Hello everybody, and welcome to episode seven. I've been there, Dean.
That it's so funny that you keep saying which episode it is because Easton keeps telling you not to say what episode it is.
You know me, I like to go against the green. He says that only because he doesn't like once we get into the fifties and the seventies and the one hundred and fifties and one hundred and seventies, it gets a little confusing.
But you also don't need to number them.
But I like to. Okay, I'm a numbers guy. I've always been more of a numbers guy than a words guy.
So that's true.
This is episode seven. I've been there, Dean. That welcome. Last week, I've been there doing that. We talked about the surprise trips that Kaylin and I plan for each other. If you haven't listened to that, go back and listen to Guatemala, one of Kaitlin's best trips of all time.
No, seriously, it is one of the most underrated countries. Yeah, everyone needs to go to Guatemala. It is incredible. Everyone needs to hike Vulcan Fuego, go to Lagatalon.
Does everyone needs to go to Saint Lucia.
I'm so sorry, but no, Oh.
Saint Lucia was a trip that Klein planned for me. I would like to hand it over to you now and tell me about how you planned where you don't want to take me, just why you chose that place.
Okay, So this was what twenty nineteen. I had barely traveled. I had gone to Asia, gone to Ireland, and then we went to Guatemala. Yeah, we went to Guatemala first. Yes, I still don't think that's right, but you know better than me. So I hadn't traveled much, and I was just trying to figure out where I wanted to go, what I wanted to do, and when we travel. Even still to this day, I kind of let Dean take
the reins. We're going to Italy in two weeks, and I'm asking him because I just feel like Dean knows the best spots and Dean knows what's going to make a good trip. So it's a lot of pressure to plan for myself. But I also knew Dean was planning a trip that was sort of centered around the things that he liked, So I wanted to do something that I thought I liked, which was just lay out by the beach, But having done that many times, it's actually
not that great or fulfilling. Since traveling with Dean, I like to do trips where I come back and I'm like, wow, that was such an incredible experience. So doing this for the first time I originally picked and this was geared again more towards Dean and like travel centric and exploring a little bit more. I was going to take us to the Glopagos and go on a little cruise and sail around and see a bunch of different animals and
take photos. I'm happy we didn't do it until this past year because our photography skills improved, and I just think it was a better time to go for us. So I chose Saint Lucia. Honestly, I don't know. I don't know how. I have no idea how I stumbled upon it. I think I googled like beautiful beaches or something, and Saint Lucia came up. So I started to plan and found a great hotel. The hotel was wonderful where
we stayed, stayed at two different hotels. The problem is we drove, and most people don't get cars in Saint Lucia is what we've been told by people who live there, and I was navigating.
Well before we get into this, I want to talk about the cars thing for a second.
Okay.
I am a big advocate for renting a car and wherever you go, no matter where it is, and I personally don't take exception to that rule. I do think most people should take exception to it for certain situations like India or Egypt or you know, these countries where traffic laws aren't quite the same as where they are in the Western world. I think having a car is the number one best thing you can do for yourself if you're looking to explore in a new place.
Do you think that people should rent a car in Saint Lucia one hundred percent? Oh wow, I disagree, But okay, so we rent a car. I agree with Dean. I think every place aside from Saint Lucia you should rent a car.
And like, don't rent a car and Maldives.
Oh true, you can't, exactly, you just can ride a bikes. Oh my gosh, Maldives. What a place. So we rent a car. Dean's driving, I'm navigating. I've got Google Maps pulled up and I can't remember which one's better, Apple Maps, Google Maps, Like there's one better that's better in other countries.
Apple, I think Google is the best.
Then maybe I was using Apple because it was not great. But I'm to blame obviously.
No, don't take all the blame.
No I will.
I will because no, don't I know, I don't take all the blames.
So we miss the first turn because I'm talking and talking, and then I was like, oops, whoops, we miss the first turn. And this happens a lot, especially when I'm driving.
Sometimes I teae myself up.
