We sailed out of the Tobago Cays this morning and rounded Mayreau before heading south. There’s a shortcut out the back through the reef that would have taken perhaps an hour off today’s sail, but so many (usually charter) boats run aground on the reef it just didn’t seem worth it – local knowledge only – and it was a pleasant sail under mainsail alone running down the whitecaps.
I’m still amazed by the clarity of the water here. Sometimes the sounder is showing 25m and we can see the bottom rolling past.
Greg and I try really hard to keep a clean wake. For one, we’re always friendly to all the boatboys and local crowd, the kids and urchins, and we keep an eye out for the other sailors we see. We’ve rescued more than one dinghy we’ve seen blowing forlornly across an anchorage, and we’re quick to help with anchors, and when I dive on ours I keep an eye on the anchors of the boats around us.
However, today, once again being a muppet, I put our garbage bag on the transom to remind me to take it into shore. Of course I forgot about it and as we were concentrating on hoisting our mainsail in a fairly big swell, the inevitable happened. I turned around to see the bag tear open and all sorts of stuff you absolutely wouldn’t want to see in the ocean was suddenly in the ocean. We dumped the main and retrieved what we could with our boathook, but I still feel terrible, a few bits and pieces of nasty plastic waste blew away. Oh dear. I’m going to have to do something very good to make up for it. And these are such beautiful waterways too.
Sadly, this is not often noticed by the local residents. We see a lot of garbage being burnt on the beach. Boatboys offer to take your garbage away for a few EC$. This is handy, as there’s just really no good place to store several day old rubbish on a sailboat (yacht designers please take note). However, we’ve been warned that the boatboys collect the money and then dump the garbage on a beach somewhere, and there’s certainly evidence of this occasionally (or everywhere in Dominica). It’s the sad paradox of poverty: it’s the beauty of these islands that attracts tourists – a sure way out of the poverty continuum – and yet it’s typically the locals (except, sadly, today) that don’t seem to care.
I often think of China in this way. China impresses the socks of the western world with its rapid economic growth, and I’m aware of no group of people so industrious to get their kids to school and improve their family’s quality of life, yet this occurs with, it would appear, little regard for the environment in which they live, and the beauty of their country. I can understand it to some extent: if you are so poor you just want to put food on your family’s plate, of course the environment takes a back seat. Still, once the food is there, it’s a hard cycle to break. Westerners of course were no better as we industrialized – and after - the Hudson River is still horribly polluted from GE’s electrical conductor plant in Schenectady, New York, and they still refuse to do much about it.
In any case, I guess the transom is not the place to put a garbage bag.
After nearly three weeks we cleared out of St Vincent and the Grenadines by visiting the small airport at Union Island, followed by a short sail to Petit Martinique, part of Grenada. We were told diesel is very inexpensive here, and there’s a very modern fuel dock. Well, that’s true, but the surge made it impossible to use as we realized at near the last minute. So we motored off and anchored in the lee of Petit St Vincent; as it’s name implies, part of St Vincent. Hopefully the Coast Guard are not watching too closely. Actually, we’re told they exist but we’ve never seen them, ever.
Greg is feeling unwell. I could cook an egg on his forehead I suspect, I think he has a fever. That should save propane in any case.
Hopefully he feels better soon – it’s highly unusual that he’s not grinning and telling stories and planning some preposterous new adventure.
Tomorrow we plan to sail down the windward side of Grenada. It’s a decent sail, and we’ve been talking today about how suitable it would be – should the wind remain in its current sector – for a good all-day spinnaker run. YAY!
For now this anchorage, while beautiful with a white sandy seafloor and pristine water, has proven to be quite rolly as the sun has set. I hate rolly anchorages. HATE, HATE, HATE rolly anchorages.
I dived under the boat and spent most of an hour scrubbing slime and the odd barnacle off the hull, and it was bouncing around like a cork. Good breath-holding practice in any case.
