Thursday, March 8, 2012

More From St. Vincent's

I apologize. I know I promised to do Mustique today, but I wanted to cover two more, lovely adventures that greet visitors to the main island St. Vincent (easily the most affordable of the Grenadines, with nice places like the beachfront Paradise Inn starting at just $70/night).

Before I jetted off to Mustique, I got to take a scenic ride up (and down and up again) the spaghetti of a road that leads from the nation's capital Kingstown to the Caribbean side of the island. This is where the newest resort, Buccament Bay is (I'll be staying there towards the end of this week, and broadcasting our show from there live on Sunday). It also is home to several delightful national parks.

I had the fun of visiting Darkview Falls, a tri-part waterfall that visitors can bathe underneath (it really is a "Calgon Take Me Away!" moment). The climbs to the second and third falls are challenging (my calves are complaining today) but with the reward of great views and lots of critter spotting. While up there, I almost got a praying mantiss to stand on my hand--it flew away, something I didn't know it could do. We also spotted a rare crab hawk, lots of beady eyed iguanas and fluttering iguanas.

A major part of the experience is the test of courage that's required to cross the hanging bridge, created from slippery bamboo stalks.

St. Vincent's is also blessed with dozens of petroglyphs, many millennia old. Here's a happy one I saw, located on a massive rock next to a stream. Archeologists argue as to their meaning. Some say they were meant as maps, others feel they have religious significance. But this one looks like an invitation to a really lovely party, don't you think?

More tomorrow.

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