Then we miss the second turn, and then we miss the third turn.
Well, And it might be important to note like the geography of Saint Lucia itself, so it's a mountainous island that's like big but not super big. The airport is in the southeast corner. Our hotel was in like the north West's center kind of thing. And because the island is so mountainous, it's kind of hard to cut through the middle of it.
But there is no middle. I think it's just all beaches surrounding and the middle of the jungle.
That's what I'm saying. It's hard to cut through the middle of it, because you typically would do like a coastal drive, but there is like one road that slices through the mountain valley and kind of gets you out to the other side. It was the fastest way to do it. And so that's the route that we took.
Well accidentally because I missed three turns.
So that yeah, yeah, I know. But the route that we were supposed to take was still up there. It was just.
Gotcha, yeah yeah. But the route that we took because of me, it was not a route, was not a road, was nothing at all. We just drove straight to the jungle and it was the scariest experience to this day, my entire life.
But you didn't even realize at the time how scary it was.
Well I did. I Did you notice that I hadn't spoken in like an hour? That shift inside of me from dogging on stop and missing three turns to then suddenly going mute.
So all, can I jump in and explain from my perspective. So we get to the airport, we get our car. It's like this little two door sedan. I guess this is the dan by definition four door, So it's this two door coupe kind of like a Honda Civic would be, but they're version of it, you know, do you agree with that? And when we were getting it, we were going that to the car and we were like, oh, look at this cool little like Geo Lander, geotracker type of car. It's a kind of like a mini Geep,
like a Suzuki Samurai kind of thing. And I was like, oh, can we get this instead? And they're like yeah, but it's an extra forty bucks a day and we're like, eh, not worth it. Too much money. So we take the coop with you know, like low clearance bald ish tires driving around the roads up there are like windy, but they're paved and they're pretty good through these cute little towns. And then we missed the turn and then we're like, okay,
no worries, we'll get the next turn. So ten minutes later, miss that turn, Like okay, let's just go get the next turn. And you know, in hindsight, obviously we should just be like, let's flip a quick U turn real quick, But the maps kept updating us and the time was always pretty much the same, and so we didn't really think much of it because in here where we're used to driving. You miss a turn, the map reroutes you.
You'll get there just a different way, you know, in the same amount of time essentially, So we kind of thought that's what was gonna happen this time around. Sure enough, what the maps ended up doing was it took us up this big hill and then the asphalt ended and it just became dirt. And around this time is right when it started raining pretty heavily as well. We drive by a couple guys with machetes. Do you remember those guys.
Yeah, that's when I got freaked. And they weren't scary, they weren't trying to hurt us, but just seeing weapons kind of freaked me out.
I mean, the people I see where you're coming from. Absolutely people use machetes all the time to cut through bushes and trees and whatever, you know. So I do think you mentioned the machetes, and I was like, that's so normal to see in places like this as people holding machetes like they're working, you know, they're clearing land or whatever it is. So I'm like, okay, whatever, she's fine.
So then we start driving again it's raining, and then we start descending this hill on the dirt in our little coop down this dirt road, and the road narrows so it's only one lane, maybe like at three quarters of a lane. You know. It's like basically like an off roading trail at this point. But I'm like, okay, it's fine, We'll just keep going. The road is like pretty well graded and we're not really too worried about it.
And it's rainforests, so I had not really had any experience driving through rainforest.
But then the road just stopped, like there was no road. We were driving. There was a point we were driving over tree like fallen trees.
Well, the road was there. There was just a bunch of debris in the middle of the road.
I remember it so differently. I remember we were like driving through bushes and trees.
Yeah. Yeah, just because it wasn't like a well maintained road. Probably the guys with the machetes we're working on it, they just hadn't gotten that far yet.
I don't know, this did not seem like a road to me.