Haven’t had internet for about a week, so these blogs are building up a bit.
31 Jan 2008
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Tobago Cays National Park, 12°37.69N, 61°21.54W
Getting our water tanks filled in Bequia (from Daffodil’s floating barge) took an age, so we didn’t make it to the Tobago Cays as planned, instead stopping in at Canoun. This morning we woke early and took up what is now my favourite position in the Tobago Cays: just in front of Jamsby island, anchored off the beach in about 3.8m of water. The sea is crystal clear and warm, it’s hot, and there is a turtle colony that leads to the odd interesting encounter. We’re just back from a snorkel on the reef. Because it’s a National Park there are small dinghy moorings to tie up to, so we tied up there and bobbed about in the current.. The water is spectacularly clear, but the effect of hurricanes (I’m told) has led to some degredation of the reef – it’s cool but not like the photos you see in National Geographic. The fish life however is vibrant. I’ll also never tire of that helicopter like effect you can get zooming underwater propelled by flippers, zooming over the ridges and valleys, scaring all the fish and sending the darting for cover.
So it’s been a fun day. There’s a giant cruise ship here called Club Med 2. It has about six masts and it hoists sails that look like jibs from them. As Greg observed, they’re just too short to be effective. We reckon they’re almost completely for show, and suspect there’s a couple of 10,000HP engines below decks quietly proving the propulsion. Still, as Greg again observed, looks good at night, and having an excuse to go really slow must be good for fuel economy!
From here we will, I guess tomorrow, head towards Grenada, with a stop at Petit Martinique as we need to buy some diesel. Perhaps a stop at Carriacou to clear out of St Vincent and the Grenadines and into Grenada. I was in Grenada in 2001, but since then it was – if you remember – absolutely SMASHED by a hurricane. I read about it in US sailing magazines (that’s how I normally get through the winter)
27 Jan 2008
So it’s been a fun day. There’s a giant cruise ship here called Club Med 2. It has about six masts and it hoists sails that look like jibs from them. As Greg observed, they’re just too short to be effective. We reckon they’re almost completely for show, and suspect there’s a couple of 10,000HP engines below decks quietly proving the propulsion. Still, as Greg again observed, looks good at night, and having an excuse to go really slow must be good for fuel economy!
From here we will, I guess tomorrow, head towards Grenada, with a stop at Petit Martinique as we need to buy some diesel. Perhaps a stop at Carriacou to clear out of St Vincent and the Grenadines and into Grenada. I was in Grenada in 2001, but since then it was – if you remember – absolutely SMASHED by a hurricane. I read about it in US sailing magazines (that’s how I normally get through the winter)
27 Jan 2008
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Bequia, St Vincent
We’re anchored in Bequia. It’s a beautiful night, with not a cloud in the sky and the most amazing array of stars spanning across the heavens. It’s also absolutely calm leaving the sea an oily black in the darkness. Quite unusual: I’m not sure I can think of such a calm night since we arrived in the Caribbean; it’s normally always windy.
So the last week has been eventful. While Kady was here we noticed that the batteries were not charging like they should – we had some charge, but not enough for our electricity charged lifestyles (you see, Club Bandit requires strobe lights, lasers and sound systems for dancing each night). It turns out our alternator had burned out and was just putting out a trickle of power. We sailed back to Kingstown, St Vincent as there was apparently and alternator expert there. I disconnected it, and hired Conway, a local do-everyting-mon, to haul me up to the high hills of St Vincent where the shop was. It worked out well as they were confident they could repair in within the day – great, without it we have no lights, refrigeration etc. and we were keen to get cracking.
Three days later it still wasn’t repaired. So, can you repair it? “no mon”
Turns out it needed parts from the US which were too much of a hassle to get.
