Grande Anse to St Anne's

Salamander
Wed 19 Apr 2017 14:24

Now in Grand Anse with its many beach bars and restaurants. Large turtles are everywhere and Murray had to dodge round them while returning to Salamander in the tender.

On another subject, due to the exotic nature of Murray's pants today, Caroline felt obliged to have a laundry session with a plea to Helen and Julie to stop any dodgy underpant Christmas buys.


A brief stop at Petit Anse, no turtles, but lots of eels, each bay specialises in something different. Then on the way to Marin a mother and baby humpback whale spotted at diamond rock was our first whale sighting for months. Our final stop in Martinique was St Anne's with a walk up the shrine trail.

We anchored 0.2 of a nautical mile away from a Belgian boat, but the lady was shouting 'too close, too close'. Later we went on deck and she was yelling at us to go back, without specifying where to, then they photographed us putting up our spray hood, while having foam over the lower face, but we weren't sure if it was the man or woman. All most strange, but Pap3 from Bruxelles is a boat to avoid if we see her at anchor again.

The only other incidents in Martinique happened in St Pierre. This time it was a pair of Dreamyacht Charters boats, one of whom made no effort to stop heading to collide with us when their anchor was dragging. It took Caroline shouting and Murray telling them to start the engine (response – 'the skipper is on his way'!!) to get them to do anything. After they had re-anchored, just before midnight the other Dreamyacht decided to move the dive boat they were using. Originally attempting to anchor too close to us, they eventually decided to tie to a mooring buoy. After half an hour of yelling from the dive boat to the tender accompanying and an unbelievably low level of motor skills (may have been due to rum?) they eventually managed to get the boat on the locally owned buoy. Regrettably the Caribbean is full of charter boats with no respect for liveaboard cruisers and limited sailing skills, so some conflict is probably inevitable. We now try to anchor away from any charter boat.


Apart from these minor incidents Martinique has been all pleasure, from the wrecks of St Pierre, climbing Mont Pelee, pink legged tarantulas, sea slugs, large turtles and a mother and baby whale, with probably the best charcuterie we have ever had.


Caroline finally got her hands on the underwater camera and took her first ever underwater picmuz snorkelling