Heading North

Jon and Tuuli Enjoying a Smooth Sail

When we returned to Aldebaran for this season of sailing we knew we wanted to head north, we just didn't think it would be during the first week of February!  The high winds and seas from the northeast, which are typical this time of year, were taking a break and our go-to weather guy, Chris Parker, said we could get going!  For the first time since we started this adventure, we had a destination deadline. OMG!  We weren't sure we could handle it! We wanted to make it to St. Maarten by March 15, and  we figured if the weather held we would be able to enjoy all the islands as we sailed north.

As we left Grenada heading for Sandy Island, Carriacou it was a less-than-ideal sail.  We were faced with 25+ knots of wind and 10-12 foot seas on the nose.  Blah!  Nearly every wave broke over the bow and over the bimini, drenching us every inch of the way.  We were definitely not having fun yet! 

Sandy Island

When we finally approached Sandy Island, it was a great sight to see!  We picked up a mooring ball, enjoyed a beautiful sunset and rested up for our trip up to Bequia in the morning.

Sunset at Sandy Island

The sail to Bequia was just more of the same as the day before.  It was a long, wet day.  We passed a lot of boats going south (smart) and only saw a few going north with us (not-so-smart).  It was great to arrive in Bequia!  We hoped for a weather report that allowed us to stay for awhile.  We have great memories of Bequia and all of the great sea glass we collected there last year.  However, the weather window was shortened so we had to keep going.  It was clear now that enjoying all of the islands would not be possible and that we would have to yellow-flag it (not check in with customs) at most islands since we would arrive late and leave early the next morning.

Tuuli pooped after a long day of sailing

We left Bequia before sunrise for the long sail to St. Lucia, bypassing St. Vincent.  It was an absolute gorgeous morning and a beautiful sail all day.  The day was full of blessings....we got to see the sun rise AND the sun set, and witness Tuuli jumping up out of a sound sleep to alert us to dolphins long before they were visible to us!!  Amazing.  We anchored at Marigot Bay in St. Lucia.  It is the first time we had been to this bay.  Such a beautiful setting.  We were happy to see a boat boy approaching with bananas!  Of course we had to buy a bunch from him....yummmm.  Bananas are so much better in the Caribbean!

Sunrise Leaving Bequia

Sunset at Marigot, St. Lucia

Marigot Anchorage

   

The next day was a short sail up to Martinique.  Once we were anchored in Le Marin we knew we would be able to stay for a few days since there was a tropical wave approaching.  Lots of rain, and lots of relaxing and reading was in store for us. Woo Hoo!  It was good to have a few days to read, go to the market at Le Marin, take Tuuli swimming in St. Anne, and make sushi for Valentine's Day.  It was a good time! 



Tuuli getting ready for a swim in her little life jacket

After our few days of relaxation in Le Marin, our sail north continued.  We sailed up the island of Martinique and anchored at St. Pierre before leaving early for Dominica the next morning.  We like St. Pierre in spite of the fact that every boat anchored there must crowd their way onto a small shelf of sand before it drops to 80 meters.  It was quite a show as all of us scrambled to get set before night fall!  This anchorage is in such a beautiful setting.......below the volcanic mountain, amongst the local fishermen, and in view of spectacular sunsets.

Sunset at St. Pierre

Our next stop was Dominica.  We arrived just as the sun was setting so the onslaught of boat boys was minimal - only two!  It was nice to visit with Albert, though.  He is one of the original boat boys and a main force in PAYS, the security group that patrols the anchorage.  Once he knew we were leaving at day break and would not be using his services to take a river tour or island tour, he wished us a great time and moved on.  We have great memories of the fun time we had in Dominica with our friends from Emerald Seas, Jade, and Far Star the last time we visited.

Day break arrived and off we went to Deshais, Guadaloupe.  We were one of only a few boats still moving north.  We got the feeling that all those going south or staying put were having much more fun than us.  We are definitely cruisers more than we are sailors.  We like to visit the islands and explore new places!!