So I called a few companies for advice, then jumped on a flight to Barbados which connected to Miami which connected to New York so I could pick up a new alternator and regulator. New York was great and I saw my mate Sylvain and his partner Therasa which is always fun and thought provoking (we discussed the electoral Primaries which I have struggled to follow) and I also saw my solid mate Henry and his sharp fiance Liz; it’s good to see your mates going off and is a champion. Anway, the new alternator is now installed and working well, and it has a nice little LED display that tells you it’s working and pumping out amps; all magic as far as I am concerned. It also explains nn what we’ve been doing for the last couple of weeks. The regulator I bought can control two alternators, so later we may reinstall the old one and we’ll be able to sell surplus power into the National Grid.
26 Jan 2008
So the last week has been eventful. While Kady was here we noticed that the batteries were not charging like they should – we had some charge, but not enough for our electricity charged lifestyles (you see, Club Bandit requires strobe lights, lasers and sound systems for dancing each night). It turns out our alternator had burned out and was just putting out a trickle of power. We sailed back to Kingstown, St Vincent as there was apparently and alternator expert there. I disconnected it, and hired Conway, a local do-everyting-mon, to haul me up to the high hills of St Vincent where the shop was. It worked out well as they were confident they could repair in within the day – great, without it we have no lights, refrigeration etc. and we were keen to get cracking.
Three days later it still wasn’t repaired. So, can you repair it? “no mon”
Turns out it needed parts from the US which were too much of a hassle to get.
So I called a few companies for advice, then jumped on a flight to Barbados which connected to Miami which connected to New York so I could pick up a new alternator and regulator. New York was great and I saw my mate Sylvain and his partner Therasa which is always fun and thought provoking (we discussed the electoral Primaries which I have struggled to follow) and I also saw my solid mate Henry and his sharp fiance Liz; it’s good to see your mates going off and is a champion. Anway, the new alternator is now installed and working well, and it has a nice little LED display that tells you it’s working and pumping out amps; all magic as far as I am concerned. It also explains nn what we’ve been doing for the last couple of weeks. The regulator I bought can control two alternators, so later we may reinstall the old one and we’ll be able to sell surplus power into the National Grid.
26 Jan 2008
Monday, January 21, 2008
Tobago Cays National Park
Kady has been here for the last week. She and I sailed from St Lucia to Bequia, Canouan, Mayreau, the Tobago Cays National Park, Mustique, then back to Bequia and to Young's Island, St Vincent. Spectacular week, more details of which will follow, but have a look at these pics meantime.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Wallilabou, St Vincent
My head hurts. This, courtesy of some rum punches at this little shack on Wililobhy, St Vincent. They taste like sour fruit juice, but we found later they’re made using original St Vincent ‘Real Strong Rum’. It’s 87.5% alcohol. Goodness me.
Still, the proprietor, an elderly Vincey, danced to the latest reggae hits and sang over the top or provided background vocals from a microphone he’s installed behind the bar, and it was real good and fun. Before we knew it, the place was pumping with dancing and laughing (lubricated, no doubt, by the RSR). The highlight however was the launch of a new music video that had been filmed in this bay (it was also where Pirates of the Caribbean was filmed) and we had an advanced copy to preview. It was by a local reggae gangsta called Bomani, and the song is called Shake Your Booty.
Now, many of you have probably heard something about this particular fascination. I had thought it was more of a South American thing, but I can assure you at this point that the Caribbean islanders do appreciate some good booty. Indeed – good gracious me! – they may be the most focused aficionados out there – stand aside Brazil – and the booty they like is voluminous, and being jiggled at an apparently random yet rapid pace and within a sort of circular motion provided by the hips. It’s harder than it looks, and requires coordination and physical fitness beyond that able to be achieved by Greg and I.
The chorus (remembering this is like trying to think through a good Maine fog) goes something like this:
Shake your booty, shake shake
Shake your booty, shake shake
Shake, shake, shake
So it’s not that difficult to learn.
