St George’s is a bustling town with lots of small shops and street vendors.  There is a large natural harbour called the Carenage (see below) where fishing boats and ferries tie up and a ‘lagoon’ with a couple of marinas inside, these waterways are separated by a large commercial dock.  Luckily there is a reasonable anchorage just outside although the holding is very poor.  We spent a few nights there as it is close to all the amenities such as chandlery and supermarket, and after the first night we discovered we were dragging our anchor and as we had boats close behind us we decided we would search out another spot.  After three unsuccessful attempts to get a bite we finally semi-secured ourselves on the outside of all the yachts and put extra scope out for good measure.  The swimming was reasonable, clear enough to see the bottom in 7 metres of water but rather choppy on the surface.

The fort at the top of the hill overlooking the town was really not worth the hot walk or EC$5 each entrance fee.  It is more of a pile of rubble with a few canons, with more modern (I use that term loosely) buildings added which are also either derelict or in a bad state of repair and being used for other purposes – a gym was in one.  It took all of 5 minutes to look around, not at the fort as there is so little left, but at the views back over to the town and the anchorage.

Red sky at night – barns on fire!

We noticed that night that the watermaker salinity warning was flashing, so decided to do a full clean of the system and change the filters but unfortunately this did not resolve the problem.  The pump was taken apart and appeared fine, but a test on its output revealed it was only delivering 245 litres per hour to the system instead of 600 so we knew we had a problem.  The chandlery didn’t have a pump anywhere near the spec we need, so Aquabase the maker put us in touch with an agent in Martinique.

On the plus side though, we found a small liquor shop selling cheaper beer than the supermarkets, although it is still nearly twice the price than St Martin for Carib, the locally brewed beer. Food prices are generally high here as most things are imported, although the fruit and veg at the market or street vendors is quite a bit cheaper than at home, the bananas and mango are excellent.  I tried out cooking plantain with our fish, pan fried in butter (ok, not so healthy) it was like having dinner and desert all in one.

Whilst waiting for the watermaker agent to get back to us, we decided to head around to Clarkes Court Bay on the south side of the island, it rained all afternoon so the waterproofs got dusted off and we were rather soggy when we arrived late afternoon.  Again another plus, we caught dinner on the way, actually we hooked three but the first got stolen by a Grenadian thief (at least something with a big mouth and sharp teeth) and the second got away. Third time lucky hauled in a Spanish Mackerel, my favourite.

Only half the fish he used to be….

Now the big decision of the day, batter or breadcrumbs?