Caught by the Roots
Irie
Mon 3 Mar 2008 00:40
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Position 15 17.20N 61 22.68W Roseau Dominica
Sunday 2nd March
Les Saintes continued to impress. There are numerous
little anchorages in the group of islands, providing means of escape from
the (slightly) busy metropolis of Bourg Les Saintes, and also giving more
shelter from the swell than the main anchorage, especially when the wind is
well north of east. Friday we had an excellent dinner ashore in a
little balconied, upstairs restaurant that also posed as an art gallery.
The menu was mainly fish, with an Asian / Caribbean fusion of
tastes and flavours matched by the esoteric surroundings of the
'objets' for sale. Saturday, Irie decamped to a lovely spot off Ile Cabrit where
we'd previously snorkelled from the dinghy. The water is crystal clear, and the
same underwater cast of creatures waited to entertain the visiting swimmers,
augmented this time by some unusual, large stripey blue tangs. Back on the boat
there was little wind and no swell for the first time in a while; the
sun settled calmly behind a silhouetted hill, as the distant lighthouse at
Pointe du Vieux Forte pricked the deepening dark - two then one flashes
every ten seconds, and one by one the stars fell from their casket to the
velvet backdrop of night, or so it seemed after a final
tincture.
Today the wind is more moderate than for a week or so,
averaging fifteen knots or so on the reach to Dominica with a burst to twenty
five on the edge of rain. It's less than twenty miles of open sea and Irie eats
them up, driving across the long swell in an easy motion. Under the island , the
breeze dies and the speed drops to three or four knots on the fifteen miles down
the coast - still there's no rush as the plan is to arrive at the anchorage
late, remain on the boat, then leave early for St Lucia, taking
advantage of the weather and avoiding all the paperwork in Dominica and
Martinique. Dominica, though extremely beautiful, is one of the poorest of
the islands and can prove tricky as from time to time security can be a problem.
A little local knowledge can help, so a call to Roots, picked from the pilot
guide secured the promise of a mooring, and he said he'd meet us off the town.
On the way in, a little boat buzzed up offering to look after us 'Are you
Roots?', ,'No I'm Pancho, Roots doesn't do boats anymore', 'Well I spoke to him
on the phone only ten minutes ago', 'Oh - perhaps that's him in the grey boat
over there.' Two hundred yards away was an aged grey boat with a aged grey
outboard and Roots, hanging on to our potential mooring, and in five minutes
Irie was secure. After a few adverts for the island, a list of his services
backed by forty years experience, then some mild rubbishing of Pancho, and
he was gone. It's another peaceful evening, little breeze, no swell, a distant
cacophony of dogs and cockerels, and overall the faint smell of sulphur drifting
down from the cloud - caped mountain behind.
Dominica on the port bow
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