Especially, being a new release, and as I mentioned, ahead of it’s musical release, we had to watch it a lot of times. I mean a lot of times. The prop was very proud that he’d managed to get a copy. At the start of the video there was a nasty, high volume beep – penetrating and excruciating – and each time it occurred we mirrored the owner’s comment “a necessary evil”.
Rum punching with us were some cheerful and funny Norwegians (another stereotype shattered). They were a poker club, that instead of gambling for money, seemed to gamble for mojo. Still, the money they would have lost they put into a kitty, and at the end of the – what do you call it? – poker season I suppose – they spent the money on a yacht charter in the Grenadines. The funny thing is the losing half have to do all the work and the winning half just chill out and demand another icy cold Hairoun. All good fun.
We have a VIP showing up this week – Kady in from London.
10 January 08 (running a bit behind given very poor access to the net)
Much later (in fact in a hotel room in Kuala Lumpur 30 Aug 08): this may link to it....
Still, the proprietor, an elderly Vincey, danced to the latest reggae hits and sang over the top or provided background vocals from a microphone he’s installed behind the bar, and it was real good and fun. Before we knew it, the place was pumping with dancing and laughing (lubricated, no doubt, by the RSR). The highlight however was the launch of a new music video that had been filmed in this bay (it was also where Pirates of the Caribbean was filmed) and we had an advanced copy to preview. It was by a local reggae gangsta called Bomani, and the song is called Shake Your Booty.
Now, many of you have probably heard something about this particular fascination. I had thought it was more of a South American thing, but I can assure you at this point that the Caribbean islanders do appreciate some good booty. Indeed – good gracious me! – they may be the most focused aficionados out there – stand aside Brazil – and the booty they like is voluminous, and being jiggled at an apparently random yet rapid pace and within a sort of circular motion provided by the hips. It’s harder than it looks, and requires coordination and physical fitness beyond that able to be achieved by Greg and I.
The chorus (remembering this is like trying to think through a good Maine fog) goes something like this:
Shake your booty, shake shake
Shake your booty, shake shake
Shake, shake, shake
So it’s not that difficult to learn.
Especially, being a new release, and as I mentioned, ahead of it’s musical release, we had to watch it a lot of times. I mean a lot of times. The prop was very proud that he’d managed to get a copy. At the start of the video there was a nasty, high volume beep – penetrating and excruciating – and each time it occurred we mirrored the owner’s comment “a necessary evil”.
Rum punching with us were some cheerful and funny Norwegians (another stereotype shattered). They were a poker club, that instead of gambling for money, seemed to gamble for mojo. Still, the money they would have lost they put into a kitty, and at the end of the – what do you call it? – poker season I suppose – they spent the money on a yacht charter in the Grenadines. The funny thing is the losing half have to do all the work and the winning half just chill out and demand another icy cold Hairoun. All good fun.
We have a VIP showing up this week – Kady in from London.
10 January 08 (running a bit behind given very poor access to the net)
Much later (in fact in a hotel room in Kuala Lumpur 30 Aug 08): this may link to it....
Monday, January 14, 2008
Wallilabou, St Vincent
Hiedi got away safely. She was great to have on the boat and I hope she comes back soon (thanks for the tremendous meal at Ladera mate!).
Greg was up early this morning (his astonished friends will understand the significance of this) so we could push off from Vieux Fort, St Lucia for the sail to St Vincent. Greg had an errand to do, and wanted to buy a couple of things at the 'super' market, so I took on the straightforward task of clearing us out of St Lucia with Customs & Immigration. To do so, Greg dropped me at the commercial container wharf and I scurried up a rusty ladder near the bow of a coastal freighter, and popped up next to a bunch of fellas killing time.
"Ten EC$ I watch your dinghy!"
"thanks man, it's okay, we're not leaving the dinghy here" (as Greg drives off towards the fishing pier)
"but you owe me EC$10 anyway because I watched it last time" (we'd never been here before).