So well, okay, as the driver, I'm certain that it was a road all the way through, just with a bunch of crap on it. And that's kind of where maybe as you're remembering it as like, yeah, there was a lot of vegetation on the road, but it was because there were felled trees and overgrown bushes and stuff
like that. And so we're driving and I'm like, oh, this road's starting to get really gnarly and we're going downhill, and so I was like, if I have to turn around, I don't think this car would be able to make it up these muddy, steep hills if I even could turn around, which there was no ability to turn around because it was densely forest jungle, you know, single lane, no turnoffs or anything like that. Like it was. It was as bad as like you're you're committed. Once we
got over into the dirt road. We were committed to that road. At the time, we maybe didn't know that, but in hindsight we one hundred percent were no turning around. So we're driving down rain gets a little heavier. It's getting late, right, it was like six or seven pm.
Yeah, the sunsetting.
The sun hadn't set, but it was definitely like about to and we didn't get to our hotel until dark. Spoiler alert. We got to our hotel. We're alive spoiler and so we're driving and we get to this point where I stopped the car, put it in park and have to like go and scout the road ahead where.
You know, it's like raining now.
It was mostly the this stuff on the road, like I needed to know exactly where to put the tires, exactly where to gun it, where to break, Like you can't break here because then you won't get over this thing kind of thing.
It was like a big pit in the road too.
And like the last thing we would like if we stalled out somewhere, like if we high centered on a tree or something like that, we would be screwed.
Because I think we were like five to eight miles.
Away from the hotel at that point. I think we were even a little further maybe fifteen Yeah, I remember it said like twenty kilometer. Maybe it was like fifteen kilometers, so yeah, about ten miles. And so I knew like that was very consequential to have an incident where we wouldn't be able to use the car anymore. So I got out of the car, I was like scouting ahead.
I didn't even say a word to Kaylin and got back in the car and I just put my seatbelt on, put it in drive, and I like did everything that I needed to do, like floored it through this, breaked hard for this, avoided this kind of thing, and that went well, and then we got up to another point where I had do that again. And I don't know if you guys have ever had this experience, but I've had it several times in my life. Not very often.
There's a physical reaction to something bad that could potentially happen. Like for me, my stomach goes gets really like, I don't know, hollow feeling. It almost feels like I'm I'm like I've got like a piece of metal in my mouth, like I'm sucking on metal. Like the taste, it just tastes like metal. And it's a very distinct feeling. It's a feeling I only get when I'm doing something that I think I'm about to regret, like I'm gonna hurt myself really bad, or this is going to end really
poorly in whatever degree. And I got that feeling, and it's the only time I've gotten it since we've been together. It's the first time I've had it, and you know, probably a dozen dozen years or so. And the sun it was kept going down, kept going down. There got to this other point where there was like a big rock wall door right, a big cliff to our left, still like densely forested, and the car is just where. I'm fling it through this terrain because I have no
other choice, and the cars just bouncing around. We're like bouncing off this tree, bouncing off this rock.
And we hadn't spoken in like an hour at this point.
It might have been more. It might have been like two hours.
My feeling, I was like shaking and quiet. And then I I don't know if we had service, Like I couldn't exit out of the map. We didn't have service, no service, So why? I kept thinking very morbid. But I'm like, no one's going to find our bodies? Yeah, like how are our families going to know where we are? Because I thought we were going to die. I had a feeling that like we weren't going to come out of it. Why. I don't know, but that's how I felt.
Death is pretty extreme. But I got the same feeling too, Like I was just saying, I had that feeling that I never get and I don't often feel like I'm going to die. That's as bad of a feeling as I can get, Like I didn't even get that feeling when I crashed skiing in Switzerland, you know what I mean.
It got to this point where we were like seven miles away from the hotel, making such slow progress, going five miles an hour through most of it because I'm like navigating through this stuff and just going really slow and meticulous, I guess you could say. And it got to the point where I was like, Okay, seven miles,
we could walk that in two hours. But now it's dark, so we would Like I've already kind of planted out all out my head, Like I was like, Oh, we'll sleep in the car tonight, wake up in the morning, and then walk to the hotel.
