Is nothing sacred!
Oriole
Mon 30 Jan 2012 15:35
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Falmouth Harbour,
Antigua
17:01.07N 61:46.28W
We sailed back into Falmouth Harbour after a week
away to the north. On Tuesday we had sailed up to Barbuda and anchored at
the north end of the Eleven Mile Beach. The nearest other yacht was nearly
a mile away and there were only a handful of yachts up there. We have
described this island gem before being one of the secrets of the Caribbean,
relatively isolated 20-30 miles north of Antigua and in the winter prone to
uncomfortable or even dangerous swells. There were one or two people on
the beach when we walked for miles but that did not prevent a little skinny
dipping when we needed to cool off. There is one hotel on the beach and we
have often wondered how it survives but now the bulldozers have arrived to
prepare the ground for a large development opposite our favoured
anchorage. No doubt this will herald the arrival of waterskiers, jet skis
and all the other paraphenalia of civilisation. The only hope is that it
will not get off the ground. Servicing such a development will be
difficult and costly as all supplies have to be ferried by small plane
or boat from Antigua, but there appears to be lots of money swilling
around.
 Sunset over St Kitts (over 50 miles
from Barbuda)
 Nothing is sacred and the bulldozers
are behind the shoreline.
After our sail north in idyllic
conditions with light winds and sea the wind came back with a vengeance and
we had a fast and furious beam reach back to Antigua on Friday in time to see
the entrants for the Superyacht Challange going round their leeward
turning mark in their first race. On Saturday and Sunday we
watched these enormous yachts being flung around like dinghies from the starting
platform up on the cliffs from where you can see the whole course. There
was lots of wind and an appropriate sea to go with it and at least one spinnaker
blown out (tens of thousands of dollars) - all quite a
spectacle.
 Overall winner of the Antigua
Superyacht Challenge - Rebecca 138 feet.
 Adela (144 ft schooner)
chases Drumfire (80 feet sloop) to the finish and just
wins.
 In the distance they look just like
model yachts.
We plan to start a slow cruise south calling at our
favourite places towards the end of the week. At the moment there is a
large pressure gradient driving strong trade winds from the north east with big
seas, and if that is what we get then we will have some fast sailing.
If a lull is forecast we might wait a while! There is some debate on
Oriole over whether we will wait to see the first match of
the Six Nations Rugby (England versus Scotland)
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