Hauling the Boat

Trinidad or bust! Inspiration sailed about 2,000 nautical miles from the time it left Panama on this leg of the journey. What a remarkable adventure it has been.


We moved the boat on 6/1 to Peake's for hauling for the hurricane season. I was tending the port side and had to throw the line rather a long distance when instructed to by the dock worker. When he said ok, I let it loose with all my strength. He caught it and said, "Yes! That's what I'm talking about!" I was relieved. The sail is done! We made it to our destination.


Bob and Abby left after the boat had been hauled. Bob used his phone to take these shots:
















Ralph and I spent the next week cleaning the boat and sweating like crazy in the June humidity. Rainy season is here, but the rain does not refresh - it just makes the concrete more steamy! We left Inspiration in the secure boatyard under the care of a local man who is going to complete some cleaning chores and come by to inspect it on a regular basis in the upcoming months.

We drank lots of champagne on the first class trip back home on my birthday!

Trinidad at Last!

On 5/24, after a relaxing swim at Port Louis followed by lunch on-board, we headed out at 2:00 p.m. for our overnight sail to Trinidad. Due to Venezuelan piracy issus, we intended to buddy boat with another sailboat, however, early on, due to the sea and wind conditions and the design of their boat, they had to adjust their course considerably so we continued on by ourselves as we wanted to arrive with the tides after daybreak. And, we accomplished our goal. The other boat arrived 14 hours after we did! They said that with the currents and squalls, they could only make slow to no progress even with their engine on! We, on the other hand, had to hold our boat back - we just let out our mainsail and jib a tiny bit (sailing with a handkerchief) in order to limit our speed to an average of 5 knots so we could take advantage of the tides which enabled us to avoid the bad weather. Whatta boat!

I just have not said enough about the fine sailing capabilities of our boat. Inspiration, a Beneteau 473, points really close to the wind, is fast (we have had her to 11 knots), and sturdy. No matter the conditions, we always say that the boat can take it! On the other hand, we, on occasion, wondered whether we could take what mother nature gave, but we did! We arrived in Trinidad, our final destination, on-time and on-target. We took advantage of the tide for a smooth ride into Chaguaramas Bay after daybreak, just as Ralph had planned.

After taking a day to recover from our overnight passage to Trinidad, we started exploring the island. First was the start of our gastronomic adventure at a near-by roti stand where we had buss up shut chicken roti - that's roti skins on the side of the curried chicken. It is served with mango pickle, mashed chick peas, sweet potatoes and scotch bonnet hot sauce-yum! We then took a bus into Port of Spain where we walked through the "safe" parts of town (some of the locals looked shocked when we said we wanted to venture out on our own and they gave us names of perimeter streets within which they said we would probably not get robbed!). We looked through shops and went to the National Museum and Art Gallery which provided a very thorough explanation of the country's history and culture. Upon entering, we asked what price of admission was. We were told there was no admission fee at museums and historical sites because Trinidad wants to encourage tourism which has suffered due to its reputation as a high crime area! We also came to learn a bit about the national election that had been held the day before we arrived. This resulted in Trinidad's first female prime minister being elected. Issues revolved around crime, official graft and corruption, education and assistance to the poor. Everyone we met who spoke of the election results was excited and hopeful that the new government would help the people of Trinidad.


Then, we met up with Jessie James (his real name). Jessie has a tour and taxi service that caters to boaters. Our first trip was the evening leatherback turtle watch tour on Madera beach. This beautiful beach is off-limits to anyone who is not escorted by an official turtle guide. It is also a high surf beach so it would not be good for casual swimming. In spite of that, leatherbacks like it. We saw 4 of these huge (up to 2,000 lbs.) turtles materialize out of the surf in the darkness. Our guide had us follow one turtle as she struggled up onto the beach, dug a nest to her perfection (this took about 1 hour) and laid her eggs. She then covered the nest and compacted the sands and struggled back to the ocean. The turtles will return 3-4 times in a season and then take the next 2-3 years off. Only 1 to 2 of every 1,000 eggs is hatched and returned to the sea. We were lucky to be there to see a hatchling that was about ready to return to the sea. It was only about the size of the palm of a hand. This was a priceless adventure.


