St.Barthelemy - the Easter witch at a pirate island
Regina
Espen Aalstad
Wed 26 Mar 2008 02:06
|
17:55.5N 62:52.8W
Leaving St. Kitts we were too optimistic heading
for Saba where the swell was still too strong on this round,
steeep island. Too bad as the teenagers had long planned to dive here in
the underwater rocks.
So like the old pirates, we made the
deviation East to St. Barths, though not for spending money or digging
treasures like the old pirates and smugglers.
A long afternoon at sea as the swell and waves were
now in all directions for our 40 nm leg. Fortunately we had full moon
coming into Gustavia on the West coast, where lot's of boats were
'hiding' here from the swell at anchor - many without anchor lights! No
problem for our calm skipper and we soon where at rest under
Fort Carl and Fort Oscar.
The Swedes once ruled here
having traded it from the French for their free access to Gothenburg.
Swedish flags still fly. in places...and there is no tax!
Today St. Barths is an island for the rich and
famous with designer stores and mega yachts. We have not seen as
huge yachts in one place.
The large swell had actually closed the inner
harbour and hence all the boats outside for anchor. We also met others who
had been asked to leave the close by St. Martin's
bays.
We seem to have made a smart choice heading for St.
Kitts.
We skipped the cafes and boutiques and found a nice
little bay a few miles further north: Anse Colombier. Everybody was delighted to
finally spend some hours at a nice beach again. Studying the mega yacht's
passengers beach life close up was great entertainment. It gives us no desire to
change lifestyle with some of them: multiple dinghies back and forth to the
beach, chairs and sun shades up and down, coolers and fresh
towels back and forth - all in an hour. Poor crew.
Our soggy towels and body surfing was a sharp
contrast....
Expectations have been building on board for Easter
eggs...from visitors bringing Easter goodies and the boy's wanting 'just like
home'. We have seen little here to remind us of Easter around. Great
relief when the Easter witch from Bloksberg found Regina, even the egg
looked like at home!
Our provisioning has been more
difficult in St. Kitts, so we have had to do without a nice Easter Sunday
dinner. Nobody seemed to notice...
We now head north for Anguilla maybe stopping off
on St. Martin's East coast if the swell allow.
|