Travel Diary: St. Lucia, West Indies

As most of you were probably wondering, I took a whole week off of my blog and related social media, at the beginning of July.  It was my Fifth wedding anniversary to my amazing husband.  So I wanted to celebrate it as just the two of us (well I did include some Instagram stories 😉 ).  Since it was a milestone anniversary, we both wanted to celebrate it somewhere special. 

Our original plan was to go to the Maldives however, with the current state of the world that wasn’t an option.  So we decided to do more of an exotic/less popular island in the Caribbean since those were the only options open to U.S. residents, at this time.  We can always visit Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Jamaica, etc at any time but we wanted a more special location for this anniversary.  We thought about all the locations that got shortlisted for our Honeymoon and decided to go to St. Lucia.  It’s one of the islands on our bucket list and we would go any other time so we decided, why not?  So sit back and enjoy my rundown of our Anniversary Trip to St. Lucia! 

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Location

St. Lucia is one of the islands located in the Eastern Caribbean known as the West Indies.  It is one of the few islands that have mountains, rainforests, and beaches to explore.  Most of the locals compare the islands’ terrain similar to Costa Rica or Hawaii.  So, if you prefer to hike or if you prefer to go snorkeling, St. Lucia has both available.  The island is unique in the sense that you can choose if you want a more active or relaxing vacation- they offer both!

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Requirements for Entry

I’ve got many questions regarding the St. Lucia entry requirements/covid restrictions.  So, I’m adding this part to the blog post, for those interested in the entry requirements:

• Valid Passport
• COVID-19 Vaccination card (only if you’re fully vaccinated)
• Travel registration form, no later than 5 days before arrival
• Negative Covid-19 PCR test, within 5 days of arrival date (even if you’re vaccinated)
• Health Screening Form

Pro tip:  Make sure to print copies and confirmations of everything.  The wifi/cellular data is not the best at the airport.  Thus, printed copies of everything serves as a good backup option.

Flight

The flight to St. Lucia was not bad.  Since I live in Memphis, TN, I always have to connect when I travel internationally.  On the way to St. Lucia, I connected from Atlanta, GA which took about 4 hours from there.  Then on the way back, I connected from Miami, FL and it took the same amount of time.

Once we got to the St. Lucian airport, we had to go through a “Health Security check” which means that they check our Covid-19 vaccination records and negative COVID-19 PCR tests.  If you’re fully vaccinated, then you get a white band that allows you to roam on/off your resort.  If you’re not vaccinated, the resorts will not allow you to do any excursions or leave the resort. 

Since the St. Lucian government and Health Department were pretty strict about who could roam the island and who couldn’t my husband and I felt safe.

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Stay

There are many resorts and hotels throughout the island.  My husband and I prefer to stay in All-Inclusive resorts so that narrowed our search to three resorts.  Since we needed to submit a negative covid test before leaving the country, we wanted to pick a resort that had testing on site.  After the process of elimination, we decided to stay at the Sandals Regency La Toc.  We were not disappointed about our stay!

I’ve heard amazing things about Sandals resorts but never thought I would be able to go to one.  However, when we finally booked our vacation at this resort, I couldn’t be happier.  Sandals take care of you from beginning to end.  They have water sports and multiple activities on the resort, included in your price.  We both enjoyed the opportunity to have multiple activities (such as kayaking, paddle boating, etc) included in our price.  Also, the resort was so beautiful as well that we spent one full day there as well.

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Activities

There are quite a few things to do at St. Lucia.  The main thing to see at St. Lucia are the two mountains known as the Pitons.  You can hike the mountain or view it from a Sunset Cruise.  However, neither my husband nor I prefer to hike, and my husband does not like boats.  So those two activities were off the list for us.

Instead, we opted to do a Rum Tour which promised a mini-tour of the island and a trip to Marigot Bay.  The rum tour was amazing.  We got a history of how the rum was made on the island.  As most people know, rum comes from the Caribbean islands so it was exciting to learn the history behind it.  In addition, we learned that the rum from St. Lucia is made from Molasses rather than sugar.

After the distillery tour, we were supposed to stop by Marigot Bay however, due to Covid-restrictions, they were not allowing tourists on that beach.  So instead, our amazing tour guide took us to a photo stop location of Marigot Bay.

Overall, the rum tour was amazing and I highly recommend it.  However, if you are only able to do one thing at St. Lucia, I would suggest trying to view the Pitons (if possible).

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Food

My husband and I didn’t get to try any of the local cuisines around the island.  Since our resort had 9 restaurants on-site, we didn’t need to explore off-site.  Luckily, we did have one Caribbean restaurant so we got to taste some local Caribbean food at that restaurant.  The food at the resort did not disappoint!

St. Lucia’s main import is bananas.  So, we did try the local bananas at the resort.  I also made sure to try as much of the local fruit as possible; such as Leche, starfruit, sugar cane, etc.  In addition, they would sometimes serve plantains during the breakfast buffet which I made sure to get every time. 

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And that’s a wrap to my Travel Diary for St. Lucia!  I hope you all enjoyed my run down.  Are you excited to travel back into the world?  Let me know in the comments below!

Much Love,