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Saint Lucia again (by land)

Saint Lucia again (by land)

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We have already been to Saint Lucia once at this point, but both Daisy and Anna had a travel plan home leaving from Saint Lucia, so we sailed back to drop them both off.

The easiest place for us to do this was the Marina in the north called Rodney Bay Marina. This time however there was no space for us in the Marina apparently, as ARC January boats were just about to start arriving. (Even though when walking past the marina, our old spot was available for the duration of our time back here)

Anyway, we saved some money by anchoring… Much more beautiful than a marina anyway! (and the marina still had the same shower block codes ;P )

Beautiful piccy from Daisy

We hired a car for the 2 days we were planning on staying in Saint Lucia again.

On day 1 we would be dropping Daisy off back in the south of the Island, so wanted to explore the west coast some more on the way down and drive back up on the east coast. So roughly 1 lap of the lower part of the island.

Our first stop was Castries. The port area here was filled with numerous cruise ships. We explored a vibrant local market and indulged in some shopping. We couldn’t resist picking up some locally made soap and materials for making hot chocolate (the local way) for use back on Hannah.

Looking online while writing this post, its actually Cocoa Tea that we bought a kit for with a Cocoa stick. You can see a how to video on YouTube that goes above and beyond what we have tried.

A short drive further down the island we found a little view point that overlooked Castries.

Next we reached Marigot bay once again, this time from land! We stopped at another viewpoint for some nice cold drinks and snapped the below picture which really shows off the mixture of boats in the bay (including some sunk / grounded). You can also see why this bay is a hurricane hole for boats, as its nice and enclosed.

We enjoyed our time in the waterfalls in St Vincent, so went on the hunt for some more in Saint Lucia. A quick online search on our drive brought us inland to Anse La Raye Falls.

We parked at the end of an unpaved road and started hiking toward the falls. The cascading waterfalls tumble down a series of rocky tiers, creating a serene and tranquil oasis perfect for swimming and cooling off from the Caribbean heat, BUT there are signs that say not to go in the water as its used for drinking water, so we just went to look around.

Next stop of the tour was a choclate factory that we just happened to see as we drove past. The tours were pretty expensive, but we did enjoy browsing the shop and buying a few tasty treats. Anna bought a little thank you present for the 2 of us, and we can confirm these choclates were all delicious!

Nearing the south of the island, we stopped off at a few more view points and beaches before reaching the airport and having one final drink before wishing Daisy goodbye. 😘🙋‍♀️👋👋

It’s been quite crazy, but also great having 5 people on board once again, but it’s time to start reducing crew and speeding up our little adventure.

The first task of the second day was to say fairwell again and drop Anna at the more northern airport of Saint Lucia first thing in the morning. Its lucky that the airport was tiny as we got there much later than planned, Anna was the last one through check in. Who would have known there would be such traffic jams in the Caribbean! 🙋‍♀️😘👋👋

Now down to 3 crew total, we spent an awful lot of time driving aroud the north east of the island trying to find our way to a little beach and generally having a look around.

Google maps isn’t the most accurate in these parts so it took us several hours to find the right road to take us there and once there the route back to the marina would only actually take us 15 minuites.

The beach had a small resturant for a quick drink while we watched the kitesurfers go back and forth and generally thought about the plan for the coming weeks.

Also there was a rather cute dogo…

We returned the car in the afternoon, had one final meal out, picked up a few more provisions from the shops and headed back to the boat ready to sail back north to Martinique.

It’s also worth mentioning before moving on, Saint Lucia is one of those places that is quite heavily influenced by a love of signs, many of which seem to be irrelevant or ignored.

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Martinique, take 1

Martinique, take 1

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Last time we left you in Saint Lucia, now we are off to Martinique, for more fun shenanigans. Get ready for 5 onboard again!

Located in the heart of the Caribbean Sea, Martinique is a picturesque island paradise that’s a must-visit destination for sailors. With its stunning beaches, crystal-clear waters, and year-round tropical climate, Martinique is the perfect place for an adventure. From the charming coastal towns to the lush rainforests and towering peaks, there’s no shortage of natural beauty to discover.

We sailed from the marina at Rodney Bay, leaving slightly later than planned as we couldn’t check out at immigration over lunchtime, so after a slow morning we set sail after lunch. We were beating hard into wind and waves, slowing progress significantly, and decided to motor sail most of the way so we didn’t get in at midnight. It was still after dark by the time we arrived but having read the reviews on Navily about the Saint Anne anchorage we knew it was going to be safe to do so, it is by far the biggest anchorage with the most boats we’ve ever been to, it still had loads of room and the whole bay was a perfect 5m deep with a sandy bottom. In the morning we looked out onto the sheer scale of boats we were anchored amongst, hundreds and hundreds on sailboats.

