St Vincent

St Vincent (Young Island Cut)



St Vincent is a very un-touristy place and very poor. We needed to get the main alternator fixed (we are using the spare) and the anchor winch and do some repairs. So it was onto the local bus which was the usual rolleroaster ride at 80 miles an hour round blind bends where people grabbed their children out of the way and dogs were used to jumping out of the road pretty quick. We held on for dear life as usual while the locals just gaze out of the window and don't seem to notice anything remotely dangerous might happen!




























Repairs on dingy


I was waiting for Keith in the alternator fixing place having a quiet beer on this quiet lane where the peace was shattered about every 30-60 seconds by a car or bus hurtling past as if it was on a motorway. When suddenly some local men set up a cricket game in the middle of the road and began to play! To my amazement the traffic never once slowed but just careered in and out of the game while the players stopped throwing the ball......sometimes! (I only had to duck once).

The cricket lane!

Sunset in Young Island Cut

Andy and Sue whom we know from our sailing club were also in St. Vincent. We had a good couple of nights with them in Canaouau and kept up the tradition here in St. Vincent having a sing-a-long with Sue's guitar one evening (she was playing of course). I took them both for a dive which they had never done before and they were brilliently enthusiastic about it afterwards talking of doing a course etc.

Andy enjoying his dive

Sue and me

Andy and Sue's boat 'Spruce'

Wallilabou Bay

With succesful result on the anchor winch and unsuccessful one with the alternator, we left Young Island Cut and headed further north up the leeward side of St vincent ot Wallilabou Bay.

The boat boys in St Vincent row out to try to get you to enlist their help from a couple of miles out but not using outboard motors like most of the other places, but rowing like mad. They then row back alongside of you hoping to be able to help you to tie up when you get there.

Boat boy giving us a hand

Those of you who are fans of Pirates of the Caribbean would probably recognise the bay for it is here that Curse of the Black Pearl and Dead man's Chest was filmed. The buildings were built by Disney as part of the set and some buildings were built on top of exisitng buildings to make a re-creation of the pirate town Port Roayl during the 18th Century. It it really is a typically Caribbean bay.

Port Royal re-creation at Wallilabou Bay


We walked to the waterfall at Wallilabou were we had water torture! Great to have fresh water, if a little bit of a battering......but worth it!!

Grenadines and north to St Vincent

Hog Island, Grenada

We stayed in Grenada for 3 weeks in the end as it was such a nice place and we got a bit settled. We moved from Prickly Bay to Hog Island (visiting Phare Bleu Bay in between to get hold of the electrician for an electrical problem).

Keith even went a little way up the back stay to fix something which is unheard of with his vertigo. You would have thought he had climbed Everest, but I suppose in his mind he had really.

Hog Island bay was so protected from the winds that it was flat calm in there. There was a tiny uninhabited island where local man (Roger) had set up a bar and came out in his boat everyday and sold beer. On Sundays he had a BBQ and a reggae band we visited the BBQ two Sundays on the trot before we finally tore ourselves away from Grenada!

Rogers Bar on Hog Island

Hog Island in the distance

Carriacou

A 7 hour sail back north up the chain took us to Tyrill Bay in Carriacou which we had stopped at overnight with Pete and Jacquie on the way down, this time we visited the island which was sparsely populated with goats just about everywhere (Very good idea I think, first it saves getting the lawn mower out, and secondly you can have goat stew or curry eventually!) We took the dinghy to explore the mangrove swamps. People put their boats in here to protect them from the hurricaines, we could see that some never come back for them!

Here we also had to clear out of Grenada as we are into a different country another 3 hours up north at the next island.

Goats everywhere!

Sunset at Carriacou

Entrance to the Carriacou yacht club!

Union Island

A small very poor island (not reflected in the price of everything). On provisioning we found it to be the most expensive island we have visited.

Rapau in Union Island

There is a tiny island on a reef on the edge of Clifton Bay on which a guy has built a bar made out of conch shells he calls it Happy Island. We had a beer in there, but just one as it was double the price we had been paying in Grenada so we wouldn’t call it particularly happy.