The next day, we returned to Port of Spain and found a great taxi driver named Harry who took us to Fort George outside the city. This was a signal fort built in the hills in 1804. It was one of a chain of look-outs that were put in place for defense of the island. The fort is 1,100 ft. straight up above sea level. It provides wonderful views over the capital and across to the mountains of northern Venezuela. The day we visited, a local women's group whose mission is monthly elderly outings, was having lunch at Fort George. They were very curious about how we ended up at Fort George (they noted that not many tourists venture out and about because of crime) and they were quite astonished that we came from Washington State on our own boat. After hearing our story, they served us up a big plate of their homemade roti and accompaniments like pickled fruits and spiced chick peas. They were delighted that we liked the hot sauce (actually everything was superb). What a great experience that was!

After the Fort, Harry took us for a drive to the Queen's Park Savannah, home to the Botanical Gardens. It is bordered on one side by the Magnificent Seven, a collection of eclectic over-the-top old mansions (pompous British colonial buildings - most in disrepair), although one houses the Queen's Royal College. Evidently, one issue in the recent campaign was the building of pretentious new Trinidadian high-rise buildings for government use while letting these architectural jewels disintegrate. I hope they can restore these buildings as they were, indeed, magnificent and among the oldest in the city.


It was in getting ready for our second Jesse James tour that we noticed both of our cameras (and my watch) had been stolen from the boat. It must have been someone watching our every move because there was usually someone on-board or it was locked. Crime in Trinidad, indeed! We really were sad that all pictures of Grenada and Trinidad were gone! Those turtle pictures were especially spectacular. You can Google turtles and Trinidad to get an idea!


Anyway, our second trip with Jesse started out with a stop at a road side stand for "doubles". This fried bread concoction (reminiscent of a sopapilla stuffed with roasted meat and doused with scotch bonnet hot sauce) was delicious! Next, we stopped at the Asa Wright Nature Center, an old plantation (the house is now a hotel) that is a nature/bird preserve. We went on a hike with a guide, saw lots of birds and learned about the area, ate roti and accompaniments for lunch, drank the local coffee, and had a swim in a natural pool under a waterfall. Then we went to the Caroni Swamp, a bird sanctuary, where we witnessed the dusk flight of the national bird, the scarlett ibis and saw a variety of other birds and fish, snakes and anteaters. I wish I could post a photo of the scarlett ibis flying overhead, you just can't believe how red and big they are. They gain their color from their diet of shrimp and crabs. Google scarlett ibis!

Grenada

Unfortunately, we have no pictures of Grenada or Trinidad as our camera was stolen in Trinidad. More on that in the Trinidad section.

We arrived at Port Louis Marina (right outside St. George, the nation's capital) on 5/17 and did some boat cleaning before welcoming Ralph's brother, Bob, and his wife, Abby (from St. Croix), on 5/21. Since driving in Grenada is on the left, as it is in St. Croix, Bob offered to drive around the island and we were glad to accept. So, on 5/22, we rented a car and started our tour. Bob quickly discovered one big difference between St. Croix and Grenada is that the steering wheel in Grenada is on the right side of the car (in St. Croix it is on the left of the vehicle like on U.S. cars) so he was looking down the center line while driving on very narrow roads that had ditches where the shoulder should be! Ralph was sitting in the front passenger seat so he let Bob know if it looked as if he was about to drive into the ditch. It was pretty exciting to park near the congested spice/produce morning market in St. George and then to take the "scenic" drive to Gouyave, a fishing village and the nutmeg capital of Grenada. Gouyave is on the northwest side of the island (and the scenic drives takes you on a very narrow, hilly, windy road with some beautiful scenic vistas). Actually, all of Grenada is made up of narrow hills and valleys one right after another - very dramatically pretty and very green except where recovery from Hurricane Ivan (2007) was on-going. On our route, we stopped at Annandale Falls and Grand Etang Crater Lake where we took some great pictures! We had hoped to snorkel at the Molinere Sculpture Garden, but it is not accessible by land and there were no commercial boats on the little beach where we ended up. So we drove back to the Marina area and cocktails were enjoyed at Morne Rouge Bay Beach which is just south of the famous Grand Anse Beach. Local cuisine was enjoyed at Nutmeg Restaurant, on the Carenage at St. George, that evening.

