Passage Bequia to Marie Galante in the Caribbean, February 2016
From Bequia we sailed over to St Vincent and anchored in Keaton's bay.
I had been told that here it as possible to anchor, because it was not too deep also there is a friendly cafe and we were promised less agro from the 'boat boys'. They are called 'boat boys' because they work from their boats 'helping' visiting yachtsmen we really wanted to visit St Vincent because it is such a beautiful island, loads of rain forest and a volcano to climb.
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| JoJo, off St Lucia |
Sadly it was not to be. As we arrived in the bay a boat boy came out. As usual we were friendly but did not need his services. We anchored and he at first said we could not anchor. We had to take a bout. When that failed he said we had to pu out a stern anchor, and we should
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| Island Swift off St Lucia |
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| Island Swift off St Lucia |
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| Island Swift off St Lucia |
pass it to him. We declined and said we could do it if there was any need. Then he started to get angry! The boys and me went down below, but it was pretty unpleasant. I used the vhf (we finally have one that works!) to radio the bar and check with them that we anchored ok. This probably made matters worse. He eventually left us alone, but by this time we were feeling quite vulnerable.
We decided to leave so we headed up to Chateaubelair to clear customs and leave for Martinique. I retrospective could have sailed straight up to Martinique without clearing customs as they don't require a clearance form. When we arrived in Chateaubelair we anchored beside two other yachts, sower owed over to introduce ourselves and see how they were finding St Vincent. They had also left Waliabou after feeling intimidated, had been here for two nights and not had much bother. So we shut and locked all our hatches and went to sleep. Lochlann refused to come ashore or swim or come on deck throughout our few days in St Vincent. We had hoped to leave the next day but the customs office did not arrive until the afternoon. So we left first thing Tuesday morning.
We arrived at St Anne's in Martinique on Wednesday the 2nd February after an overnight stop on St Lucia at Rodney Bay. It was fun to have French bread and cheese! The sail up from St Vincent to Martinique was a brilliant reach, so good to be sailing again.
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| Arriving in St Lucia, anchoring under sail |
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| Fun and frolics off Dominica |
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| Fun and frolics off Dominica |
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| Fun and frolics off Dominica |
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| Fun and frolics off Dominica |
We met up with David and Catherine again in St Anne, who had introduced themselves to us in Bequia. David built the first Wylo in New Zealand after Nick Skeates built Wylo II. They have bought a boat in Greece and are sailing her back to New Zealand where they were going to build an eco house on an island. Going through the Panama Canal this April. This inspired us all. Wouldn't it be brilliant to sail across the Pacific! Maybe in a few years time.
I wanted to get stores in Marin which is an excellent and an easy place to stoke up. I also wanted to get some of the things on my list for the boat. But....it was Mardy Grai! Shops shut! We could not wait because we wanted to get round to Grande Anse and meet up with Jack, from Carpe Dium, who was coming back from England, and he had no transport out to his boat!
Luckily when we arrived in Grande Anse our little anchor spot, that we had used last year was free. It's tucked right under the south of the bay and it's a good spot because it dose not roll like the other spots do.
Jack arrived back tired but well with lots of important things for us. OU course books for Lochlann a couple of good harnesses for the boat and a Delorme Inreach. This is much cheaper than a sat phone, only dose texts messages, but will work all over the world. The main reason for getting this is to get weather updates as we travel back to the UK. But it will also be useful for medical emergencies and our friends can track us across the ocean.
We spent a happy week with Jack but I was keen to get further north. So we left for St Pierre and then Dominica. We did not stay long because in Dominica you can't scuba dive with your own equipment! Simon and Finbar have been going out regularly to snorkels and find good dive sights.
The next islands were Les Saints which are just south of Guadaloupe. This was a nice interlude but like so often the guide books don't quite paint the right picture. It was just a bit too touristy for us, but I had hoped it would be good diving. We did find a nice anchorage, but the ferries create a big wake that violently rocked the boat, breaking anything that has not been stowed.
One evening a little double ended sailed into the anchorage. Kate and ... On .... A Venus 35. It was nice to have company! The next evening Adix sailed into the anchorage and we met up with Leo again. Last time we saw him, Lochlann swam out a piece of Finbar's birthday cake In Las Palmas January 2015. Just as he was setting out to sail his folk boat solo across the ocean. Now he is Bosun on the prodigious boat Adix!
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| Fun and frolics off Dominica |
As we had not got provisioning done in Martenique I thought we should sail over to Pitre-Point in Guadaloupe. Bad plan. We did not like it here. Very expensive, not good shops, dirty and it rained. But our new outboard motor was used to good effect to fill up with shopping. The weather was mild so we set sail for Marie Galante. This island is less visited by boats because it lies to windward of the other islands. We had a brilliant sail out and dropped anchor off St Louis as the wind dropped even further. The next day we headed round to Grande Burge to find a safe spot go the wind increase that was forecast. This is our sort of place, small, manageable, friendly and comparatively cheep.
A place to get jobs done. Fill up with water, washing, shopping and fixing the self steering (we hope!).
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| Walking in Marie Galante |
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| Provisioning in Guadaloupe |
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| Walking in Dominica |
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| Film making in Les Saints |
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| Leaving St Pierre |
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Walking in Dominica
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