 Situated in the small village of Monripo and resplendent in plant life, Mamiku Gardens is a natural lover's wonderland. This 22-acre natural wonder is also steeped in historical significance, evidence of which comes easily to even the casual observer. On top of the hill where Madam Demiku lived and hence the reason it's called Mamiku because Madam Demiku actually owned the estate and her husband who was Baron Demiku Governor of St Lucia handed her over the estate because she foresaw the British going to invade the island and it went from the Union Demiku to Madam Demiku estate and from French to Creole it became Mamiku. After my grandfather, that's my father's father came here after the war and he traveled the entire Caribbean from I'm not too sure from where to where but he couldn't decide between Trinidad and St Lucia and he decided well obviously St Lucia in the end and he bought the estate in 1906 and it's been in the Shingleton Smiths family ever since 1906. Presently Mamiku Gardens is the product of the search for alternative avenues of natural development through diversification of the economy. In the earlier days the time wasn't right, tourism wasn't really ready for us down here and bananas were still doing well and then when when governments started talking about diversification of agriculture it was like what do we do what how do we diversify what do we go into we did flowers we we diversified into flowers and then flowers led us into tourism because we started working with the tourists more and then it was like well what else do we do so we decided the time was right let's do the garden and it will be part of part of diversification we'll join agriculture and tourism together. The beauty of Mamiku Gardens is actually well a botanical garden is it's not just a garden there's also the dry forest walks there's actually the very beginning of the rainforest there's a herb garden where you can cure just what any minor element and there's also the historical site plus there's a banana plantation walk so they're about five different things you can actually come and look at flowers and plants in several varieties are bound at Mamiku Gardens and as many species as they are so too the wide range of benefits they provide in total we have over 400 different types of flowers and plants and trees most of them are actually numbered and we have a booklet that has the common name the botanical name and the family name so if you can walk around with a small booklet if you don't know the names and you can check the number on your list and you can get the name for most of it. We've got a wide range she worked with all the natural trees that remain there's very beautiful local trees that are indigenous to the area local shrubs and we we've left them and we work with a backdrop we've planted a lot of newer trees all the different flowering trees. The other beauty of this place is it's like the very beginning of the rainforest and there's some very special trees inside that that don't grow nowhere else but the center of the rainforest one of them being the galba tree it was cut now in the past and cut up into little pieces and made into charcoal which is sacrilege which is one of the most beautiful woods of building a house. Some of the flora found at Mamiku Gardens also leaked to medical value. One of the other trees we've found out is the Ainu just Majekwab it's actually a bush and I was always told it was a poison and not to eat it. We've now discovered that it's a miracle cure controls cancers and controls diabetes. We don't need to go to the pharmacist or to the doctor continuously obviously we can't cure everything but we can cure minor ailments and there are lots of herbs and plants and flowers and leaves growing if you know how to use them correctly and the right dosage you can be caught cured quite simply. Coals, flus, sore throat, gas, aches and pains and in the herb garden there's enough medicine there to cure you. The garden still interesting tales of battles fought long ago between European masters and the African slaves battles that have left their mark on these grounds. When the Frenchmen came down from France and started preaching all men were equal the African slaves heard this and said look hang on if all men are equal what are we doing being slaves? So they rose up and whenever you've had throughout history wherever they have had slaves they've always had runaway slaves and they had run into the interior of the island formed themselves into very effective bands and fought a very successful guerrilla warfare against their former French masters and then later the French the sorry the British invasion they defeated the British they out fought the British completely. Tourism is an essential element of Momiko gardens the gardens being part of the natural heritage tourism program. It's beautiful the steps are very nice makes it very easy to get up and down and all the flowers and different plants coming up are very beautiful. Heritage tourism put us on with their list of tours we were already in existence and they came by to do the inspection and we already met all of their requirements cleanliness bathrooms proper parts and stuff we already met all their requirements so we are on their list of people and they do send us a few people but we're looking for a lot more people. When you first come in you walk through Mystic Garden and then you can go on into Secret Garden and Grandpa's Garden and the Cassie Garden and Veronica's Garden and then you've got the historic site on top of the hill and with the woodland walks and all the different gardens it's about 12 acres. When we first started the garden Mom got a group of men together they were all banana farmers they were going out of the banana business and they didn't have anything to do they either worked for somebody else in the banana business and they couldn't afford to employ them anymore and so she taught them from scratch because taking care of bananas is a different manner than taking care of a garden and she taught them from scratch what she wanted them to do and it was just pure bush I mean years ago it used to be nice grassland in here when we had the cattle it was just pure bush and they literally carved the garden out of the hillside so that's who we started off with with a team of men working in the garden and then we've hired the tour guides and the girls in the bar and cleaners and boutique we've had everybody's from around our area Prahlen, Monripo, Passians maybe as far as Denri and Miku but our area the bread we get is from this area the vegetables from this area whatever we can get from our area we use we're going to continue developing the gardens make them bigger and the more they grow the more beautiful it will look because it's still in its very early stages we have lots of plans to actually do with Mamiku Gardens and incorporate the bananas more the mangoes passion fruit the flowers the gingerly fields everything else to be incorporated so you end up doing a complete plantation tour together with the history