The next day, Bob again braved another treacherous route through Grenada to the Belmont Estate (dating from the 17th century) on the northeast side of the island. Belmont Estate is now the home of the Grenada organic cocoa plantation. It also has a very nice restaurant that serves goat cheese (wonderful!) that is made on-site as well as vegetables from its own gardens. Luckily, we were there on a Sunday when they offer a buffet lunch of Grenadian favorites. We had callaloo soup, goat cheese, papaya salad, creole mahi mahi, curried chicken, plantation beef, provisions (starch vegetables such as breadfruit, bananas and plantain). Homemade cinnamon and nutmeg (we are on the "spice island") ice cream were the desserts. They were delicious and refreshing. We noticed a lack of chocolate on the menu and that they did not have any chocolate candy bars for sale. In response to our inquiry, we were informed that they only sell balls of unsweetened cocoa for baking and making hot chocolate.


We then went to the River Antoine Rum Factory where we could drive through the beautiful grounds and see the magnificent old windmill and factory, but it was closed so we could not sample the product. Our shortcut route home was not as exciting as most of our driving from the day before. Either the roads were better or we were getting used to the Grenadan roads!

Bequia and Carriacou

St. Vincent is an island more like Dominica. Intensely green and not very developed. It also goes straight up from the sea and so the anchorages are reportedly difficult. Therefore, we by-passed it and headed straight to Bequia. Bequia has an active whaling station and locals whalers can take four whales a year (although it was noted that some years they do not get any). This reminded us of a certain B&B in Ocean Park, WA!

Wonder if there is a message here???

El Capitan!

I think this might be the most up-hill road of all of them.

When we left Bequia we sailed by the Tobago Cays and other Southern Grenadine Islands. Most are either privately owned, or a part of the National Park and uninhabited. All beautiful, although we were hit by a series of squalls during the sail and sometimes visibility was limited.

We anchored at Tyrell Bay, Carriacou next to this establishment. Carriacou is part of Grenada so we cleared customs here. This island is sparsely populated and has a long history of boatbuilding. It also has Simon, the boat vendor with wine. He had a good Chilean Merlot featured the day we arrived, so I bought a bottle. Like many other islands, one hurricane or another has touched it through the years. This area was devastated by Hurrican Lenny but is springing back to life.

Leaving St. Lucia

Overlooking Rodney Bay from Pigeon Island, we sighted the Brig Unicorn - 136 feet long and supporting 15,000 sq. feet of sail. Glad I am not a crew on this ship so I do not have to climb masts! The Unicorn was featured in the Pirates of the Caribbean movies as the Henrietta. Now you can be a pirate for a day, if you take one of the tours on the Unicorn.

Yes, Pigeon Island has Fort Rodney protecting the bay. Fort Rodney has a bit more recent history in that it was used as a U.S. Signal Station in WWII. From here, you can see Martinique to the north and all the way down the coast beyond the Pitons to the south.

Pigeon Island National Park is also famous as the mainstage venue for the St. Lucia Jazz Festival. We were there the day after the final event so saw the clean-up detail hard at work. There is a beautiful view of the water behind the stage. It seems fitting this area should be so identified with music and entertainment. In the 1960's, a wealthy singer Josset 'Ma Snowball' Leigh of Britian's D'Oyly Carte Opera Company retired here. Reportedly, she had the run of the island, led quite the bohemian lifestyle and had lavish parties where she entertained a constant parade of A-list houseguests.

A toast with local beer to St. Lucia.

After leaving the hustle and bustle of Rodney Bay, we anchored off Vieux Fort, St. Lucia. We shared the anchorage with local fishing boats and no one else. Hard to remember the last time we were the only pleasure craft in an anchorage. This was a beautiful place with calm waters. We had a good rest before heading down St. Vincent and onto Bequia.