The town of Deshais, Guadaloupe

Deshais is such a cool little town.  We loved it there the last time we visited.  We have great memories of visiting the Botanical Garden and walking around the town.  This time we arrived at sunset and just had time to enjoy the town from the anchorage a bit before dark.  When morning came we were really dragging our feet.  We were planning on sailing north to Antigua next, resting for a few hours, then heading to St. Maarten from there.  We only had two more days of settled weather so we had to keep going.  The only problem now was that there was NO wind. 

We started out anyway and as we cleared Guadaloupe we looked at Montserrat in the distance and decided to head that way (northwest) instead of north to Antigua.  We had a rolly time motoring until the wind picked up just before we reached Montserrat.  After that we enjoyed a nice sail in the lee of the island where we got a good view of the volcano smoking and the town that had been wiped out from the volcano erupting in the 90's. 

A view of the lava flow areas on Montserrat

Since we decided to sail this direction we planned a stop in Nevis.  We knew there were huge mooring balls in a wide open anchorage so we were counting on being able to pick one up in the dark.  We arrived there about 9:00 PM and inched our way in the dark towards where we thought the mooring balls were.  As we got closer a spot light appeared from another sailboat.  A person from that boat was shining the light right on a mooring ball.  Awesome!  We got the mooring line and settled in for a great night sleep.

The next morning was our last good day of sailing weather and we started out early for St. Maarten.  Our plan was to motor in the lee of St. Kitts and then sail between St. Kitts and Statia, then on to St. Maarten, arriving before sunset.  As we started out our engine started to falter.  Oh s**t!!!  We knew we were low on fuel in that tank so Jon went below to switch us over to the other tank.  Well, that lasted a few minutes before it started to falter again.....bad fuel :-(  Thank goodness for wind and spare fuel filters.  We were able to sail into St. Kitts as cruise ships were approaching and a container ship was bearing down on us....all while Jon was down below changing fuel filters. 

Once we arrived in St. Kitts and anchored near the marina, we put the motor on the dinghy and Jon took off to get some fuel.  Not so easy!  They don't sell fuel in this marina, so he had to haul the fuel jugs up to the road to find a taxi to take him to a gas station. The taxi driver took him to a gas station up on a hill instead of close by in town to sidetrack the morning rush hour and cruise ship traffic.   

Back at the boat, we emptied the jugs in the fuel tank and took off once again with our fingers crossed.  Of course, the engine started to falter as the filters clogged from the old fuel!  Here we go again....changing the fuel filters and bleeding the fuel line.  Poor Jon, he had the dirty work while Carol and Tuuli got to enjoy the beautiful sail in the lee of St. Kitts.  Finally!  It was done, and we were back in good order and on our way to St. Maarten.  As it turned out, this was the most beautiful day of sailing we had the entire time since leaving Grenada.  It was beautiful weather with 17 knots of wind and 5 foot seas.  We LOVED it!

Carol and Tuuli on the last day of sailing

The sun set as we were approaching St. Maarten.  Four cruise ships evenly spaced out were leaving Phillipsburg and boats were zipping around the island.  We were familiar with Simpson Bay since we had been there several times before but in the dark it was a different matter.  You cannot tell what anything is in the dark on the water!  We were approaching very slowly, discussing what we thought was in front of us when all of a sudden Carol commented on a chugging sound.  Then as a new set of green navigation lights whisked by in front of us, we were freaked out when we realized it was some sort of work or tug type boat moving very fast and very close to us!  With our knees shaking we focused on a catamaran anchored in the bay, moved up behind it and put our anchor down.  Whew!  We made it! 



Sunset on our Sail to Simpson Bay, St. Maarten



Our Return to Aldebaran

Tuuli's first dinghy ride!

This picture of Tuuli, our new little companion and first mate, just says it all....."Weeeee! This is what I've been waiting for!" We arrived back to Grenada on January 18 after a great day of travel. Tuuli was perfect on both of the flights to get here and then we had a warm and friendly welcome at the airport in Grenada. In spite of the more-than-tipsy agriculture agent, Tuuli was documented with ease and we were on our way with all our gear in the taxi to Cool Running Apartments where we stayed while getting Aldebaran ready to splash again.