Happy Island

After stocking up on victuals we went around the corner to Chatham Bay which is lovely and remote but with the inevitable boat boys coming round in their boats to flog you anything from bread to fish to jewellery. They wanted 15 EC dollars (around £3.75) for a baguette so I have now taken to baking bread again. I am still experimenting. One lot I made was called galley bread which turned out like a cross between bread and crumpet. The next loaf was left a bit long to rise while we went out snorkelling, it looked like a breathing alien I had to squeeze it into the oven. It then burnt on top but was a bit squidgy in the middle. I intend to keep practicing though at £3.75 a loaf. Water too has become an extortionate price so we are now back to washing dishes in sea water and getting washed in the sea off the back of the boat, (shampoo lathers up well in sea water). The salt will either give us glorious natural skin, or we look like a couple of old salty dogs by the time we get back (no comments please!)

The alien loaf

There was good snorkelling in the bay but it was amongst where there were many pelicans diving into the water to catch fish. Keith was a bit nervous he would get a pelican diving up his ar..e but he was quite safe, not even a bird would want to do that!

Tobago Cays

The wind blew up above 25 knots so we stayed in Chatham Bay for 3 days before moving to Tobago Cays (which is nowhere near Tobago incidentally) only about 7 miles from Union Island. That was after Keith got over the shock of finding that one of the bolts holding on the alternator had sheered right through when he was doing his engine checks to leave. Luckily he found a spare bold the right size to fix it.

Tobago Cays

Tobago Cays is a designated national park which is beautiful only it was a bit too windy while we were there unfortunately. We snorkelled off the Turtle area and were amazed by the number of turtles eating the sea grass there who weren’t at all perturbed by humans swimming around them. It was too windy and rough to take the dinghy over to horseshoe reef to snorkel there sadly and the forecast was not due to change till later the next week so it was too long to stay around longer.

Upon leaving Tobago Cays the anchor winch stopped working so Keith now has to use muscle power until we can get it fixed.










Canouan

A lumpy 2hour passage took us to Canouan and we anchored in Ramau Bay where Sue and Andy from our sailing club on ‘Spruce’ were, plus their son and his girlfriend visiting. We invited them and a family cruising from Denmark to come over for sundowners which proved to be a jolly affair and after a few rum punches, for those of you that know the song, we now have the Danish people going round singing the Focal Song!

There was a pretty reef nearby we all snorkelled on the next day.

This sleepy little island is a product of the ever-changing development process which is happening to all these islands. Half of it has been taken over by Italian developers who have transformed half of the island into a big fancy hotel complex and now even the locals cannot access half of the island which has resulted in some understandable disputes. Even the best beach on the island where some of the locals made their living has been put out of bounds. Andy’s son went spear fishing with Glen, one of the young locals who sells his catch to make a living. We all bought some lovely fish (red snapper and ‘old wife’) from him for a much more reasonable price than we have previously paid. He had a lovely puffy fish which disturbed me a little, but he said that it is difficult to catch one of these and he can get a good price for it as the meat is superb. He also told us that he is hoping to join the British Royal Navy as Canouan is part of St Vincent which is an independent state within the commonwealth.

Glen the fisherman

St Vincent

We sailed a bumpy windward passage around 5 hours to Bequia stopping overnight to have the spray hood repaired, then another 2 hours on to St Vincent.

Barbados, the Grenadines and Grenada

Happy New Year to everyone!

Barbados

On reaching Barbados with less than 24 hours before Nick had to catch his flight home we had a quick swim where we were anchored in Carlisle Bay and a longed for shower on the boat then went out to Oistins Fish Fry which is a Friday night speciality in Barbados. We ate more wonderful fish and next morning said a sad goodbye to Nick as it is a shame he had to fly home the day after arrival after our long trip.