"ya mon" (as I walk off)
(BTW, US$1 = 2.6 Eastern Caribbean Dollars, or EC)
The Customs people were very polite. I double checked that I could complete formalities here - ya mon! - as we needed to get an early start. After a small problem caused by failing to turn over the carbon copy paper* resulting in another half dozen forms to complete, it seemed I was done.
(*to younger readers = this is an inky filmy paper that, when put between two forms, makes an imprint on the lower form when you write on the upper form, causing a 'carbon copy' to be produced. It has nothing to do with the cc line on email, except naming rights. BCC - or Blind Carbon Copy - has never existed; even this wonder paper can't do brail).
"so we're good to go?"
"Ya mon! Customs finished. You just need to go to the airport to clear Immigration!"
Oh man.
The airport is about 40 minutes walk each way - say 10 min by car - or you can pay the extortionate fee of EC$54 for a taxi, or about US$40 for the return trip.
I wandered into town and sat on a wall. "Gidday mon!" The local St Lucians are great. If you're friendly, so are they (although Greg tells me he got a "HEY WHITE MAN GIVE ME FIVE EC!". I shudder to think of the reply). But by and large they are tremendous and spirited.
An old man that looked like a street beggar toking on a a giant splif came up to me, his eyes, like many people here, covered by cataracts from too much fishing without sunglasses:
"You American?" I said no, I'm from New Zealand.
"Enjoy it. We're happy to have you here! Enjoy our beautiful country"
And if you sit on the wall and go through the process you can work out stuff.
In the end I got a lift to the airport, and my attempt to hand over a fistful of EC for some petrol was enthusiastically refused.
Immigration was easy, although I wasn't able to sign Greg's name on the form but magically when she - the Immigration Officer - sent a text message to her friend and looked the other way, and when Greg had in the meantime mysteriously signed it, it was okay mon.
Then I got the local bus home. The music is better than the taxi's anyway, and everybody sings along and chats and plays around and wears great sunglasses ('Channel') and children are being breastfed, and when you want to get off you yell 'DROP ME HERE' and you'd better put your lungs into it. And when it was all done and dusted I was charged a solid $1.25 and it was ten very fun minutes.
And that was EC$.
Greg was at the dinghy with his shopping. He was excited because he had found frozen goat meat and wants to make a curry with it.
I'm not typically excited by goat (although it was good but boney in St Martin), but I wasn't excited by "Tuna Helper" either ('tuna helper!') and that was surprisingly good too; but as an aside Greg's improvised yesterday's roast lamb risotto with leek and zuchinni is simply stunning and could easily be sold to worldwide acclaim at Michelin starred restaurants everywhere.
In any case, we sailed out of Vieux Fort nearly three hours after we had planned. Fortunately we had a 20-25 knot deep reaching breeze and the boat was flat and fast, surfing down the big ocean swells and we made good time.
Unfortunately, and inconsistent with our recent experience, we got a little cocky and got licked in one of our 'us, no!, we're not racing you!' races. The key here is to look like you're lounging around not really paying attention when you're actually - ever so casually - trimming as carefully as you can and watching the instruments like a hawk. Our mistake was to take on a Leopard 47 catamaran. You see, these things are damn fast off the breeze, and this guy was smoking. He sailed past us with at the very least a knot up his sleeve - and we were surfing into the nines!
(I took a mental note. If you're going to show off about how fast you are, choose your opponents carefully.)
We even pulled in the fishing line, to gain 0.0001 knots.
It was not looking good.
We just couldn't catch him.
Until finally, he sailed into the LOT.
You see, we were rounding the northern end of St Vincent. We've rounded a lot of islands like this lately. They've very high. In St Vincent's case it's the Soufriere volcano that dominates the skyline at the northern end, and the chart suggests it's 1,200 meters high. And we were also sailing down the western side. These islands, all of them, are in the tradewinds, a consistently strong wind that is approximately easterly. So the breeze wraps around the top of the island, twisting south and accelerating, giving you a major boost, but you have to follow this flow at least a nautical mile offshore; cut inside that curve and you hit this absolutely windless area in the island's lee. We call this zone THE PARKING LOT. If you sail into it, the island blocks your breeze completely, and you simply stop dead, your sails flopping listlessly on an oily sea. We've done it enough times to know.