And I'm thinking, I, if we stall out, I'm leaving my luggage. I'm going to sprint through this jungle as fast as I possibly can.
Yeah, because you know what else are you going to do? I thought sleeping in the car would have been the best option.
But eventually we made it. And after we made it and got service or we went on a hike later on and someone told us that the most I haven't actually fact just checked this, but the most venomous snakes in both Americas. Lives in Saint Lucia. So had we gotten out of the car, how do we get a bit by a snake? Then death was probable.
Death was thankfully we didn't have to get out of the car, minus the times that I I had to go and see the road ahead of us, I guess, but but I mean it was scary, and I think the biggest fear that I had was because, like I said earlier, like I knew that, like, let's since there were so many felled trees and like overgrown bushes and stuff, the likelihood of it being so bad at a future point on that same road was pretty high, you know, like you always kind of expect the middle of every
trail to be the worst because it's probably the least trafficked. And so in my head, I was like, if it's this bad this early on, it's only gonna get worse. And so that's kind of why I started feeling that way, knowing that I couldn't turn around and get us out of there. And so yeah, so eventually we like I can't remember exactly how it happened.
But we bounce in and bobbing and swerving.
We got out and the road like straightens out and like flattens out, and it's graded a lot better. And I'm like, I think we're out of the woods now, but like you didn't want to jinx it because you never know.
And I put my finger up and I said, don't talk until we get to the hotel.
Yeah, And then so then we eventually like passed a couple little buildings and I was like, I'm pretty sure we're in the clear now. So we landed at like two pm and we didn't get to the hotel until eight pm. It was crazy, even though it was only supposed to be an hour and a half drive it and I've taken as six hours.
And when I think about Saint Lucia, this is what I think about. So anyone's like I want to go to Saint Lucia, I always say don't.
Go because, look, in hindsight, you survived. Do you not think it's like a cool, fun memory to have.
Yeah, now, but it's definitely tainted my experience. But Saint Lucia itself, so we get to our first hotel, I think there are people who just want to lay by the beach and not do much else. I think Saint Lucia's the perfect spot for that. Like it's a very honeymoon esque destination, a lot a lot of honeymooners. And it's funny because Diana and I were there for a
few days. We had drinking like fifty pina coladas over the week at that point, and everyone's on their honeymoon, so everyone has these like amazing bodies, and I was like, just get me out of here. I felt so bloated and gross. But it's just a very like relaxed hang by the pool drink. We did kayak one day, and we did go on one hike. But and the Patones are great.
I was gonna say, I ask if you remember what they were called Patons. Yeah, good job.
Yeah, the Potones are really cool to see. I just don't maybe I planned it poorly, but I don't think there's like a ton of exploring to do, yeah, adventure esque activities.
Ironically enough, one of my friends is there right now and he did like a he like sailed a boat around the island, okay, And I think he's having a better time than we did because he's kind of leaning into more of the adventure side. Yeah, And I think that's why you booked it because it was like there is adventure to be had, but we were just maybe so burnt out from just getting to the hotel that we just wanted to like sit around and not really.
Do much and just live and survive.
Yeah, And I'm not really that kind of I'm not the kind of guy that just wants to sit on a beach and drink. I'll do it. I'll do it like a day or two, but I don't want to do it the entire trip, you know.
But we did kayak in the ocean. Kayaking in the ocean is so hard, but it was cool.
Yeah, how hard did you try? And the kayak?
Again? This is back before I worked out, so I was My arms were little noodles.
Put us in a kayak tomorrow. I guarantee I'm doing ninety nine percent of the paddling.
Do you see how strong I am?
Here's a very strong but you're strong to your weight ratio. I weigh twice as much as you. Well, also, paddle. One paddle for me is ten paddles for you.
And it's like, you know, the TikTok. When my husband's home, I can't lift this. And when my husband's not home, I'm like lifting a bed on my bare back, you know. So it's also being in a kayak with you and knowing you're so much stronger.
