PART 1, Carriacou and Tobago, 15 July to 6 August 2018
Carriacou and Tobago 15 July to 6 August 2018 Crew: Ken Robertson, Jenny Thomas Sunday 15 July: Grenada to Tyrell Bay, Carriacou 38 miles, 8.25 hours, 2.6 engine hours, 4.6 knots average speed. Total miles since leaving Falmouth in August 2016: 11109 Carriacou, although an interesting, picturesque, friendly island, didn’t hold the best memories for us as it was where, in 2017, our engine first failed. So there were two reasons to re-visit. The first being to explore the island further than its engineers and secondly to obtain a better wind angle for our forthcoming passage to Tobago. So we headed North from Grenada to Carriacou, in order to head South to Tobago!
We anchored in Tyrell Bay, the largest and most popular bay for yachties as customs and immigration are located here.
Fuel pontoon and Customs and Immigration Buses take you all around the island for very little cost so, with Steve and Dee from La Mischief, we caught the bus to Windward, on the NE coast. There wasn’t a great deal going on here, but some spectacular views across the reefs. Fishing boats are built in Windward, but there was little activity in the sheds and surprisingly no bars or restaurants.
Having had a short stroll, taken some snaps, we were soon on the bus heading back to Hillsborough, another buzzing little town, for lunch. Chicken roti was the order of the day – a ‘wrap’ filled with chicken, potatoes and vegetables in a delicious curry sauce. This was the first one, however, we’d had with bones in – an unexpected surprise at first bite! Delicious all the same but note to self – order next roti without bones even if it costs more! (We discovered later in Tobago that goat roti also comes with bones - some venders are willing to de-bone, some are not so keen!).
Hillsborough lunch stop We asked the bus driver to drop us at Paradise beach so we could swim and then walk the remaining distance back to Tyrell Bay.
Drink and swim at ‘Off The Hook’ Back in Tyrell Bay we stopped at The Lazy Turtle and gave Jeff and Sandra, catamaran Nawii (whom we’d previously met in Grenada) a call on the radio to come and meet us for sundowners.
View from The Lazy Turtle. A good weather window to sail the 122 miles to Tobago was forecast for the following day, so it was just a fleeting visit to Carriacou. We knew the passage was going to be difficult, even at the best of times - one with a tight wind angle plus choppy seas due to a shelf we would need to cross where deep water meets shallow water. Plus we would have a strong current against us for part of the trip. The forecast was showing some North in the normal Easterly trades, which would help our sailing. We checked out with customs and immigration and planned to leave mid afternoon having refuelled, for an overnight crossing that would get us to Tobago during office hours the following day, to avoid a steep overtime charge by customs and immigration. Our departure was delayed by at least an hour as the fuel pump nozzle fell off mid-stream spraying diesel all over Ken, myself and Lady Rebel’s clean decks! The welder assigned to mend the pump didn’t grasp our urgency to depart, but we have learned you can’t rush the Caribbeans!! Finally we were on our way. La Mischief and Nawii had already departed and chatting on the VHF radio warned us of the, as predicted, choppy seas, 2 knots of current against and a very close angle to the wind. It wasn’t the most comfortable trip, as expected, and is in fact why Tobago is rarely visited by cruisers. With engine assistance we arrived just before customs and immigration closed for the day. Within a very short space of time, Tobago was one of our most favourite islands, if not the favourite! We were so pleased we heeded the advice to visit, from Peter and Celina, Tobagonian locals we’d met back in Union Island. The anchorage in Charlotteville was stunning, the people couldn’t have been more welcoming. We were flagged down by a fisherman, boat (pirogue) name ‘Expect De Unexpected’ to give him a lift from his boat to shore. We diplomatically asked him if we should lock our dinghy as we’d heard crime was high. With great pride he said ‘dere’s no tievin ‘ere mon’. The customs officer also confirmed they were clamping down on theft to encourage tourists to visit. The minute we stepped ashore we felt safe as houses.
Charlotteville Anchorage
Thursday night is Castara’s beach bbq and bonfire night. Road Runner drove the six of us the forty-five minutes to Castara along the very scenic coastal route, where we ate, drank and danced the night away.
Tobago has spectacular diving so it was a good opportunity to practice our diving skills. We did four dives in total with an excellent dive company – ‘Tobago Dive Experience’, who looked after us well. Turtles, Eagle Rays, Moray Eels, sea spiders, a huge variety of fish and the largest brain coral recorded in the World! One of our dives was a lionfish hunt off Sister’s Rocks, half a mile offshore. Lionfish are very invasive and feed on reef fish, but they themselves have no natural predators so are spreading like wild fire. The dive-masters speared at least a dozen which we enjoyed on the bbq that evening aboard La Mishchief, in the company of Nawii also.
Sister’s Rocks Filleting the Lionfish
It was time for Ken and I to dive on our own, without the guidance of an instructor or dive master. Steve and Dee kindly leant us their tanks and weights (we have our own BCDs, regulators etc.) and we dove off the back of La Mischief. I was very unnerved as didn’t have a compass or dive watch so felt disorientated not knowing exactly where we were, the direction in which we were heading and the time we’d been diving. It was a very shallow dive so no need for a decompression stop and we had an air gauge, plus Ken has a compass so we were fine. I would just feel happier with a dive computer and compass of my own! They have been added to the shopping list!!
The walk from Charlotteville to Pirates Beach was beautiful, collecting an abundance of fallen mangos along the way. The walk to Fort Cambleton to burn off an enormous lunch at Suckhole restaurant proved to be worthwhile with its spectacular views across Charlotteville. We went in search of a waterfall, no joy, so settled for a quick snorkel around Booby’s rock on the way back in the dinghy.
In between our diving, snorkelling, walking, sightseeing and socialising we tried to keep on top of boat maintenance, primarily fixing the fridge and freezer; an ongoing process! The next anchorage we visited was beautiful Englishman’s Bay, with dolphins accompanying us part of the way.
Englishman’s Bay Finally down to Store Bay on the South West of the Island, catching a small, but tasty King Mackerel on route.
To be continued ………. |