Sorry catamaran, tactical error. One more to Bandit.
(Lucky escape me thinks, damn catamarans with all that waterline length and those big roachy mainsails).
(But we would have KILLED him to windward)
We're now stearn tied to a coconut tree in Willoughly, St Vincent, about a boatlength from shore. Just as well: it's deep. Greg is excited as this is where Pirates of the Caribbean was filmed; the sets are still here.
I swam in to clear customs with our ship's documents and a T-shirt in our dry bag, but that story will have to wait for another day.
Tuesday, 8 January 08
Greg was up early this morning (his astonished friends will understand the significance of this) so we could push off from Vieux Fort, St Lucia for the sail to St Vincent. Greg had an errand to do, and wanted to buy a couple of things at the 'super' market, so I took on the straightforward task of clearing us out of St Lucia with Customs & Immigration. To do so, Greg dropped me at the commercial container wharf and I scurried up a rusty ladder near the bow of a coastal freighter, and popped up next to a bunch of fellas killing time.
"Ten EC$ I watch your dinghy!"
"thanks man, it's okay, we're not leaving the dinghy here" (as Greg drives off towards the fishing pier)
"but you owe me EC$10 anyway because I watched it last time" (we'd never been here before).
"ya mon" (as I walk off)
(BTW, US$1 = 2.6 Eastern Caribbean Dollars, or EC)
The Customs people were very polite. I double checked that I could complete formalities here - ya mon! - as we needed to get an early start. After a small problem caused by failing to turn over the carbon copy paper* resulting in another half dozen forms to complete, it seemed I was done.
(*to younger readers = this is an inky filmy paper that, when put between two forms, makes an imprint on the lower form when you write on the upper form, causing a 'carbon copy' to be produced. It has nothing to do with the cc line on email, except naming rights. BCC - or Blind Carbon Copy - has never existed; even this wonder paper can't do brail).
"so we're good to go?"
"Ya mon! Customs finished. You just need to go to the airport to clear Immigration!"
Oh man.
The airport is about 40 minutes walk each way - say 10 min by car - or you can pay the extortionate fee of EC$54 for a taxi, or about US$40 for the return trip.
I wandered into town and sat on a wall. "Gidday mon!" The local St Lucians are great. If you're friendly, so are they (although Greg tells me he got a "HEY WHITE MAN GIVE ME FIVE EC!". I shudder to think of the reply). But by and large they are tremendous and spirited.
An old man that looked like a street beggar toking on a a giant splif came up to me, his eyes, like many people here, covered by cataracts from too much fishing without sunglasses:
"You American?" I said no, I'm from New Zealand.
"Enjoy it. We're happy to have you here! Enjoy our beautiful country"
And if you sit on the wall and go through the process you can work out stuff.
In the end I got a lift to the airport, and my attempt to hand over a fistful of EC for some petrol was enthusiastically refused.
Immigration was easy, although I wasn't able to sign Greg's name on the form but magically when she - the Immigration Officer - sent a text message to her friend and looked the other way, and when Greg had in the meantime mysteriously signed it, it was okay mon.
Then I got the local bus home. The music is better than the taxi's anyway, and everybody sings along and chats and plays around and wears great sunglasses ('Channel') and children are being breastfed, and when you want to get off you yell 'DROP ME HERE' and you'd better put your lungs into it. And when it was all done and dusted I was charged a solid $1.25 and it was ten very fun minutes.
And that was EC$.
Greg was at the dinghy with his shopping. He was excited because he had found frozen goat meat and wants to make a curry with it.