Aldebaran did great during our absence, with just a light coating of mildew and some road and boat yard dirt on the deck. Everything else was great, and after cleaning and putting everything back together, we were back in the water again in 4 short days! It is so nice to be floating in calm Prickly Bay and getting reacquainted with friends from past seasons. (For those of you who are familiar with Prickly Bay, you read it right, it is CALM!! Go figure)

We will soon be heading north to St. Maarten when weather allows, but in the meantime we are doing little projects (Oh wait, Jon says the new Y valve he is putting in for the toilet right now isn't so little! Oops) It's not all about the projects, though. Last week we went to Dodgy Dock to learn how to make chicken curry and rotis while sipping rum punch...yummmmm...and we have been to our favorite sea glass beach a few times to search for some new treasures. The beach adventures are so fun with little Tuuli. She loves to lie down on the wet sand to cool off after playing, and every once in a while she catches a glimpse of a crab skittering across the sand into a hole. She still has no clue what it is!

Yesterday Tuuli had her first swimming adventure in the bay at Grand Anse. We put her tiny pink Hawaiian print life jacket on and walked out into the surf. It took her a minute to get her little feet going, but soon she was swimming back and forth between us and doing great! I wouldn't say she loves it yet, though! She was MUCH more excited to be back on the beach. We are amazed at how easily Tuuli has taken to life on the boat and in the tropics. Everything has been effortless for her (even using the astro turf potty mat) and she has taken an immediate liking to mangoes, bananas, and papayas. She makes so many friends on the island that even the other day the fruit and veggie guy, Anslem, gave her her very own mango. Way to go Tuuli!!!!

Tobago Cays

Petit Nevis

Loving life in the Tobago Cays

Sunrise over the Atlantic Ocean

Ooh la la view from the top of one of the islands

Gorgeous sandy beach in the Cays

On our way back from snorkeling in the Cays

One of the hundreds of iguanas found on the islands around the Cays

Our first stop on the way to the Tobago Cays is Petit Nevis, a tiny uninhabited island just south of Bequia. This island was once the original whale rendering island for Bequia. There is still an active whaling station in a low-key and traditional way. Local whalers are allowed to take four whales a year between February and April. There are very few people left with the skills necessary to hunt them. They do this in an open sailing boat using hand-thrown harpoons. Petit Nevis had great snorkeling where we saw 2 kinds of eels along with all the gorgeous fish. We also found one tiny beach with ancient sea glass, nearly black with a rainbow colored sheen.

The next morning we motor sail in no wind to the Tobago Cays - the gems of the Grenadines. No wind is really the best while anchored in the Tobago Cays since there is just a reef separating the anchored boats from the Atlantic Ocean. This place is absolutely breathtaking! The colors of the water change all day long, there are several tiny islands you can walk around with huge iguanas and amazing views, and the snorkeling is incredible. To top it all off, seeing sunrises over the Atlantic that are over-the-top stunning!!!

The Tobago Cays is what we went sailing for - that's for sure. We spent our days snorkeling, visiting with friends, and exploring. While snorkeling we saw sting rays, eagle rays, a five foot lemon shark (yikes), huge parrot fish, flounder, sea turtles, jellyfish (ouch), trunk fish, hog fish, blue head wrasse, damsel fish, trumpet fish, and so many more gorgeous fish that we couldn't identify.

The Tobago Cays is by far our most favorite place to anchor and explore in all of the West Indies! I could keep posting picture after picture that is so breathtaking, but I better leave something for you to discover on your own!

Bequia

A young Brown Booby - Poser!!

Carol at the Old Hegg Turtle Sanctuary

Lower Bay - Our favorite sea glass beach in Bequia

Aldebaran anchored in Admiralty Bay, Bequia
This photo was taken from the Old Fort

Bequia is the northernmost island in the Grenadines. It is a small island that is just south of St. Vincent. With it's large bay and good yacht services, it attracts a lot of cruisers. When we got here we realized that it was varnishing time, so for two weeks we sand, varnish, sand, varnish, read, go to the beach, hunt for sea glass, visit the internet cafe (computer still dead), and take walks. The weather has been windy, windy but we manage to complete the first varnish phase before the rain comes (the phases never end, by the way!).