Our search for a cheap food shop finally came to an end when we found a ‘Leader Price’! So we went to town on stocking up the boat, It’s perfectly aimed at cruisers with a dinghy dock right next to the shop which you can take your trolley down to. Martinique is a French island so it’s well connected to mainland France with all its great cheese and wine, after this we had the fridge full to the brim, well for the next week at least as we ate through all the fresh produce pretty quickly with lots of people on board.

We knew one of our boat buddies Vela was going to be sailing into the same bay, Saint Anne after crossing from St Lucia that day so we decided to invite them over for a lasagne dinner, they loved the invite after a long day’s sail. Cooking for 8 on a small boat is always a laugh, I think we ate 5 lasagnas with no leftovers 😂

As a gift in the morning from Vela we got a delivery of croissants and fresh bread from a bakery on shore.

On XXX we went snorkeling on the reef at the channel entrance into Le Marin, this was one of the first times we got to try out our new dinghy anchor which we bought in a Chandlery in Rodney Bay. The anchor was well set and we all jumped in to explore the underwater world, not long later I looked up to check on the dinghy which turned out to be much further away than expected! I yelled to Adam “It’s floating away!!” Adam quickly jumped into action and swam after it, only later realizing he still had his snorkeling weights on which made it hard work, luckily he made it to the dinghy and the kill cord was still in the kill switch, so not long and he was back. Turns out the knot had come undone between the dinghy line and the anchor line, after that, we tied it together with bowlines, not reef knots, and haven’t had a drifting dinghy since!

Despite this, we all managed to have a great look around.

We wanted to explore something land-based so we climbed the hill in St Anne up to a religious shrine/ outdoor church and got some lush views on the way (including the picture of the St Anne anchorage earlier in this post)

In the evening we found a very popular beach bar and got some drinks, when the sun started to set we found out why it was so special, the view of the anchorage in front of the setting sun was spectacular.

Daisy makes a cracking carbonara so she whipped us up a quick dinner that evening with copious amounts of pasta 🤤

The mission the following morning was to pick up our 5th crew member, as Andrew flew into Martinique later that day! We sailed out of the lovely protection on Saint Anne and around the southwestern corner of the island to Anse Noir where we did a quick shuffle around of people and got his bed sorted and then picked him up from the pontoon in the little bay in the late afternoon.

Having 5 onboard, where not everyone knows each other/ only one couple was a new experience, it meant Kathryn and Daisy shared the double in the saloon and Adam and Andrew shared the double in the front! Anna got a good deal in keeping the aft cabin to herself 😋

We had organized to go canyoning near Fort Du France the following day so after a very early start we sailed across the bay which only took about an hour to the busy anchorage at Fort du France. Just to add to the time constraint we found the holding to be rubbish so we ended up setting an anchor 3 times which never happens, finally happy that Hannah Penn was not going to drift away after we left, we all hoped in the dinghy and went to land to get a taxi

Andrew had a relaxing day café-ing whilst the rest of us put helmets and wetsuits on and jumped off some waterfalls, abseiled down bigger ones, and climbed and swam through deep canyons, the rainforest all around was gorgeous, so green and vibrant and full of life. It was a welcome change to be in fresh cool water and we all had a blast.

In the afternoon our canyoning guide gave us a lift down the mountain to a shop where we could get some bbq supplies, we met up with Andrew again and went back to the boat for a good old-fashioned BBQ in the sunset.

We heard from some friends that the best snorkeling in Martinique was in a bay called Anse d’Arlets, so we headed there.

On a bouyed-off area (to stop boats from getting anywhere near) there is an amazing little reef, like an oasis of life in the middle of a deserted ocean floor.

We saw all kinds of fish including some super-friendly angel fish.

And we managed to snap this great video swimming behind a Turtle!

I’m the evening we went for cocktails, Adam and Andrew got to talk in-depth about work and the girls chit-chatted in the golden sunshine.

Snorkeling isn’t something Andrew had done much of before so we left him, Anna, and Daisy to go back one more time whilst I checked us all out of the island in preparation for our sail back to Saint Lucia.

It’s now the 1st of Feb and we had an easy downwind sail back from Martinique to St Lucia, so took this opportunity for some boat shenanigans.