Pete, Keith and I went to welcome Jacquie to Barbados on 16 December, she was more than happy for the warmth after the harsh winter weather being experienced in UK (looks like we chose the best winter to be away!) I now had a swimming and snorkelling buddy as the fellers do not seem too up for that kind of thing. Each morning Jacquie and I swam to the beach from the boat then ran up and down the beach looking just like Bo Derek in the film 10 (Sorry we don’t have a photo to prove it!) Then we would swim back to the boat, a truly morning exercise to look forward to!

We started to get the hang of beach landing the dinghy; you surf in on a wave then jump out quick, pick the dinghy up and run up the beach with it before you get swamped by the next wave! Got it wrong trying to launch it one day when we didn’t quite get over the first wave and the second one flipped the boat up and knocked Keith right under water, this must have greatly amused the people on the beach, and his money was drying out on the saloon table for a few hours afterwards!

We checked out the rum shacks in Bridgetown and the one we call the ‘wife beater bar’ as one evening when we were in there a man hit his woman and there was uproar as one of the local men told us that a man should never hit a woman....in public!! Of course when we visited the Barbados Yacht club there was none of that sort of thing going on!

Bequia (part of the Grenadines)

We sailed overnight to Bequia in the Grenadines on 20 December and anchored in Admiralty Bay. Here Jacquie and I abandoned our fitness routine and just did our swim close to the boat as the water taxis zooming around (some with very interesting names) could take your head off if you strayed too far!

I took Jacquie diving on a small reef nearby and she did really well (needs a little buoyancy practice but that’s normal). The bay was beautiful, we had a lovely meal in ‘Tanty Pearls’ on Christmas Eve (rescuing a goat that had its foot stuck in a grave on the way) and a BBQ on the beach on Christmas day. It was magnificent, but despite wearing our Christmas hats it didn’t feel a bit like Christmas.

Christmas Eve at Tanty Pearls

Carriacou and Grenada

We left Bequia on Boxing Day and did an 8 hour sail to Carriacou (which mostly appeared to be closed as it was Boxing Day) then a further 8 hour sail the next day to reach Prickly Bay in Grenada. Grenada is a wonderfully lush island with waterfalls and rain forests in the centre.
Jacquie and I got a local bus to town (they are mostly minibus type) but as they were calling us down the street to get on board which we did, then they went up and down the road shouting at everyone to see if they wanted the bus, reversing up side streets and nearly taking out a couple of motor bikes, we thought at first we may be being abducted! More and more people got on the bus until we were 5 people sitting on 3 seats and just when you thought they could get no more on they still hailed people and let them get in! We did finally make the 4 mile trip into St Georges and subsequently became accustomed this mode of transport as the days went on.

We then went to the place where they make chocolate and tread the cocoa beans like grapes (only you don’t squash the beans you just move them around with your feet to aerate them).

We took the lads to a waterfall that Jacquie and I had sussed out was not too far from the bus stop (and hoped this was true). After hiking up this long, long hill, in the hot, hot sun we were afraid they would rebel and decide not to go any further.....then finally we spotted the shop (which means there must be an attraction). A lovely swim in the waterfall and Pete did confess he was just about to give up! On a subsequent visit to another waterfall Keith and I flagged down the bus on the way back and it was full but it stopped. My only memory was of seeing Keith out of the corner of my eye shoved in the seat behind me next to a rather large local man on a seat for 3 that now had 5 across it and it looked as if Keith had his face squashed up against the window like one of those cartoon characters!!










Waterfalls

Mount Gay Rum factory!

Beauiful Sunsets

Some dancing practice!

We said goodbye to Pete and Jacquie on 29 December as they flew back to UK and the snow! We spent New Year’s Eve in ‘De Big Fish’ at a pig roast were they celebrated the UK new year at 8pm local time (as most of the people there were from the cruising community anchored in the bay) and then threw us out at 11.30pm local time! We walked up a nearby hill and watched the fireworks going off all around at midnight. New Year’s Day saw us at the Friday fish fry at Gouyave.

We spent over a week waiting for an electrician to come on board something to do with the battery charging system again (it’s a boy thing so don’t ask me). We finally went round to Phare Bleu bay to seek out another electrician so have stayed in Grenada longer than planned, but I can think of worse places to be stuck!