St. Lucia Tour Part Deux

Jean, Jonah and me exploring a roadside attraction.

We did not go out of the vehicle to get a better view of this roadside attraction.

Just a street scene.

Jean and Allan with the Pitons in the background.

Our guide at the sulphur springs.

St. Lucia tour

When we arrived in St. Lucia, we met Al and Jean sailing on Ryen's Quest from Novia Scotia. The four of us hired a taxi driver (Jonah) to take us on an island tour. One stop was at the Government House in which resides the Queen of England's representive, Dame Pearlette Louisy. St. Lucia is a parliamentary democracy with its own Constitution modeled under the British system.

The Pitons overlooking the town of Soufriere.

Sulfur springs in the volcanic park.

Boiling water in the sulfur springs.

One of many waterfalls in the forest. All the people are there because you can swim in the pool this waterfall forms. Al and I went in and stood under the waterfall - that is the most fresh water I have had on me since I left Albuquerque. It was very refreshing. In addition to many waterfalls, this island seems to have more butterflies than other islands. We see them everywhere.

St. Lucia Evenings

The St. Lucia Jazz Festival is held the first week of May. What started as a marketing event to boost tourism during a slow time period has developed into a major international musical event (kinda like the Water Music Festival on the Long Beach Peninsula!). We sat with people from London, England and from the Ivory Coast who had come to St. Lucia specifically for the festival. The concert on 5/5 featured great shows by the St. Lucia School of Music, 22 year old Irish phenom Laura Izibor, and jazz guitarist legend Earl Klugh. On 5/6 with Caribbean jazz nicely performed by the St. Lucian group, 3M, shown above. They were followed by the incomparable Jean Luc Ponty!

Could he do things with a violin! Great! Great! Great! The festival itself continued through the weekend. Rodney Bay Marina, where we stayed, was filled with French jazz aficionados who sailed from Martinique for the weekend concerts. Restaurants in the Marina had very good live music throughout the week, as well.

Friday, May 7th, we attended our first Caribbean Jump-Up - like a night-time street fair. The streets of Gros Islet, right up the road from Rodney Bay, were closed to traffic. Bars and street food vendors set up and music blaired. Eventually everyone dances in the streets and parties til the wee hours.

This bar gave its proceeds to a local youth group. My new favorite bartender made a heck of a rum punch with "extra strong rum" which is the double strength variety - 80% alcohol. I am not going to be buying a bottle of that! By the way, I am holding Ralph's beer, I was NOT drinking beer with my rum punch.

This woman grilled various meats on skewers and served them with a creole sauce. It was the best creole sauce I have ever had. I asked if she had a restaurant because I could have had some of her food everyday, but she said she did not, she just had her own recipe and only cooked at street events. She was very pleased that her food was so appreciated.

St. Pierre

St. Pierre on Martinique lies at the foot of the Mt. Pelee volcano. This is in the area where the European settlers killed the last of the Carib tribes in 1658. Legend has it that the last Caribs to die cursed the area by asking the volcano to revenge their demise. Instead, the town became known as the Paris of the Caribbean as the years went by thanks to the wealth generated in producing and shipping rum, sugar, coffee and cocoa. This picture shows the entry to the large town theatre. St. Pierre prospered until 1902 when the volcano erupted, killing 29,993 of the 29,995 residents. It is now home to about 5,000 people who have re-built among the ruins. It is now predominantly a tourist area.

Ruins of the interior of the theatre. Ferdinand de Lesseps reportedly stopped here to see a play on his way to Panama while working on his early failed French attempt to build the canal. We read about him when we were in Panama!

One of the two survivors of the 1902 eruption was the murderer Cyparis who was imprisoned in this stone jail cell. Although he suffered burns from the blast, he was able to survive by drinking water that leaked into his cell until he was discovered and sent for medical treatment. Upon recovery, he was released and became an exhibit in the Barnum and Bailey Circus. The other survivor was a cobbler who was in his cellar. I do not know what became of him.

Ruins on the waterfront - described on the plaque below. Hope you can read it!

