17:54.36N 062:51.59W

10/3/2011 to 14/3/2011

Our next stop was St Barts which was lovely.  Quite positively the poshest place we have been and certainly one of our favourites!  We anchored in the bay in crystal clear blue water.  Perfect for super yacht spotting as they came and went all day.  ‘Top Trumps’ of the pack was ‘Eclipse’ at 535ft anchored a few hundred yards from us.  She was bigger than some of the cruise ships that visited.

The little town of Gustavia is very pretty and great for people watching.  When you are bored of super yacht spotting you can start counting lap dogs (a very strange fashion accessory)!  There’s loads of shops, but it’s quite safe as there’s no chance of being able to afford anything unless you have your personal Swiss banker in attendance!  Good restaurants though.

Sailing to St Barts in company with James & Robin on Platon.

Beautiful St Barts – The poshest place in the Caribbean.  It’s very French and chic but with a lovely atmosphere.   It’s where the most beautiful people come, which is of course why we were there!! J

“Eclipse”, the biggest super yacht we have seen at 535ft and possibly the biggest in the world.  Anchored a few hundred yards from Stella in St Barts.

There was great snorkelling in St Barts.  Below are a selection of photos from our new underwater camera, a much loved birthday present for Alan from his brother!  We’re getting better at the photos but the fish keep swimming away when we try to take their picture!

Alan retrieving some sunken treasure –in this case a small dinghy anchor we found whilst snorkelling

Just after Mary jumped in for another snorkel she looked back and saw something big and scary swimming under Stella’s keel!  We didn’t want to go in too close for a photo!

She swam off to get Alan and then James and Robin came to say hello but we couldn’t say why we were keeping a safe distance from the boat as Robin is already very scared of sharks and we feared she would never go swimming again!

The next morning the big scary fish were still swimming under Stella.  We took some better photos and finally identified them as Shark Suckers (and not small sharks as we had originally thought).  Shark suckers are big fish that hang around sharks and wait for the tasty morsels that the shark doesn’t eat.  For some reason these shark suckers had attached themselves to Stella and followed us from one anchorage to another.

After the shark suckers we later saw a real shark.  You can just make out the shape a nurse shark in a top left of the photo below.

It was great fun sailing in company with James, Robin and Henry.  Henry took to the water very well and gave Alan even more opportunities for dinghy safaris!