BASSETERRE, ST KITTS

Today, we arrived at our second port-of call; Basseterre, on the island of St Kitts – situated right next door to Nevis, the island we were supposed to be visiting via tender, but didn’t due to strong winds and choppy seas.

After enjoying a leisurely breakfast, we headed ashore. Since any available beaches were too far away, we decided to go for a walk, to an area described on the map as a ‘National Park’. To get there meant walking through the town. There was a small park with egrets and roaming cockerels, and a small cathedral. After checking out these, we continued on our way, following the route recommended by Maps.Me, which took us alongside some busy roads to the outskirts of town, and – finally – to the National Park.

I must confess, it wasn’t quite what I’d expected. For a start, we struggled to find our way into it, the first track leading us to a dead end, cluttered with rubbish that had clearly been tipped there. Retracing our steps, we returned to the road and finally found our way into the area.

What to say about it? Well, it was very hot. Fortunately, we had lots of water with us. We followed what tracks were available to us, which took us in a roughly circular route, and saw huge red butterflies as big as your hand, many dragonflies flitting around here and there, and some large grasshopper-type things that seemed to like resting right in the middle of the track and bounding out of the way into the undergrowth at the very last second.

The track became a little muddy in places, and the only sign of any human life was what looked like a crude, steaming incinerator built of wood, that appeared to be managed by a crusty-looking chap on a quad bike.

Our route back to the centre of town was more of the same, avoiding the busy roads and giving us a glimpse of the suburbs.

All-in-all, it was a pleasurable couple of hours. None of the vegetation of trees in the National Park grew very high, which meant that the backdrop of hills in the centre of the island was always visible to us. Maybe we’ll get a chence to tackle some of those another time…

All-aboard time was 5pm, but we were back in plenty of time. We’d missed lunch, though, so we headed for the Living Room for a few sandwiches, cookies and a beer, and was away before the general influx of guests looking forward to a Festive Afternoon Tea.