Martinique

When we arrived in Martinique, I had the best gin and tonic ever with the limes from Antonio Banderas! Fort de France is a a bigger city than others in the French Caribbean. Although definitely French, it has more of the Caribbean feel than Guadeloupe or Iles des Saintes. Like the other French islands, it has its church and bell tower which rang off the hours from dawn to dusk. And there are croissants, baguettes, crepes, quiche and great French food to be enjoyed throughout the city.




We anchored right off the old fort. It is not a tourist attraction, however, it is a functioning naval base.

While Martinique has the narrow roads of other islands, there are plenty of cars and buses here. Many of the roads in Fort de France are one way, so it looks as if the traffic flows pretty well. There are several nice pedestrian walkways in the old part of town. We found a couple lovely cafes that served great food/drinks along with wi-fi in air conditioned bliss!

The Schoelcher Library is a metal wonder that was built in France and reassembled in Fort de France is 1889 for an exposition. It is named in honor of the famous French slavery abolitionist. He is a real hero in these lands and each island had something named in his honor.

Dominica

Dominica is a less affluent island than some and has its share of crime. A group of water tour guides in Prince Rupert Bay formed a security association that is funded partly by rental fees collected on mooring balls that they maintain. Rather than anchoring here, we tied to their mooring ball so we could support their efforts (and benefit from their security patrols!).









Each day, we were astounded at the size and number of turtles that we saw swimming about. They were plentiful and were the biggest turtles yet. The bay also featured a nice snorkeling area, a fort, and beautiful swimming beach. There were also many vendor boats who came by regularly to see if we needed trinkets, fruits, vegetables and various services. One of the vendors was the Antonio Banderas fruit boat. I could not find limes anywhere (even at the big Saturday morning local produce market in town). The day before we left, Antonio was coming back from his delivery run to various boats at 5:30 p.m. When he passed by our boat, I asked if he had limes. He said "not on me, but I can get you some" I told him not to make a special trip. However, at about 8:30 p.m, in the dark, we heard a boat approaching. It was Antonio with 12 of the most fragrant limes I have ever smelled. He apologized for being late! I paid his price and gave him a tip, thanking him for providing such beautiful limes. He said, "that's why I am the fruit man".









The building on land, in the middle of the picture, houses Big Papa's Restaurant. One night, Big Papa (who hails from Switzerland) had a birthday party for his son who was turning 18 years old. We were warned that the music would be loud, but loud does not begin to describe the sound! It BLASTED, BLASTED, BLASTED from about 10 p.m. until 5 a.m. Happy birthday, Little Papa!





Andrew "Dede" Nicholas rented us our mooring ball. At that time, we arranged for him to take us on the Indian River Tour. The scheduled day happened to be the day after the birthday party. Andrew, when he picked us up at 8 a.m., told us that he had been at the birthday party and had only one hour of sleep. In spite of that, and the fact that no motoring is allowed on the river, Andrew gave us a great tour - rowing the entire way while describing flora and fauna and telling us all about his country.

The river gets quite shallow and narrow at spots. We happened by a group of women doing with wash at this spot. Interestingly, while St. Kitts has no rivers, Dominica has over 350. In travelling down the coast of Dominica, we found it the most beautiful of all the islands. Less developed than some, it is the most dramatically beautiful. Lush and green, its topography is a fantastic mix of valleys, gorges and mountain pinnacles.

This area on the Indian River was used as the site of a small house with a witch in residence in the second Pirates of the Caribbean movie (I think that is the one Andrew mentioned-I don't remember the movies well enough to know). We have seen lots of places on various islands where Johnny Depp and the filming crew have been! We have a new appreciation for the actors who had to brave this heat and humidity with all those clothes on!

Iles de Saintes

From Guadeloupe, we sailed to Iles des Saintes and anchored off the largest town on the largest island - Bourg des Saintes on Terre d'en Haut Island. This is a prosperous fishing village with two storied red roofed buildings with balconies that are decorated with flourishes of gingerbread. Flowers abound in beautiful gardens and homes are furnished with great taste. There is just a bit of a Caribbean feel, but we are definitely still in France. We had one of our best meals yet featuring locally smoked fish, grilled shrimp and tuna with green peppercorn sauce. These islands were never involved in agriculture and so never imported slaves.