We jumped off whilst sailing and you had to swim to a rope dragging behind the boat to get back on board, thankfully everyone got back to the rope in time so there were no MOB maneuvers necessary, getting dragged behind the boat whilst sailing is a fun experience and it lets you feel the power of sails, even when only going 4 knots (any more and you’d struggle to pull yourself back to the steps!)

We did some similar towing earlier in our trip.

We later arrived back in Rodney Bay.

There was no space in the Marina for us this time, so we anchored just outside.

We headed to a pizzeria we had been eyeing up the last time we were at the marina, it was so tasty we ordered a 6th pizza halfway through our meal!

Next, we hire a car and explore the island for a couple of days before Daisy and Anna head home, but that’s for the next port.

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Daisy comes for a Birthday treat (Saint Lucia)

Daisy comes for a Birthday treat (Saint Lucia)

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On the 22nd of January, Daisy was flying into Saint Lucia in the south of the island.

We picked up anchor from our final anchorage in St Vincent and headed slightly upwind to Saint Lucia on the 21st to be ready.

As the evening drew closer, we hadn’t managed to make it as far upwind as we would have liked, so headed to a more downwind anchorage, between the Pitons.

The Pitons are two iconic volcanic peaks located on the southwestern coast of Saint Lucia. The Gros Piton stands at 2,619 feet (798 meters) tall, while the Petit Piton is slightly shorter at 2,438 feet (743 meters). These stunning landmarks offer a breathtaking backdrop.

Photo courtesy of Anna

On the following day, we sailed to the anchorage near Hewanorra airport, paid an extortionate amount of money for checking into the country (as it was a Sunday (oops)), and collected Daisy from the airport! At least the customs officer gave us a ride to the airport…

We sailed from the south, past the Pitons, up to Marigot bay (a well-known hurricane hole on the island).

The anchorage wasn’t amazing, and we had to anchor on a rocky bottom. Adam dived in to make sure that the anchor was adequately secured for our overnight stay, and Daisy also jumped into the Caribbean water for the first time at anchor.

Our boat friends Atlas & Danae were also in Marigot bay, so we had a little catch-up with them. In the evening we headed for some food and drinks on land with Atlas who also had guests on board, so between the two boats we were 8 people.

The ribs here were amazing…

We set sail the following morning to head further north on the island.

On the way the wind was strong and we were tacking into it repeatedly. Kathryn noticed that the headsail winch looked a little wonky and upon closer inspection of the winch base noticed a small crack. So we quickly put the headsail away and motored on to Bois d’orange Bay.

The bay was quiet, and best of all, we were the only boat anchored.

Here Kathryn was left aboard to take the winch and winch base apart while everyone else (Anna, Daisy, Adam), headed to the beach. From the beach, we found a trail that headed up toward some civilization.

We started walking up through woodlands, then down toward a quarry, finally poking our heads out near some houses. Of course, we were initially aiming for a Bar, however, on the route, we found a lovely little Roti shop that was still open at the side of the road and also had drinks.

So we ordered enough Roti for the 4 of us, sat down with a drink while we waited, and then headed back to the boat before dark.

Another thing of note here would be our first sighting of a giant land hermit crab.

Arriving back, Kathryn has successfully deconstructed the winch and base (but we will come onto this more later).

We ate the Rotis on deck, admired the sky, enjoyed the tranquility, and then headed to bed.

The following day we had a very short sail north into the larger Rodney Bay (Bois d’orange Bay was on the south side of Rodney Bay). We anchored in the north of the bay near Pigeon Island and set out on a snorkel.

This was Daisy’s first Caribbean snorkeling experience (where we were expecting to see some fish etc). We snorkeled around for about an hour and saw all sorts of cool things.

There was an underwater desk with a fake computer on it (some kind of art or monument), fire worms and reef squids.

You can see more pictures of the squid on Instagram.

We had booked into the Rodney Bay marina for a couple of nights to celebrate Daisy’s birthday, so after returning for snorkeling we headed straight to the marina which was also within Rodney Bay.

Because we all wanted some relaxation and celebration, Kathryn headed to the local chandelier with the winch base to see if they would be able to fiberglass in some reinforcing around the cracked area. They obliged and at the end of our stay, we managed to put the winch and winch base back together.

To celebrate Daisy’s birthday we headed to Sea Salt restaurant (an excellent choice). The meal really was amazing and we all had lots of fun. Cocktails, and some of the best restaurant-cooked food we have had in a while. Fancy and expensive.