We hear that the weather is going to go through a period of being very calm and clear so we figure it is a good time to visit the Tobago Cays. Our friends on another Tayana are about to show up so we decide to sail together to the Cays. We stock up on food, drinks, ice and prepare to leave. While we wait for the good weather, we decide to take a walk to the other side of the island to visit the Old Hegg Turtle Sanctuary. This sanctuary was started by one man, who is now in his 70's. They watch for turtles to come to shore to lay their eggs and keep watch on them so no poachers come and take the eggs before they are hatched. When they begin to hatch they make sure the babies reach the sea. They keep a few small turtles to raise at the sanctuary since only 1 in 3,000 survive when they reach the sea!

The sanctuary has tanks with babies and tanks with various ages of turtles, and a few tanks with old turtles. They are all either green turtles or hawksbill turtles. There is even one that is around 10 years old that has some extra swimming privileges. Once in a while they put a leash on him and let him swim in the surf at the beach! The sanctuary is small but they do really great work. They have released nearly 800 turtles back to the sea, and they have a great education program to teach local children about sea turtles. They hope the information will be passed on to the fishermen of the family so that capturing turtles to eat and use their shells will decrease. When we leave the sanctuary we give an extra donation for the education fund. At the beach front in town where we leave our dinghy, there are craftspeople with tables full of turtle shell jewelry. It is against the law, but it is not enforced yet, something that those at the sanctuary are working to change.

The calm weather arrived......time to sail to the Tobago Cays!

Computer Died

Yes, that is correct, our computer is dead. Someone left it on the navigation table at night and a big rain storm came, one that we actually didn't hear. We got up, closed the portholes, but one sleepy head did not tightly secure the one that sent a drip to the computer. We will never forget the smell of a fried computer. The blog will come in time, but it has to be done in an internet cafe. Why they call it a cafe I will never know since no food is served here!! In the meantime, we are in Bequia. Bequia is a small island that is part of St. Vincent and is located about 8 miles south of the main island of St. Vincent. We are in the varnishing stage of cruising and every year we are dismayed by the amount of wood we have on the boat. The wind is blowing hard - not good for varnishing - but it sure is looking good! Next week we are planning on renting a kit car and driving around the island. Our next stop is the main island of St. Vincent where we will be having a new bimini and sail cover made. Please stay tuned!

Union Island, The Grenadines

Anchorage at Union Island. We are the farthest black boat

anchored in front of the tiny Happy Island

Downtown Clifton

Fruit and vegetable market in Clifton

Carol on a beach on the north side of the island. The papaya was given to us by a local named Billy Ray who we met on our way to the beach

Nearby Palm Island at sunset

We were excited to get to Clifton at Union Island because we did not visit this part of the island last year on our way south. We left Carriacou and sailed over on a Saturday afternoon and arrived with a bunch of other boats hurrying to anchor. We took the last spot at the end of the reef after several boat boys wanted to know if we needed anything; help anchoring, a mooring ball, ice, water, fish........

Once we were anchored and settled in we took a good look around and saw that we were right in front of Janti's Happy Island. Janti is a local man who worked trying to clean up the island of conch shells discarded by fisherman. His solution was to use them to build an island. We visited Janti on his Happy Island and he showed us pictures of the building process. He used conch shells, sand, and soil, and layered them "just like in the earth". He now has his house there and a bar, where people can visit in their dinghies to enjoy a drink and some great Reggae music played on his stereo system that you can hear around the anchorage. We, of course, just hadto have "several" of his specialty rum punches! Yummmmmm.........

We really enjoyed Union Island. We liked being able to walk all around the island to the different beaches, up to Old Fort, and to the only other little town of Ashton. While we walked we met local people who always said hello, and came across goats and sheep tied up here and their with their newborn babies - it's Spring!! Jon untangled several of the mamma goats so they could get better access to their babies and edible grass - too cute. One day as we headed up the hill to Old Fort we met one local named Billy Ray. Billy Ray had a house that he kept impeccably tidy and added natural artistic features all around the outside. He was very proud of his house. He wanted us to come into his yard to see his newest project which was a huge paintbrush and paint can that he made and was hanging outside his front gate. Very clever! Jon commented on all his papaya trees and the next hing you know we are leaving with one he picked off his tree for us. We became great friends and he would call out to us to say hello every time we saw him after that.

