On the face of it, today’s adventure in Guadeloupe shares similarities with yesterday‘s. From our balcony we can see a cloud-shrouded mountain, and we’re going up it!
After that it’s different - today we’re going on a bus, and it’s not just a mountain, it’s a live volcano. And we need a guide to get us up to the crater.
A small group of nine from the ship head up a tortuous hill in an old coach, getting some distance before the coach can’t do it, and we transfer in two sub-groups to a minibus for the last miles to Bains Jaunes, the start of our trek at 950m.
Our guide Mais, a jolly young girl from Avignon is full of energetic good fun, she sets out the plan for the day and we head off upwards, firstly the going is easy but before long there’s no formal path and we’re walking on lava strewn along the route. The journey is probably not as strenuous as yesterday’s but its still hard work. Of course we’re first in line, and set the pace for the fit young American’s half our age.
In every weather from sunshine to driving rain, it takes over two hours to get close to the summit where we observe small sulphurous steam outlets and vegetation covered craters which, whilst not dormant are relatively calm. When the independent walkers reach a fence protecting them from the dangerous sections, we go round a post and continue on. We stop to see scientists at work, then head right to the edge of a crater.
We get to see and hear the most incredible chimneys puthering smokey sulphur flumes. We can’t stay too long, breathing quantities of sulphuric acid isn’t necessarily good for ones health, but as with many things, a little does no harm!
It’s three miles up to the 1440m crater, then of course the same back, but some of us are a bit faster. Again we’re ahead of the others, and beat the young Americans again, we get to the minibus, and are moved onto a picnic area to start on our lunch before the other group are even off the mountain!
Lunch is a surprisingly pleasant chicken and rice dish, with salad on the side, pretty impressive for nearly at the top of a volcano! Chef also serves us a modest helping of the local rum, said to be an aphrodisiac too. Afterwards we head back down to sea level and our beautiful ship, but decide to take a short walk along the front first. It just an extension of Paris Plage ... one could easily be forgiven for thinking we’re in the middle of the Caribbean as all the street furniture, cars, attitude and eccentricities are pure French, of which, naturally, we approve!
On our return we head for five aft and our favourite Jacuzzi for some muscle therapy. There’s even one of our fellow walkers in there - we discuss the days outing and then cover mutual experiences, though in this case the lady is well in advance on the adrenalin scale than we are!
After several Midori Pinã Coladas we head home, I quickly done something suitable and head for the show lounge whilst hubby decides to stay home and read. It's the multi instrumentalist again, Mark Donaghue, who’s in fine form this evening, from Rossini to Mercury via Dylan and Meatloaf.
We’re aiming for Earth and Ocean tonight and because it’s been raining there's little uptake - we’re in luck. We secure a table under the overhang so if rain returns we’re safe. We then get a Kir and Bellini from the bar just to keep us going.
Although we’ve had this menu just last week, we’re looking forward to revisiting it. Starting with warm shrimp, which comes with some fiery chillies, it's very satisfying with the recommended white. We move on to pasta - Rigatoni Azzurro with sausage and mozzarella which is fabulous, now with the Nine Hats cab sauv.
The we hit the lamb shank with truffled ricotta polenta which is excellent, the meat pulls off the bone just by looking at it, and it’s texture is perfect.
We observe that the Camembert is omni-present on this menu, a signature dish, so we feel it’s time to give it a try - again perfect, we really enjoy this with the remains of our Cabernet Sauvignon.
To finish we once again order the tarte tatin, elegantly prepared from a single turn of apple spiralled from end to end. It’s lovely but Hubby assures me that my version is better!
We’ve managed to make Earth & Ocean a five-course dining experience and it has been exceedingly good. A perfect dinner score, not in part due to the excellent staff we’ve now become very familiar with, and all under the watchful eye of one of the best Maître de Table’s we know, David, who’s professionalism is unsurpassed!
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