois and Point des Chateaux
Wednesday 2/3/2004
Lilli and I had planned to take a morning dive out to what is called "Jardin Japonais". I still had a bit of a problem in my left ear. But we hurried up in the morning so that we could be down at the dive center in Bouillante at 7:45AM. We left the kids behind. The drive over the mountains was interesting. The weather was not particularly nice. In fact, it was still very windy up at the top and it rained too. As we started the descent to the other side the ocean looked gray and we could see the spray on the surface. We talked about it on our way down and decided we would not dive, even though we had signed up. When we reached the dive center we told them. We were still the only ones who had signed up for this dive. While the weather looked a little bit better, it did not look great. And while we stood down there, talking to them, it started to drizzle. That settled it for me. No dive today. We looked to see if we could not dive the next day, but they were busy with young divers and were not sure they could do it so early in the morning. Well, we wanted to do a few more things with Bengt and Lotta. So we left it up in the air with regards to getting back in touch with them for a dive tomorrow. We drove back to the bungalows and arrived around 8:45AM. It still takes a while to make the trip back and forth over the mountain pass...
We ate breakfast and talked about what we could do today. It looked as if it would be nicer towards the east. So we decided to make this more of a beach day. We needed some of that, since we had not had beach weather for a few days. We packed for a day away. We made a quick stop in St Anne, to look at the little market along the main road. It was packed enough that we could not find a parking spot by the road so we decided to head back to the beach area, where we parked a few days ago. This time, however, a man from the town waited to charge us parking. But, unlike so many other prices, it still cost the same here (10FF or 1.52 €). We've driven by that market so many times over the years but have never stopped. After having looked around for a while, it did not appear as if we had missed much. The prices were definitely high and the goods were not that extraordinary. I bought some fresh bread from the bakery and we went on our way towards St Francois.
By the time we got to that beach, the weather had improved even more. Erik had really wanted to bigger waves than the other day. And he got his wishes met! The beach looked much better than when we stopped here a few days ago. We ate some food at the beach. The kids went out into the water over and over. Now the kids had a bit of a sun-tan prime so there was less risk of being burned.
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| Erik riding the waves in St Francois |
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| Eating lunch on the beach -- finding a post to cut the tomatoes and cucumbers on |
The kids stayed down on the beach and built drip-castles. St Francois has really become built up since we last visited. In the picture above you can see many homes that have come up over the last couple of years. By the looks of these houses, they do not belong to local islanders. After some good time in the sun, we wanted to head out to Point des Chateaux. Here, as usual, the waves are very high. A few locals were in the water along the beach, trying to body surf. Not clear how successful they were. When you go out to the tip of the lava rocks, you have to cover your camera lens because you keep getting sprayed by salt water.
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| Erik and Karl enjoying a view at Point des Chateaux |
Adam fell asleep in the car on our way from the beach to Point des Chateaux so only Lilli and I walked up with some of the kids to the cross. The steps up were improved from the last time were were up there. And the cross itself looked like it had been rebuild since the last time. When we were here three years ago, the cross was in serious decay. Now it looked like a freshly cast concrete cross.
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| A view from the cross |
The kids were a bit bored up by the cross. After they had sat down for a while, gazing west from the cross onto the hills below it, they noticed cows! And they all ran down to pet them. Not all of the cows wanted to be petted. Either way, the kids had a good time.
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| Holy cow! |
After the trip up here we got ready to leave. I needed to visit the video-photographer in Bouillante, while Lilli, Bengt and Lotta wanted to stop at Carrefour on the way home. Bouillant is basically as far away as you can be from Point des Chateaux. But this is a small island, so it should not be a big problem. I took a bunch of kids in my car and drove home to the bungalows, where I dropped them off. Isabella agreed with baby sit. By the time I left for Bouillante, it had gotten dark. All I had to go on was a very tiny hand-made map. Getting to Bouillante was no big problem. But getting from there to the actual house was a challenge. There were no street lights and signs were tiny. But after asking and stopping a few times, I finally made it. The video turned out very good. I only hope it will play on our DVD player at home. He had recorded it in PAL, but had then converted it into NTSC for me. When I got back to the bungalows, they had made crepes (thin pancakes) rolled up with all sorts of stuffings (ham/cheese, shrimp/bechamel sauce/cheese). Lilli also made some with mushrooms that I did not have to eat :-) It tasted very good.