One of the other great things about our visit to Union Island was where we were anchored. The water was clean and clear and so inviting! We would swim off the boat in the hot afternoons and hang out watching fish swim by and laughing gulls fly around catching them. The laughing gulls crack us up. Their call is "ha ha ha" and sound just like they are laughing, so you just can't help yourself but laugh along. Around the full moon they showed up in huge numbers and were hanging around on the reef near us and laughed all day and all night. It was one big party!

Anchoring at the reef was great because the reef buffered us from the ocean waves, but we had the full force of the ocean winds. We had a full charge on our batteries the whole time we were there because of the non-stop wind turning our wind generator and sun shining down on our solar panels. It was so great to never run the engine to charge the batteries!

We stayed almost two weeks at Union Island and we could have stayed longer, but it was time to meander north to some other islands in the Grenadines while we had good wind direction. Mayreau is our next stop.......

Carriacou

Our first night in Carriacou

Paradise Beach

Nickernuts found on Paradise Beach

The weather report FINALLY shows a NNE wind and seas under 20+ knots and we decide it is time to sail north to Carriacou! We filled our fruit and vegetable hammocks, topped up with water, and headed north up the island. Early morning in the lee of the island of Grenada things looked new and fresh, the fisherman were already out in their boats, and a stream of sailboats were going north with us.

We realized that we would be sailing very close to the wind so we took a tack into Sauteurs on the very north of the island to help put us at a better point of sail. In the open water the winds were still 20+ knots but we were reefed and ready to go! Then we saw the biggest squall that stretched as far as we could see and we knew that it would not miss us...oh well. We got drenched (well, Carol did anyway) as the wind and rain slammed into us. We just hung on as Aldebaran stayed on course, put her port rail into the water, and flew along. As most squalls do, it passed in about 15 minutes. We patted Aldebaran and praise her for taking such good care of us :-) Then the sky cleared up, the winds calmed to 18 knots and the dolphins came out to play!! All around us the dolphins swam, crossing back and forth in the wake near the bow of our boat. We always get excited when we see those beautiful creatures as they come up to say hello!

We reached Carriacou in the afternoon along with all the other boats that left when we did. We all packed into Tyrell bay. Boats were everywhere, anchored as far out in the bay as they could go and still be protected! We relaxed for a few days in the bay, took some walks in the tiny village, bought some grapefruit from the lady at the fruit stand on the road, walked the beach. We knew we needed to make a decision soon about what we wanted to do next. Carnival would be coming that weekend - crazy time - our visas were running out - renew them or leave...such BIG decisions!! We decided to check out and move on. To check out of Carriacou we had to take a bus to the main town of Hillsborough. Not a big deal here....we love to ride these buses. They just drive along slowly (unlike Grenada) through the countryside, honking at everyone they know along the way. They dropped us in Hillsborough and we began the long process of checking out. Everyone is at lunch - wait.......Go to Immigration first - wait in a packed office until it is your turn, and then go across the street to Customs - wait (good thing Jon is the Captain).....in the meantime I take off to the beach to hunt for sea glass :-)

After we checked out we got a sandwich at a tiny deli and took a bus back. We asked to be dropped off at Paradise Beach so we could rest in the shade, eat our sandwich, and stroll along the beach - tough day. We didn't find any sea glass on the beach, but we did discover some seeds in spiny pods hanging on bushes on the beach. We recognized the seeds because people use them in jewelry, so we started collecting as many as we could. Last year we bought a book in Martinique about grains and seeds found in the Antilles. The book is written in French , but the pictures are great for identifying seeds. I looked up the seeds we found on Paradise Beach and discovered that the common name is Nickernut, and at one time children played a game similar to Mancala with these seeds. They are a beautiful green or gray color as you can see in the picture above. We are excited about finding more of these seeds on the other islands we visit.

Note** Sorry about the formatting - this program has a mind of it's own and will not break correctly for paragraphs!