Hi all,

Thought I’d reverse our recent trend and do a relatively up to data blog re St Helena, located in the middle of the South Atlantic, which quite clearly is a British Island (um along the lines of Gibraltar maybe)

Anyway firstly it was a quite eventful trip from Cape Town, leaving on a bright sunny Tuesday afternoon following a great stay as described in our last blog – and we still didn’t manage to get to the top of table mountain, so a great reason to get back there some day!!

No long after setting off weather started to cool down, back to the level of requiring T-shirts on the overnight shifts – are we spoilt? Not sure if it was the extended Christmas break or some mid-life event, but I really felt quite chilled and completely relaxed with the world, so decided we’d have a gentle sail/trip to St Helena, and that’s exactly what is was – whilst we didn’t always have wind we didn’t motor until we were doing less than circa 4.5 kts (rather than the usual 5.5kt lower limit) and equally even though there were other Oysters not too far in front the competitive me was clearly still on holiday (um even though we ended up beating Pearl of Persia into St Helana, but mainly be having diferent sailing plans rather than racing).

So on the way there were a number of significant events. Firstly we crossed the line of longitude corresponding to Ipswich from where Babe was officially launched back in Oct 2011, hence a splendid reason for a bottle of bubbly. Not long after that we crossed the meridian line – this time celebrated with a bucks fizz breakfast – all very civilised! The only real challenge was to try to break our Atlantic fishing catching virginity (um does that phrase work?), but the only thing we managed to ‘catch’ was a flying fish that decided to sacrifice its days by flying  onto Babe, yummy!?* The other event on the way was the passing of RMS St Helena – got a radio call asking if we minded if they can close to our stern so the passengers could give us a wave – yea no problem, although did make us think how isolated the St Helenan’s must be to want to buzz us!

After slowing down even more to make landfall in the daytime we came across St Helena at first light on a dismal typical UK type overcast day! Anchoring onto a large mooring bouy/disc just outside Jamestown. From first impressions St Helena reminded us of La Gomera in the Canaries, with a very similar volcanic formation. As it happened it was even more similar as St Helena, just like La Gomera has a lush green interior that you can’t really see from the sea!

First duties to sort clearance, for which we were boarded by very nice people from immigration, customs and health – all very painless! Getting ashore involved hailing a water taxi as the harbour side was fairly swelly - £1.2 a run (yep currently is in £, even though they have their own notes, which is amasing for an island with only 4,000 inhabitants). First stop was the yacht club/tourist place on the way to the town centre. Booking a day island our – essential.

In town – just like stepping back into the 50’s (not that I have any recollection of that of course, only visions from that Yorkshire police series on Sundays with that guy out of Eastenders in it and Greengrass), anyway high street with very old style shops, small supermarkets that were just like corner shops (and with little stock, no eggs or fresh vegetables, so no provisioning here then, just as well we stocked up fully in Cape Town). What made it more British was that there were about 3 ‘pubs’ in town (in addition to the yacht club on the harbour side) um well not really pubs, even in a 50’s sense, more like houses that sole ale! Still there was a hotel where the other Oyster lot had gathered and commandeered as a base for socialising, lunch and the like, so after first going to the bank (another 50’s affair) was time for a relaxing beer at the hotel and to catch-up on comms – what a joke, no cellular coverage, only a couple of public telephones (vouchers required) and only 2 places with WiFi. Of course with circa 12 Oyster folk all trying to access WiFi in the hotel screen updates were like watching paint dry – for £6 per hour!!

Had a great evening though, luckily we managed to book a table in a ‘training restaurant’, which apparently is known as the best place to eat on the island – although that’s not hard – to eat anywhere you need a reservation and in most places you even have to select from the menu at the time of booking, not to mention that most places are also full at the weekend, which it was! The restaurant had also been booked by Geoff and Sue off Spent, so ended up being a combined table and with BYO wine flowing with good food was a great start to the evening….followed by a walk down to the (only) local sea front night-club, an outside venue with a broad mix of locals. Met up with the others from the other Oysters in St Helena there and within a few minutes managed to get the dancing off to a great start – freaky moves fitting in well with the locals!!

Next day did a tour of the island (head hurting from the night before) – it appears that this it the island where Napoleon was ‘imprisoned’ by the British and spent his final years before expiring in his 40’s! so most of the tour centred around his stay here – his ‘house’ near the town and his other Gaff on the top of a hill where he eventually died. Both made into little museums! Didn’t manage to get to see his grave as the road was closed for repairs, although did get to see where they were building what will be the island new airport, capable of taking 747/A380 planes! Um even a single plane load of passengers would completely overwhelm the island. Anyway a good day trip. One of the highlights )?) of the island is the 999 steps leading from Jamestown to the village at the top of the adjacent headland – a significant incline. It appears the record for ascent is ‘a little over 5 minutes’, although for most it takes 20 odd minutes, not that we bothered. For the adventurous (although even I resisted)the best way to go down is to sit on one rail and put your feet on the other rail and slide down – risky!

The other main attraction at this time of the year is whale sharks, for which the harbour was certainly had a few almost basking about 1/2 mile off shore. We hire a boat to find them on the Sunday, but of course when you plan things they don’t happen. Fortunately Nelius had a run on a tender with Mario and Marcus from Pandemonium and actually managed to swim with them, like holding onto them!

So that’s about it for St Helena, wow what a long blog for only a 3 day stay! Next leg is from here to Salvador in Brazil some 1960nm away making the trip from Cape Town to Brazil the longest of the rally (actually I’m writing this whilst on my morning shift about 8 miles out of Salvador, which is clearly visible in front)

OK will sign-off now and get sorted for entering Salvador. Take care all and hopefully next update in a week or so.

Luv & hugs,

Paul & Trish

Photo’s:

a)      Babe Crossing the ‘round the world’ longitude

b)      Bucks fiz breakfast after passing the meridian line

c)       Desperate for a catch and fish supper

d)      RMS St Helena – the only remaining postal ship service

e)      St Helena – La Gomera looking with UK type weather

f)       No it really is like stepping back in time!

g)      Trish chilling in the hotel

h)      A beer for me please whilst catching up with emails

i)        Like you could get lost

j)        Gaff where Napoleon lived and died

k)      Stairway to Heaven – well maybe not quite

l)        But what a decent

m)    Nelius and the Whale Sharks