Walking is easy on this tiny island although the roads are very narrow and filled with locals and tourists on scooters. We spent a morning exploring the area and various bays on our walk to Fort Napoleon.

Another island, another fort! Fort Napoleon was built in 1867 and is kept in great condition. The grounds contain well maintained gardens that feature various types of cactus.

Everything is colorful on this island.

Guadeloupe

We left St. Kitts on 4/15 and had a lovely sail that day to Montserrat, the island with a currently very active volcano. In 1995, the Soufriere Hills Volcano first erupted. It destroyed the capital city, Plymouth. Much of the island today remains in an exclusion zone and on bad days boats going by get covered with ash. Fortunately, this day, we saw only clouds. However, the anchorage was the worst one yet. The boats were all thrashing about. After one catamaran started dragging anchor, Ralph thought we would need to do anchor watches the rest of the night. It was apparent that neither of us would get any sleep, so we raised anchor at 10:30 p.m. and did a slow overnight passage to Guadeloupe.










We arrived at Deshaies, a lovely fishing village, on a gentle bay. It looked to be a popular spot. There were 40 sailboats at anchor the first night we were there. Viola! We thought we had been transported to a Breton fishing village. It is very French. Each evening, a very good looking, very blonde young man from a bakery came out to take orders for baguettes and croissants for delivery the next morning. The stores have pates, wonderful cheese selections, duck breast, veal, etc., etc. French restaurants abound. The Euro was strong while we were here making it all quite expensive. And the people speak French. We did not hear any Creole spoken here!










There is a lovely river walk in the village and small remains of an old fort at one end of the bay. Right outside of town is the Jardin Botanique de Deshaies with a koi pond, waterfall, flamingos and a lovely trail through a large variety of beautiful plants from all over the world. I think I saw examples of every houseplant I have ever had.

And parakeets!

St. Kitts

We spent a week on lovely St. Kitts. During a tour of the island we found this hanging lobster claw at Romney Manor gardens. A 350 year old Saman tree shades an acre of the property which is an old sugar plantation. It abuts the rain forest. There are petroglyphs in this area making it likely that is was location of a Carib Chiefton's village. While driving around the island, we saw a thorn tree packed with egrets, Frigate Birds, Brown Pelicans (the national bird), an occasional mongoose and the green "Vervet" monkey (originally imported from Africa by the French as pets). There are now more monkeys than people here! (Our guide said that some people eat monkey and it reportedly tastes like lamb...). Cashews, breadfruit, bamboo, papaya, several variety of mangos, coffee and cotton grow throughout the island. Beautiful flowering bushes and trees abound. In addition to the natural beauty and history, we also enjoyed the people of this island who are extremely warm and friendly.

We also saw many ruins of the 68 sugar plantations operating here when sugar was king. Sugar subsidies from the U.S. and Great Britian ended in the 1980's and the industry was officially closed in 2005. The governent is deciding how best to use the acres and acres of sugar cane fields that it now owns. Some options are agricultural endeavors in partnership with the Taiwanese government, for example, and leasing land for resorts and golf courses, etc. They will not sell the land as they have determined it belongs to the people. Our guide said that the on-going world economic situation had put some projects on hold for the forseeable future.

Sandy going to fire a cannon at Brimstone Hill Fortress National Park. The cannons are almost 800 feet above sea level. It is known as the "Gibraltar of the West Indies". First established in 1690, it was built by slave labor and engineered by the British military. It's now an UNESCO World Heritage site and you can learn more at http://www.brimstonehillfortress.org/, if you so desire.

Where the Atlantic meets the Caribbean. Not much of a picture, but there is a pretty big disturbance in the water here, which I thought was more interesting than Ralph did. Onshore, the beach action immediately shifts to large breakers on the Atlantic side.

Black Rocks Beach formed by the volcano on Mt. Limuiga which is 3792 feet high. Consequently, this area has black sand beaches. The island also has many beautiful white sand beaches, where the bigger resorts are located.