In my blog ‘Saturday Night’s Alright’, I said I was determined to return to Les Salines and find out what was on the other side of that bridge. Well, today, we did just that.

It had been raining, not English drizzle, but heavy tropical downpours and we hadn’t stepped out the Airstream all day. It was now about three in the afternoon, and it would get dark in three hours. The rain started to slow, so I hustled David into the car and we drove down the pot holed road to Les Salines. The pot holes were now mini lakes. The craft sellers were gone, and there was no one on the beach.

As soon as we stepped onto the path, we hit our first challenge. To continue, we would have to ford a mini lake. Actually, it was more of a river, flooding out the mangrove swamp towards the sea.  So it was off with the walking boots and into the wet boots (fortunately we had brought to help us get over the bridge – always be prepared – dib, dib, dib!) The intention was to change back into the walking boots once we were over the bridge. However we spent more time sloshing through water than we did on dry land, so it was wet shoes all the way.

As we emerged from under the trees, a rumble of thunder echoed through the woodland. The wisdom of continuing was discussed and I told David about an English man I met a few years back. He had been running across Highbury Fields in the rain, holding an umbrella when the umbrella was struck by lightening. He suffered severe nerve damage which left him with a Parkinson-like tremor.  Fortunately we didn’t have an umbrella but the fact that we were out in the open, on a headland, wading through water did seem somewhat foolish. David agreed – and revealed that he’d seen a flash of lightening a few moments before. However, the bridge was now in sight and we wanted to see what was on the other side, so against all logic, we pressed on.

I had done a bit of research and now knew that the bridge was part of an old salt works, taking salt from the salt pans inland (hence ‘Les Salines’). Getting over the bridge was a challenge as the current was running faster than last time. And it was raining again. Once over the bridge we entered an area known as the ‘Savane des Petrifications’ (‘The petrified Savannah’ –  owing to the fact that fossilised tree remains were found here – unfortunately they have been pillaged over the years). Petrified would have been an appropriate response as we came out into the open to witness a flash of lightening – but for some reason, I couldn’t stop laughing. There was a touch of a Scooby Doo adventure about this walk. The skies grew dark.  Black slabs of volcanic rock dropped off to rough seas as we approached ‘Pointe d’Enfer’ (Hell Headland – like, yikes!), which looked out over an enormous rock rising out of the water – the ‘Table du Diable’ (Devil’s table).  The mangrove swamps gave way to an almost lunar landscape.  Desert like plains stretched out before us, dotted with tall cactus plants. We were the hapless kids, meddling  where we shouldn’t oughta. Where was the evil henchman and what was his plan?

The end of this story is a damp squib. We made it back safely. No one got struck by lightening. There was no evil henchman, or at least none that we saw. Just us, a billion crabs and a few toads.