Deep Bay, Antigua

Harmonie
Don and Anne Myers
Mon 7 Jan 2008 16:24
17:07.570N  61:53.180W
 
On Thursday (1/3), we said good-bye to Margy and Rick and shortly thereafter left Jolly Harbour Marina and sailed a few miles north along the coast of Antigua to Deep Bay.  We had heard from other boaters that Deep Bay was a nice anchorage and we decided it would be a good place to hang out for a couple of days before heading south to Falmouth Harbour, and then on to Martinique from there.  We received an email from Margy, and based on what she wrote, our trip up the coast of Antigua was a lot more enjoyable than their trip back to Syracuse.  Lots of delays leaving Antigua caused them to miss their connection in Newark, which of course was the last flight to Syracuse for the night.  They opted to rent a car and drive home - arriving at 3am Friday morning.  Once again it has become clear that travel by sailboat is much more rewarding than travel by air.  It may take a little longer to arrive at your destination (like 9 days instead of 3 or 4 hours), but the aggravation factor is infinitely smaller.
 
We stayed in Deep Bay for three days (we are now in Falmouth Harbour), caught up on boat chores and dried out.  We did take time off to dinghy in to shore and hike up to Fort Barrington, another old British structure built as an observation post - no doubt to help the Brits keep track of the Frenchies.  On the way to the fort, we ran into a bunch of goats (picture 1).  According to Michael, taxi driver extraordinaire, all the goats on Antigua have ear tags and are owned by someone, but they are not confined to fenced-in fields, and therefore, wander about freely.  The hike up to the fort was steep (picture 2), but the view at the top definitely worthwhile (picture 3 - that's our boat in the middle).
 
The countdown to the start of the World ARC rally is winding down.  We have to be in Rodney Bay, St. Lucia by 1/14 (wow! that's only a week away!), so our plan is to sail from Falmouth Harbour, Antigua to Martinique on Tuesday (1/8), arriving sometime on Wednesday.  The trip is about 150 miles and will take us about 30 hours.  The sailing should be good since we will be heading almost due south and the trade winds blow consistently from the east (and happen to be somewhat light this week).  We will pass the islands of Montserrat, Guadeloupe and Dominica along the way, but won't stop - maybe next time around.  We'll stay in Martinique through the weekend and sail to St. Lucia on the 14th - it's only 30 miles from the south end of Martinique to Rodney Bay, so we can easily do that in a day.  As we get closer to the rally departure date (1/23), the feeling that our adventures over the past seven months will be nothing compared to what's in store for us over the next 14 months becomes stronger.  The pace of travel will be much faster than what we've done on our own and the places we visit will be more exotic.  We are both looking forward to finally meeting the other participants in the rally and it will be nice to be traveling in a group (although we won't necessarily be able to see the other rally boats when we are sailing, we will at least know that they are within radio distance).  As Don put it, the bottom line is, it will feel good to finally get going on this round-the-world thing.  Translation: in typical Don fashion he is essentially saying, 'Enough talk already! Time for some action!'.
Anne

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