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Saint Lucia

Caribbean

A volcanic island in the eastern Caribbean's Windward chain, framed by the twin peaks of the Pitons that rise straight out of the sea above Soufriere. The mountainous, rainforested interior drops to reef-lined bays on the sheltered west coast, from the yachting hub of Rodney Bay in the north to the drive-in volcano and dive walls of the Pitons Management Area, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, in the south. English-speaking with a French-Creole culture, the island runs on hiking, diving, sailing and a summer season of jazz and carnival.

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What you can do in Saint Lucia

Music & Culture Festivals

Saint Lucia Jazz and Arts FestivalRodney BayApr MayThe Saint Lucia Jazz and Arts Festival is the island's flagship cultural event, staged each spring with its main concerts at the Pigeon Island National Landmark, the old British fort on the peninsula across the causeway from Rodney Bay. Running since the early 1990s, it grew into one of the Caribbean's best-known music festivals and now spreads a full arts programme, theatre, visual art, fashion and food, around a line-up that mixes international jazz, R&B and soul headliners with Saint Lucian and wider Caribbean acts. The setting is the draw as much as the music: a grassy natural amphitheatre between two hills that were once gun batteries, the stage backed by the sea and the sunset, with the audience spread on the slopes. Beyond Pigeon Island the festival takes over venues across the north of the island for late shows and smaller sets, so the whole Rodney Bay area moves to it for the run. For a week each spring this is where the region's musicians and its music-lovers come.

Sailing

Rodney BayJan Feb Mar Apr May Nov DecRodney Bay is the sailing capital of Saint Lucia and one of the best-known jumping-off points in the eastern Caribbean. The sheltered, man-made lagoon at IGY Rodney Bay Marina is the island's main yacht base and, every December, the finish line of the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers, when more than 200 boats arrive off the trade-wind crossing from the Canaries to a champagne welcome on the dock. From here the classic Windward Islands run opens up in both directions: south along Saint Lucia's own west coast to anchor beneath the Pitons at Soufriere, or north across the channel to Martinique, both comfortable day sails in steady 15-to-20-knot trades and flat, protected water in the lee of the islands. You can take the helm on a bareboat charter, join a crewed yacht, or spend a day on one of the big local catamarans that run down the coast with snorkel stops and rum on board. The combination of reliable wind, short hops between anchorages and a full-service marina makes it an ideal place to learn, to charter or simply to sail.

Scuba Diving

SoufriereJan Feb Mar Apr May Nov DecSoufriere holds the best diving in Saint Lucia, on the volcanic drop-offs that plunge straight down from the base of the Pitons. The whole coast here sits inside the Soufriere Marine Management Area, set up in 1995 to end anchor damage and overfishing, so the reefs are dense with coral and reef fish and the shallow zones have recovered into some of the healthiest in the country. The signature site is Superman's Flight, a sheer wall beneath Petit Piton that runs from the surface past 40 metres with the current pushing you along it, named for the scene filmed here. Anse Chastanet is a classic shore dive with a reef starting a few metres off the beach and the wrecked Lesleen M sitting upright in the sand nearby, a deliberate artificial reef now covered in sponges and home to turtles and moray eels. Water is warm and clear year round, sites range from beginner reefs to advanced walls, and the drama of diving in the shadow of a UNESCO peak is hard to match in the Caribbean.

Trekking / Hiking

SoufriereJan Feb Mar Apr May DecGros Piton is the great walk-up summit of the Caribbean, the larger of the two lava spires that make the Pitons a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the emblem of Saint Lucia. The trail starts at the village of Fond Gens Libre, named for the freed people and escaped slaves, the Brigands, who used the mountain as a stronghold in the 18th century, and every ascent goes with a local guide from the interpretive centre at the base. The climb is about 798 metres of gain over roughly two hours up, easy at first around the mountain's skirt and then relentlessly steep on rooty, rocky steps through changing forest, from dry woodland to cloud-brushed summit scrub. The reward is a 360-degree view over Petit Piton, the town of Soufriere, the reefs of the marine park and, on a clear day, the neighbouring island of Saint Vincent. It is a genuine challenge rather than a technical climb, no ropes or scrambling, and finishing it is the classic Saint Lucian achievement.

Witness / Attend

Lucian CarnivalCastriesJulLucian Carnival is Saint Lucia's biggest street party and the high point of its cultural year, a July explosion of soca, steel and masquerade that takes over the capital. The season builds for weeks through calypso and soca competitions, queen shows and open-air fetes, then peaks in two back-to-back days on the streets of Castries. It opens before dawn with J'Ouvert, when crowds cover themselves in paint, oil, mud and cocoa and dance behind the music trucks as the sun comes up, and rolls into two days of the Parade of the Bands, thousands of masqueraders in feathered, jewelled costumes moving through the city to the year's soca hits. Unusually for the Caribbean, Saint Lucia moved its carnival from the pre-Lenten calendar to July in 1999 to stop competing with Trinidad, which means you can experience a full-scale Caribbean carnival in high summer. You can watch from the roadside or, in the local phrase, play mas by joining a band, buying a costume and crossing the stage yourself, which is the way Lucians will tell you to do it.

Best months at a glance

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Music Festivals
Sailing
Scuba Diving
Trekking
Witness / Attend

Upcoming events in Saint Lucia