St Lucia

Vieux Fort (St Lucia)







First stop after St Vncent was at the south end of St Lucia at Vieux Fort which is a very busy local town town 'without a tourest bone in its body' according to the guide book, and it seemed to be right. We enjoyed our few days there with cheap food and drink and not a boat boy in sight which was a refreshing change. Not so sure about the shoes though, I spotted a sign saying 'Ladies shoes only $29 buy one get one free', first time I've seen that option, must be a one legged person's dream shoe shop.



On a disappointing note, the day we got up to leave, the painter (line, for those of a land lover persuasion) from our spare inflatable dingly ( we had been using the spare while we were repairing the main one) was all that was hanging on the back of the boat..............no boat attached! We had towed it some considerable way some days before so the knot would have been really tight on the boat end so we can only assume someone has stolen it during the night.





Soufriere (St Lucia)







A two hour sail to Soufriere Bay which is in the Pitons, A breathtaking anchorage in the Bay and some great snorkelling around the point. Met up with Andy and Sue again on Spruce and decided to share a car hire and drive around the Island.







Rapau anchored in the beautifull Pitons

















snorkelling at the Pitons






It was an open top jeep type of car and we drove clockwise around the island stopping at a little village called Anse Le Raye and chatting to a nice lady called Greeta who was selling bread on the street and very excited that we would put her on the blog. She told us her life story, 8 kids, dead husband and still baking bread for a living at 68. She even tried to give us some bread for free which put back our faith in people here.






Greeta the bread maker












Coffee stop





Stopped for lunch in a one horse town called Micoud (no horses only chicken and sad dogs) and got very cheap lunch at a rum shack (bit early for the rum though even though we could see the panadol on the shelf with the alcolhol!)









The handy Panadol!







We drove on down the east side of the island to Lattille Falls were we chatted to a Rasta man who was living off the land and all the lovely fruit and veg by putting a homemade ram pump (Andy assures me people will be impressed with this!) onto the falls and generating electricity to pump water around to the crops etc. We then went for a secret walk in the rainforest (we should have had a guide but hey had all gone home when we got there so we snuck in). We named Sue the Banana Bandid the way she sloped into a wooded shack we passed and picked up the stray bananas as we drove past the Banana plantation! All in all a very nice day.






The secret walk








Keith can't communicate via a coconut he realises!
























Andy and the Rasta man








Us at Latille Falls

















Banana Plantation




Keith spent a few days dealing with the never-ending problem of trying to get the SSB radio to work with help from Andy who is a wiz at these things. Still no real joy though. We really need this to be working so we can get weather forecasts during the return crossing.


Marigot Bay

An overnight stop at Marigot Bay where a British Admiral hid his fleet from the French by disguising the masts as coconut trees by tying coconut fronds in the rigging, the french reputedly sailed right by! The Bay is well hidden from view, but it would be impossible to hide here now as the mumber of tripper boats coming in and out of the Bay is astonishing and it is certainly not a quiet place!











Marigot Bay



Rodney Bay (St Lucia)

Another couple of hours sail saw us enter Rodney Bay, home of the famous maina were the ARC rally boats finish. Pigeon Island stands to the north end of the bay and was the main base of the British Navy in this area in the old days, apparently because you can see Martininque on most days which was the French main base






Pigeon Island on left of picture












Rodney Bay is very commercialised, but it is a premier yachting haven and we needed to get work done on the alternator and one of the reefing lines needs changing. We were there during St Lucia's independence day (1979 they gained independence from Britain). We didn't see much in the way of celebrating in this area, though we were told there were parades in the capital town of Castries.





St Lucia Yacht Club near our anchor spot, had to try it out......several times






There is a desperate water shortage in St Lucia at the moment as the rainy season brought no rain last year and they have no desalination facitities. We have been conserving water as much as possible but we needed to have some jobs done, so a trip into the marina for the night was needed, and they have water.......or so we thought! The day we wanted to go in there was no water to the marina. The next day there was, so we went in and managed to fill our tanks, get a problem with the reefing system sorted and some other jobs, all at considerable expense. Still not got the spare alternator sorted unfortunately so another job still outstanding for our next port of call.