I still have to write about the end of my trip to Panama 6 weeks ago and I'm already back from another exotic destination, Saint Lucia (note, not Santa, it has mostly French and English heritage). Hint about Panama: while I had a couple of great runs in Panama City, the rest of my 2 weeks there would rather be in the "Not Running in Panama" category. And Saint Lucia would easily get in that category. You have to wonder how the Saint Lucia super start, Julien Alfred, managed to train to become the fastest woman on Earth at the Paris Olympics last Summer. Certainly not running on roads on the island, way too dangerous! From
her Wikipedia page, she moved to Jamaica for high school then the University of Texas for her Bachelor: these are much better places to run.
We got quite an introduction to road traffic in the few hours after landing. We were driving from Hewanorra International Airport (UVF) to Castries when a reckless driver provoked a major accident. In quite a fate, the guy ended up on the top of his car, just in front of us, but not before hitting another car which was attempting to pass on a winding road, at the exact same time, and that other car hitting the back of another car which got into a spin and ending up facing us. Phew! It took me a lot of efforts all week to manage to record a witness statement at a police station. A few miles later, another serious accident involving 4 cars. Then, as we were exiting Castries, the capital, another one with a motorcycle lying in the middle of a roundabout.
That previous paragraph should be enough to refrain you from trying to run, right? Well, while I don't have the same eagerness to log tens of miles as I used to, after my 2024 meniscus fracture, I wasn't going to do was most tourists do in Saint Lucia, which is to rent a beach chair and lay down for a week. Or more...
At least we were staying on the North part of the island, Rodney Bay. Because the main road ends there, there is less traffic than closer to Castries. It's also an upscale neighborhood so the nearby streets don't have much traffic. An heads-up though: this is a volcanic island so, apart from the nice marina, exploring the many caps around, provides some good hill training. As in steep. Plus heat training as a bonus, all year round!
Main tip is to be super careful and focused on incoming traffic, meaning that you need to run against the traffic. Most of the time there isn't even a shoulder. I carry bottles when I run (my dear Ultimate Direction ones) and use them as virtual shield. You wouldn't believe the effect that lowering my bottle at the height of cars' headlights has on drivers. Still, I got a few close calls and, based on the accidents I recounted above, you don't want to get hit by one of these reckless, bad or aggressive drivers. Be alert!
As a second tip I would advise to run very early. I started one of my 4 runs at 5:45 am but then it was dark and I didn't have a headlamp, it was challenging to avoid the puddles. Did I say puddles? Although I was visiting in February and it's not the rainy season, we got showers every day. Not long but pouring hard. And that is another hazard as visibility is impaired during such showers.
Last warning: at some point, I was trying to run from the end Cap Estate to Cas-en-Bas, to try a new route. Google Maps was showing a road, or at least a path, even for cars. But half way, there was no road, it ended in a private property with fences and 6 dogs yelling at me. As I was retracing my way back, I saw that one of the dogs has escaped, that gave me a boost to sprint up the hill! And another trick then, which I learned from one of our local runners after she got bitten by a stray dog in Costa Rica, the year before I went there to run
the Coast Challenge: dogs, even stray ones apparently, are wired to freak out if a human is going to either straw a stone, or use a stick. What's interesting is that you can even mimic or feign it with the gesture, even if you can't find a rock or stick handy. While in Guatemala in December 2022,
I had to use a stick to push away a very aggressive dog, and it worked!
Ok, I'll stop there. I had told you I could have placed this post in the "Not running in..." category. Maps do show some trail heads but they aren't easy to find, or may not exist anymore. I was going to run to the top of Mount Pimard for instance, but there was a huge construction site for a new hotel at the bottom and they didn't allow to cross. I tried another way only to get into a super muddy area. Back to the asphalt... As for all the roads displayed on Google Maps, as I found out, many are just access trails to private areas.
I so needed to run, I did log 45 miles but it was challenging. And risky. This Sunday, I went to our local high school track, it feels great to get back to running haven!
Here are 4 Relive.cc flyover videos of these 4 routes, with pictures:
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