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MORNE SION WINDMILLS
There are three windmills located just north of Choiseul Village on sweeping grassy hills with excellent views of the Pitons. The wind mills date to the early 19th Century and were used for processing sugar cane, a bumper crop in St. Lucia during that time. Two of the windmills are in ruins but one has been preserved and is in very good condition. These windmills have a lot of St. Lucian history in them. What we see today is the stone base and on top of this would have been the large rotating windmill. Inside would have been the components for crushing the sugar cane. The Morne Sion Windmills are strategically located on the western portion of the island to take advantage of both wind and slope. Just below the wind mill is the ruins of a processing building. The cane was crushed in the wind mill and then the resulting juice flowed through lead pipes down to this building and fed into storage tanks. The juice was used as molasses and turned into rum for export and also processed into granulated sugar. Windmills have been used as a means of processing crops since the 17th Century. Water power was also commonly used to process sugar cane and other crops here in St. Lucia. A great example of this can be found at Balenbouche Estate in Choiseul. Eventually other crops replaced sugar and steam power replaced the wind mill.
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MORNE SION WINDMILLS |