So I'm like, and I'm not braggerbout being stronger than my wife by the way, Like I bet you come on. But yeah, the kayaking was fun. The hotels we stayed at were nice. They were like kind of junglely vibes. The first one, at least, it was like a little villa on a hillside overlooking the water, was really beautiful.
The patons were cool. I really wanted to hike the There's a big potona in a small potone I think roughly what they were called, and you can hike the small paton to get really cool views of the big poton. I wanted to do it. One morning. Our hotel was like an hour away from them, which was kind of far because they're on like the west the west southwest part of the island Ish and so it had been
an hour drive. I wanted to get there for sunrise, and it would have been like a six hour hike, so I was like, I have to leave it like one am to get there. There's like no beta online about hiking these things. I think the locals probably don't hike them often, and if they do, they're not like getting online to share all the information that they get out on it, you know, so they're like, there's there might be a trail. I ended up not doing it
just because I didn't want to. Again, I think I was just kind of burnt out from the experience getting there. But I think they hiked it, and my friends that are there now, they hiked it with a guide and they said it was great. What else did we do? Then we drove up for next hotel. Caitlin had never been on a jet ski.
You had never been on a jet ski. I had been.
Okay, I've definitely been on a jet skis. You just really wanted a jet ski.
I think, no, Oh, you had never jet skid in the ocean. That's what it was.
Yeah, gotta do that at some point in your life.
But we did right before our flight. So we like hopped on a jet ski for an hour.
Yeah. Our flight was like PM. Checked out of the hotel at nine am, drove an hour north, got these jet skis.
It was fun.
It was fun for a minute. Jeki. It's really hard jet skiing in the ocean is challenging because there's so much chop, like you're you're fighting the current the waves.
Because typically what I've done if jet skiing in the ocean is like you're on a boat. The boat has a jet ski, so you're like out in the middle of the waves. Aren't crazy, fancy, fancy.
Girl, You're on a boat with the jet ski.
Je's fancy. Uh this you're like going through the what is it the break and getting through.
The break wasn't hard. It was just like once you're out at sea, the waves, they're the water is so choppy, so it's like you can't really go fast because you're just bouncing around everywhere on that small little thing.
But I was like, but that's what I was talking about in the middle of the ocean where it's calm.
It's not calm anywhere in the ocean. Was well, I like to go fast and you can't really go fast, and it's like that.
And they were like dangerous rocks and left and right that it was in the waves. It was it was a little scary but fun.
Yeah. So that was basically the Saint Lucia trip in a nutshell. It's just funny that the like the experience that we talk about most is getting to the hotel.
Oh yeah, it was, because it's scarred us both in talking about it. People are like, oh wow, so crazy. But if you were there in that car with us, you would have felt that same feeling and felt like death was near.
And we were only dating for like four months at that point.
Probably yeah.
But would you recommend anyone to visit Saint Lucia.
I wouldn't go back. I would tell people to do a different itinerary from what we did, right, And also, there's this chocolate hotel that looks incredible, so I would suggest going there, but it was also like two thousand at night.
Yeah. I do think there were some cool hotels that we might have missed out on that were like how would you say them? How would you say they were? They were.
Luxurious?
No, no, no, almost like the opposite. It was almost like they were more of like an experiential hotel, m like your live I guess the Villa hotel we said it was kind of like that. But there were hotels like near the Potones that had like mud spas, and it just felt like more of an authentic experience from a wealthy yer standpoint. You know, like obviously the local aren't going to be doing that, but it just seems like a cool thing that you probably wouldn't be able to get many other places.
Yeah, we also did a rum tasting, and in Ireland we did a whiskey tasting. And we're not just we're not tasting people.
We're not tasting people like.
I can't tell you the difference between the whiskey and the rum. And I just don't want to take random little shots.
Yeah, And I just don't. I don't really want to get wasted. Yeah, you know, and I don't enjoy the taste of those things, right, So why would I sit here and take little SIPs of them? This one's from here, this one's from here, this one's sweet, this one's sour. I'm like, oh, they all taste like crap to me. Yeah, I hate this, but it was interesting.
