Honeymoon - What We Did (Before the Hurricane)

I told you all about the Halcyon here.  But what did we do on our honeymoon?

Well, on our first night, we took it easy.  We were tired and gross after our long day of traveling.  We checked in, got acquainted with our room, and then had drinks and watched the sun set at the Beach bar.  After a couple of drinks, we went to dinner at the Bayview.  After dinner, we went back to our room and sat on our balcony for a bit, then went to bed early.  We slept a lot on our honeymoon.

On our second day, we were still feeling pretty lazy, so we just layed around the Sunset pool.  We were invited to play a couple of games, but declined, and weren't bothered much after that.  It was a relaxing day, and we really needed it.  After a few hours at the pool, we needed to get out of the sun, so we went and relaxed on one of the beds in the garden.  Then it was back to the room for a shower and dinner at the Pier. 

Sitting on the balcony of the Irie bar, waiting for the Pier to open for dinner

A small storm off the coast.  I tried for about 5 minutes to get some lightening.

Dinner at the Pier

We tried to play chess.  I don't get it.

Day Three (Thursday) found us on our first (and only) excursion.  We took a catamaran down the coast to Soufriere.  From the port, we were driven up into the volcano, where you get to see/smell the Sulfur Springs.  Then we went to the Botanical Garden to see the Diamond Waterfall.   After that, they drove us up to this amazing restaurant with what has - hands down - the best view ever.  Once we had a our fill at lunch, we went back to the boat and headed up to Marigot Bay for some snorkeling.  It was Matt's first time snorkeling, and I'm pretty sure I was more excited for him than he was for himself.  I just couldn't wait to see his face when he got to swim right with the fishes!  And it was so worth it - he absolutely loved it.  When we got back to the hotel, we were greeted by a bottle of champagne chilling in our room!  We split our bottle of champagne and then had dinner at the Bayview.

Our catamaran

The Pitons

Our captain took a picture of every couple on the trip!

The town of Soufriere.

When we got there, there were 3 women bathing in this hot spring

Yeah...it was stinky!

Mineral springs.  People were bathing in this.  They say it's good for you.  I'll just take their word for it.

Cocoa beans!  Our tour guide even talked about Hershey!

Us at Diamond Waterfall

It's multicolored because of the different minerals in the water

At lunch.  Seriously.  Best. view. EVER.

This is the restaurant

I still haven't decided if this is natural carvings or not.

Yay!  Champagne

That was easily the best day of the trip.  It's sad, though, because Soufriere and the entire Southern end of the island was destroyed by Hurricane Tomas.  The road we drove up to get into the volcano basically doesn't even exist anymore.  It was entirely washed out by the rain.  Much of Soufriere was under water.  We were very concerned about that restaurant where we ate lunch.

Day Four (Friday) found us back at the pool, but this time we tried out the Paradise pool.  And we ate dinner at the Pier again.  

Matt at the Paradise pool swim-up bar

Friday night, during the night, the rain started.  It woke me up at one point, but since it had rained a bit every day, I didn't think much of it and went right back to sleep.  We were scheduled to go on our Zip-lining excursion on Saturday.  We were awakened by a phone call Saturday morning from the Tours desk explaining that a Tropical Storm had hit St. Lucia overnight, so our excursion was canceled for safety reasons, so they could check the lines and such.  We were disappointed, but figured we'd reschedule for later in the week, and headed out for breakfast.  We quickly found out that the Tropical Storm hadn't just "hit" overnight, but instead had parked itself on top of St. Lucia and become a Category-2 Hurricane.  More on that experience and the days after the hurricane next...