I'm not typically excited by goat (although it was good but boney in St Martin), but I wasn't excited by "Tuna Helper" either ('tuna helper!') and that was surprisingly good too; but as an aside Greg's improvised yesterday's roast lamb risotto with leek and zuchinni is simply stunning and could easily be sold to worldwide acclaim at Michelin starred restaurants everywhere.
In any case, we sailed out of Vieux Fort nearly three hours after we had planned. Fortunately we had a 20-25 knot deep reaching breeze and the boat was flat and fast, surfing down the big ocean swells and we made good time.
Unfortunately, and inconsistent with our recent experience, we got a little cocky and got licked in one of our 'us, no!, we're not racing you!' races. The key here is to look like you're lounging around not really paying attention when you're actually - ever so casually - trimming as carefully as you can and watching the instruments like a hawk. Our mistake was to take on a Leopard 47 catamaran. You see, these things are damn fast off the breeze, and this guy was smoking. He sailed past us with at the very least a knot up his sleeve - and we were surfing into the nines!
(I took a mental note. If you're going to show off about how fast you are, choose your opponents carefully.)
We even pulled in the fishing line, to gain 0.0001 knots.
It was not looking good.
We just couldn't catch him.
Until finally, he sailed into the LOT.
You see, we were rounding the northern end of St Vincent. We've rounded a lot of islands like this lately. They've very high. In St Vincent's case it's the Soufriere volcano that dominates the skyline at the northern end, and the chart suggests it's 1,200 meters high. And we were also sailing down the western side. These islands, all of them, are in the tradewinds, a consistently strong wind that is approximately easterly. So the breeze wraps around the top of the island, twisting south and accelerating, giving you a major boost, but you have to follow this flow at least a nautical mile offshore; cut inside that curve and you hit this absolutely windless area in the island's lee. We call this zone THE PARKING LOT. If you sail into it, the island blocks your breeze completely, and you simply stop dead, your sails flopping listlessly on an oily sea. We've done it enough times to know.
Sorry catamaran, tactical error. One more to Bandit.
(Lucky escape me thinks, damn catamarans with all that waterline length and those big roachy mainsails).
(But we would have KILLED him to windward)
We're now stearn tied to a coconut tree in Willoughly, St Vincent, about a boatlength from shore. Just as well: it's deep. Greg is excited as this is where Pirates of the Caribbean was filmed; the sets are still here.
I swam in to clear customs with our ship's documents and a T-shirt in our dry bag, but that story will have to wait for another day.
Tuesday, 8 January 08
Sunday, January 6, 2008
The Pitons, St Lucia 13°49.48N, 061°03.84W
Here is a cool photo that shows the yacht anchorage between the Pitons. I don't have a wide enough angle lens to capture both Petit Piton and Grose Piton, but you can see how spectacular it is. Greg and Heidi spent a couple of nights at the Ladera. This photo is from their balcony. The hotel's logo is 'view with a room' and you can see why!
Heidi leaves today, back to New York City - she's been great to have on board as usual.
If you're wondering, St Lucia has more Nobel Laureates per capita than any other nation.
GDP is around US$6,000 per person (for comparison, in the US it's about $40,000)
It is part of the Commonwealth, so Queen Elizabeth II is technically the Head of State as she is in New Zealand too.
6 Jan 08
Friday, January 4, 2008
The Pitons, St Lucia 13°49.48N, 061°03.84W
In a scene certain to have the world's gossip magazine editors all a tizzy, both megalomaniac Tom's (Perkins and Buchanan) had their magnificent yachts anchored off St Lucia's Pitons at the same time.
Perkins had his 294' megayacht Maltese Falcon anchored in the northern end, while Buchanan had his 43' gigayacht Bandit nearer the beach.
In the first photo, Bandit dominates the horizon with her imposing and stylish shape. Observant readers with keen eyesight (click to enlarge the photo) may just be able to make out Perkins boat somewhere in the background (clue: it's a bit to the left).
For the sake of journalistic balance, here's another photo of Maltese Falcon.
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