Only a couple of hours down the coast of Dominica the capital, Roseau, was definitely worth a short afternoon visit after we left Portsmith, and before we headed overnight to Martinique.

First stop in town was Fort Young Hotel for a drink and some internet time, catching up on the latest weather.  The hotel has been created out of the original fort which was built to defend Roseau in 1770.  Noted as being the most upmarket establishment on the island, we happily waited out the hottest part of the day, enjoying their local homemade lemonade and a shared plate of samosa’s.

Hotel set in the ruins of the old fort

Unable to shift the team from the comfort of the hotel, I headed out to investigate the town, wow – possibly the most interesting architecture of our trip so far, with buildings built from the ruins of the old town, intermingled with funky bars and authentic Caribbean style buildings.

The Harrods of Dominica

After my quick reccy, I collected/dragged the boys out, perhaps they are getting a little bit over visiting old towns, as they weren’t particularly enthused by my tour, in fact, on pointing out a beautiful old building Ben told me to “Shut up – I’m not in school at the moment”.   Oh well, hopefully the memories and blog photo’s will get a better reaction someday in the future!  I think however we are all getting a little bit tired and grumpy after the fairly aggressive itinerary we have set ourselves in our mission to get south asap.

Final sunset drinks  back at the Fort Young Hotel dockside bar before we headed back for dinner and possibly our last overnighter of the trip. We were now leaving the Leeward Islands, to start our exploration of the Windward Island group, which consists of Martinique, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Granadines, and Grenada.