I guess the place where we had it was really cool. It was almost like a wine cellar. But yeah, I would say go and do the opposite of what we did.
Yeah, but don't rent a car, you're saying, Yeah, I would still rent the car, Okay. I would go back just to like maybe drive that road. Again and same road and be less scared this time. Wow, whisky, Maybe that's what it was for me. I don't really get scared, and that was maybe just me being scared of the feeling that I had, you know, and.
Took you a long time to recover from it the whole vacation.
No. No, But I'm just saying like, that's maybe the feeling that I was experiencing was fear. Fear, which is not a feeling that I'm familiar with.
When's the last time you were scared, Saint Lucia? No, seriously, that was four years ago.
I get scared every time my skydive, not that I've skydived in a while, but but different kind of fear, maybe more of like ane excited fear versus like a dread. Maybe that's what it was. Dread. Let's call it dread.
Dread. Wow, Yeah, I had dread yesterday.
Because the house didn't have heat. No, because you're driving.
Yes, I drove my very personal storm yesterday and I was filled with dread. Mmm, you weren't there.
Don't compare your dread to my dread.
No, there were Okay, So it was so snowy that there were these massive gusts of wind because it was really windy too, and it would just it was a complete wide out. You could not see anything in front of you or near you. It was pretty scared.
M dread that scary as Saint Luicia.
Saint Lucia, it was worse, but this was a close third.
What second, I don't know, but.
It can't be like right under it anyways.
Don't compare your dread to mind dread. But yeah, that's Saint Lucia. Is there anything else that we're missing?
Probably we didn't do that much.
That hike that we did that one day was really nice.
Yeah, we learned about some fruit and vegetation, and it was we had a tour guide or a hike leader.
Book through our hotel I think probably, yeah.
And there was a couple with us.
So, like the vista at the top was really nice. Remember like that little deck with the used to see the patons from where you're sitting. You just got to like situp there and look at the view for a little bit. Yeah, just trying to think of anything else that was really exciting that we did.
We really didn't do much. We drank a lot because I think it was one of those all inclusives, which really get you because then you're just panaclatta left and right. And then towards the end the trip, we were like, we should stop drinking this just straight sugar and milk.
Yeah, well, I love those two things though. And the first hotel we say that the food is good. I don't remember it being especially good at the second, not that it was bad, but I do remember at the first hotel we were like impressed by the menu.
Yeah, because the second was all inclusive, so it wasn't as great of a menu as the first.
Right, right, I think that whole area is very French influenced, right am I mistaken with thinking that French colonized?
I have no idea.
So the food is pretty good. The pinut clattas and the wine were really good. Iually remember that first hotel there was like that long stone hallway that we would walk to get down to the restaurant. Do you remember that? No, but yeah, that's Saint Lucia. I personally would probably not go back, but I would like if someone was like, hey, we got a trip to Saint Lucia, we got you covered, do you want to come, I'd probably be like, yeah, I.
Wouldn't mind going to the Chocolate Hotel. If someone were to randomly invite me, then I'd.
Go to that. If you got a free trip to Saint Lucia, like if Saint Luis to Saint Lucia Tours and Board heard this podcast, they wanted to like amend their your experience there, would you go?
Yeah? Because I don't. I don't think we had like a true experience, And I feel bad shutting on it because I don't think it's necessarily It's not a bad place. It's beautiful and gorgeous. It was just tainted by that scary drive. And I didn't this. Again, It's my first time planning an international trip, so I didn't plan it. I thought that I would love to just like lay by the Beach true week, and I got bored pretty quickly.
Yeah, but you live in your learn, live my learn. I agree. Anyways, that's gonna do it for this week's episode. Have been there, Dean That next week, I'm not sure what we're gonna talk about, but we'll figure out when we get there, so be sure to tune in then, where maybe we suck just a little bit less