12:38.0N 61:21.42W

 

Well we  cleared out of St Lucia at least for a month anyway. We had a lovely time in Rodney Bay met some great people on the anchorage there and Jambe de Bois  on pigeon island,was the most atmospheric (and cheap) bar we found yet on the islands...great cocktails and Rotis. We spent a week with Robin and June who came to visit with a ton of chocolate!!!! yesss!!! and other goodies that are too expensive to buy out here like good cheese and good wine....take note future guests. The water maker saga is over too and we can produce water when we like slowly but at last quietly.

 

In a futile attempt to justify this trip educationally I thought we would outline some of the things we are learning in the island for our learning passports.....(Topointers will get that)

1)there are a lot of places called Soufriere..... it means Sulphur in the air!!! Im not kidding, down at the amazing pitons where we have a spent a lot of time you can smell it. The volcano on St Vincent is also called Soufriere ....think they need a marketing person onto it! To be fair the volcano on St Vincent is much much bigger than St Lucias (in height anyway) so maybe Soufiuere Biggiere?? (thats why I dont work in Marketing) We went to the drive in Volcano on St Lucia....imagine an undeveloped  building site smelling of v v bad eggs making you want to vomit ....thats about it  really but you have to do the tourist trip sometimes..I am waiting for “the petford wives” to arrive to climb Soufiere on St Vincent as Kirsty has ruled that out! (The word ‘climb’  being the big issue not the “Sulphur in the Air”)

 

 

2) anything a rasta on a boat wants to sell you that you are not sure about buying, suddenly becomes definitely “good for the mon” eg...make him strong in da trouser department. This goes from strange odd tasting fruit, to dodgy cocoa powder, to poisonous apples on trees, to strange smelling tobacco. The local men here obviously have it easy, it seems they have so many things “good for the mon”. We did ask one rasta what was good for the woman....he said a bottle of Campari!!!!

What was interesting was that that particular rasta rocked up at breakfast so we got him to try a thick splodge of marmite on a small piece of bread. He looked very suspicious at first till we told him ... “ its good for the mon” !!! he quickly ate it and needless to say he wasn't impressed but took it in good spirit!!!

 

 

 

3) just like home the wind is always on your nose. Because of the current just small windshifts to the north or south can make life uncomfortable and when we go north they shift to the north... and vice versa...Im calling it the Lee and Kirsty Phenomena. Other yachties are now using us a way to work out where to sail...ie not in the same direction as we are going.

 

 

4) there are 1000 good drinks to be made from Rum..... Rum being the cheapest drink on the islands it makes sense to experiment. Our latest is the Bequia Bounty (which we named after our favourite island and chocolate bar) 2 parts rum 1 part kahlua then add thick coconut milk to taste and sprinkle with chocolate shavings (we used galaxy) see below (I’m sure it wasnt that blurred before drinking it)

 

5)Let us here in lesson 5 quash the stereotype of the French not being able to park or anchor a yacht. It is NOT a stereotype its true. Admittedly most of the charter yachts around are French making the death toll due to French incompetence artificially higher than it would normally be for other nationalities, but after nearly being reversed onto by a French liveaboard the other day, and seeing daily incidents of French boats in near or full on collisions with other anchored vessels(including our friends)  ....they get the wooden windlass award for bad anchoring everytime.  (Phillipe after your expert anchoring with Jaff, you know better ...please have words with your countrymen back home!!!)

 

So anyway lesson over we set sail from St Luica and arrived bashed about but back in  our own shangri la....Bequia....we still havent found a place like it it is developed enough to enable a long stay, has some great eateries and bars and beautiful scenery, good snorkelling and the people are lovely.

 

 

 

Hope it stays that way. After a pit stop we headed  to Mayreau and anchored in an amazing bay called Salt Whistle Bay after another tough sail with a crescent moon beach separating us from the Atlantic ocean. But that was just a warm up for the magnificent tobago cays where we currently are. The photo below doesnt do it justice so ive added one off the internet(in case you thought we’d leaned to fly!) We just came back from a swim looking for turtles and I managed to video about 10 in 20 minutes. Amazing. We will stay here for a few nights being waited on by the boat boys

 

 

 

 

Tobago Cays from above

 

Sunrise in Tobago Cays this morning

 

 

 

So life continues we head further and further south to meet Graham and Sharon and then plough north again to meet the Petfords before turning back south to meet Cara and Jaff and take the boat to Trinidad.

 

 

Our flights home are on the 21st may...see you all then hopefully.

 

Lee and Kirsty.