St Lucia – Rodney Bay

Spectra
Paul & Norma Russell
Sun 18 Jan 2015 14:57

St Lucia – Rodney Bay

14:04.431N 60:56.93W

18th January 2015

5520 Miles from Ramsgate by log.

 

            We have now had one complete day without rain which is a first in several weeks. The trip up to Rodney bay was a pretty uneventful 10 miles of which we  managed about 6 under sail before the constant wind shifts became too much of a pain and we switched the donkey on, 5 to 25 knots and shifting through over 100 degrees constantly. But before I continue here are the missing pictures from the last blog.

 

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Marigot bay after a rain shower

 

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Same scene as the sun went down

 

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Marigot bay harbour office and customs building just before a rain shower

 

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Norma gets all arty at the table in JDs, Marigot bay

 

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The path to the toilets at JD’s through the mangrove swamp

 

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The Pitons pass by as we approach St Lucia

 

Rodney bay itself is now a very well run marina that is still well stocked with ARC boats all flying their flags and has no facility for anchoring in the lagoon so it was onto a pontoon for us. Getting onto the pontoon was rather complicated by a local man in a floating bush covered in the flags of all nations who repeatedly tried to get between us and the pontoon in order to sell us fruit as we made our final approach, finally I told him to bugger off and come back later to which he smiled and said, “no problem boss keep it real” I suspect he had been smoking some of his personal jungle, (see pics).

 

 

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Somewhere in there is a driver

 

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And he goes on his merry way having caused chaos on the pontoons.

 

    We have rather enjoyed being on a pontoon for a few days, the first time tied up since Grenada, and have made the most of it by getting a few jobs done on the boat. The water maker is working again after clearing a faulty valve on the output. It had been indicating 50 litres an hour of good water produced but nothing was coming out! I suspect that the slight blockage in the valve had caused back pressure which made the machine dump the fresh water over the side with the brine, oh well all working now. I have made up a new bridle for our sea anchor which now only needs a good test in storm conditions (joke), If that stays in the locker for the next ten years I will be a happy bunny. My bow roller now rolls which Is a novelty and we have a new kill switch for the outboard.  I also replaced the bungee cord on the main preventer and on the deck sails which were looking rather tatty, while this was going on our empty gas bottles were being filled (with propane regardless of what it says on the bottle, this is the Caribbean after all) which gives us four large and one small gas bottle all topped up. The sail maker could not fix our spinnaker storage bag in time and so I will sew that myself as we go along and our engine battery charger is sitting on another technicians bench (number 3) so we will see what happens there. I did take it to the on site electrical repair shop but the conversation with the sleepy girl who was busy doing her nails, at the reception desk went a bit like this.

“Hi, I have a problem with this battery charger, a technician in Grenada has identified the broken parts but he couldn’t get them delivered in time before we departed, could you have a look at it?”

“Ooh, we probably couldn’t get the parts either” … back to the nails.

Could you look at it and tell me?”

“Well probably, but when do you want it” ….. looking up briefly from the nails.

“Monday?” this was on Thursday.

“Well I don’t know maybe Tuesday would be good”…fully focused on the nails now

“No, I leave on Monday, do you want to know what parts you would need so that you could check?”

“Probably, but I don’t think we could get them” …. Looking at the nails from arms length

“I tell you what I don’t think I will bother, I’ll try somewhere else”

“Ok, you have a nice day then” … nails looking good another satisfied customer leaves the store.

………………..Bloody hell it is hard work to just give money away sometimes!

After that little exchange Norma had to give me an emergency shot of beer to get the blood pressure down and I then found a computer repair shop right under the customs building. The man in there was not only keen but he was actually interested in doing the job and so my battery charger is in pieces spread across his bench, chair and parts of the workshop floor the last time I checked. He assures me it will be done by Monday morning and I am brimming with faith.

  While I was pottering about doing boaty bits Norma reorganised the nest, most of the boats contents were pulled out, rearranged, cleaned and put back away again, leaving Spectra a very refreshed and clean girl indeed.

With all of the immediate tasks completed, yesterday was a down day and so Steve took a walk up to the fort on the hill at the entrance to the bay and sampled some of the local produce (Rum) in the rebuilt Napoleonic officers mess which he declared an excellent brew and so had another. Meanwhile I went shopping with Norma which was an absolutely fantastic fun filled day for the whole family. Even Norma agreed that $70 US for a pair of shorts duty free was a bit steep and so we brought a new set of hair clippers for me. Last night I was held down and sheared like a sheep by Norma and so I am now a lot less of a hippy even when I wear my banana hat (see pics)

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Now that is a hat even Tommy Foster would be envious of. All of that hat for $10 EC and a small can of lager after some hard bargaining

 

            Our American visa, or lack of,  issue has also progressed. Steve returned from a trip to the marina toilets and announced that he had met a very interesting man in the toilet and got a result!!!!  As you could imagine all work stopped and we were all ears to hear further details of this life changing moment. Unfortunately he was only talking about Visa applications and Norma and myself had suffered a premature innuendo overload, if you will excuse the innuendo. He had met a man who had been told that you could ferry across from the BVI’s to the AVI’s and do the visa in a day and then go back pick up your boat and sail into American territory. On further investigation this proved to not be completely correct for us as he was booking his boat in as cargo to get shipped back to the UK on a freighter, so nearly there but no banana this time. We have started to fill in the D-160 forms for the American Embassy and will then book an interview in Nassau the Bahamas sometime in mid March which should allow plenty of time for us to get to Florida and meet up with Gemma, Duncan, Lilly and baby MacDonald by the beginning of April. Unfortunately we will have to miss the American Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico as they come first and with no US Visa we can’t get in. The problem now is that we were going to drop Steve of in Puerto Rico to catch his flight home, he is now looking at ways to get from the BVI’s to Puerto Rico by commercial flight/ferry  but that is a problem for another day. Our itinerary will now be from the BVI’s to the Dominican republic, possibly Haiti or the Turks and Caicos, Cuba and then across to the Bahamas which is all good.

            Last night we had a bit of excitement when a police boat started stopping boats in the harbour for checks, blue lights flashing etc, etc. He seemed to be concentrating on the local open boats which buzz about after dark with no lights on so perhaps there had been a tip off, speculation ran rife aboard Spectra and we were expecting a Miami vice style drugs bust and shoot out but instead the police went home and it all went quiet; except of course for the local open boats who all started to buzz around the harbour without any lights on again.. That’s it for now, beach day today, (Sunday), and then set sail for Martinique after clearing customs and picking up my fully repaired battery charger on Monday morning, what could possibly go wrong with that plan I ask you?

 

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Rodney bay with the lagoon/marina on the top left

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Another picture from a bounty advert

 

 

 

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