From here we headed on to Martinique, but that’s for the next post!

And don’t worry, we will be coming back to Saint Lucia too, to drop Daisy at the same Airport.


St Vincent

St Vincent

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Sailing around St Vincent around the end of January was a true adventure! From navigating crowded anchorages to discovering hidden underwater caves, we had a blast exploring this beautiful island.

The sail to St. Vincent was enjoyable and only about 10 miles from our last port of call, Bequia. We arrived at our chosen first anchorage to find it already busy with boats. Unfortunately, the boats didn’t shore tie so took up more space than necessary. So, we decided to move on to the next bay around. Although it very was small, we noticed an anchor symbol on Navionics and thought it would be worth checking out.

Adam snorkeled around the bay with a string line with a weight on the bottom of 2m in length, the idea being Adam could swim around with this, and if it touched the bottom it was too shallow. Meanwhile, Anna and I waited on board in deep water outside of the bay for a thumbs-up. We needed to ensure the chart was accurate and there was enough depth before entering as the chart said it might not have been deep enough in some places.

Luckily it was deeper than that chart stated, like many places around here the charts are not particularly accurate as the areas are not well surveyed. So knowing we wouldn’t scrape the bottom we entered the bay and got to work anchoring in the middle and shore tying to a central tree on the beach. It took us about an hour to complete the anchoring and tying procedure, but it was well worth the effort.

It was really beautiful.

The anchorage “Petit Byahaut (Small Cove)” is now on Navily with our review and pictures. 😊

We stayed there for a couple of nights and enjoyed some incredible snorkeling, including finding an underwater cave that we could swim through.

We also discovered bat caves in the cliff, which you can swim all the way through and out the other side however with a lot of swell coming in at the time we decided not to. We did see lots of the endangered Elkhorn coral, and a diverse range of fish and other corals and sponges.

Another boat we know called Vela also tried to anchor in the same bay with us, but unfortunately, their anchor didn’t hold well in the seagrass seabed and it dragged when setting up the shore tie, it was getting too dark to set everything up in time so they moved around the corner to find space for normal anchoring.

Vela got a great drone pic of us though.

After two nights there and lots of free dives through the underwater cave, we sailed on to Walilabou.

Although we initially planned to get help from a local, as the anchorage was fairly busy, to do the shore tie we declined when they demanded an exorbitant fee. So, we set about doing it ourselves, ending up with nearly all of our chain out due to the deep waters. I swam to shore with a big coil of rope and buoy attached to float it before tying it to a tree and bringing the free end back to the boat.

During the anchoring a number of locals on boats or kayaks hung around and finally once we were anchored, the boat was surrounded by locals trying to sell us vegetables, fruit, and fish. We bought some things including some tasty avocados and fish.

That afternoon we walked to some nearby waterfalls in the Wallilabou Heritage Park and paid a small fee of $5 each to get in to enjoy the refreshing waterfalls and natural pool. Whilst there, we encountered giant bamboo, lots of lizards, and the most enormous wasps we’ve ever seen.

Walilabou is well-known for having some of the Pirates of the Caribbean films set in purpose-built buildings in the area, particularly Fort Royale. This set was used for a number of the films.

After hiking back down from the waterfall, we went to see if a local guy who we’d spoken to earlier in the day was there, he’d mentioned being able to cook us a BBQ on the beach. He saw us looking but by the time he got there we had gone back to the boat, to our surprise he came over on a surfboard and was very happy to cook the fish we had bought earlier and made us a pasta salad.

We ate and drank into the night, with many of his friends also coming to help and say hello. We also tried the famous “St. Vincent Sunset” rum, which was 84.5%! Anna and I mixed ours with ginger beer but (insert name here) had it with only a chaser of water.

We then sailed to another anchorage called Paradise Beach in Troumaker Bay, where we shore-tied once again and anchored in about 20 meters of water. This time we got help from a kind local fisherman and later bought a big fish from him that we had for dinner.

Anna and I hiked up a hill to Troumaker village, whilst Adam relaxed in a hammock onboard and prepared dinner. We made it to the top of the hill sweaty and hot but the view from the top was breath-taking, and Adam managed to take a picture of us as little specs in the distance.

We went to a bar in the village for a cold drink and got some homemade fudge for $1 in the bar we met a lovely 10-year-old girl who had just finished school for the day and needed to wait for her mum who worked there. She was incredably chatty and talked about all kinds of things, including how they still use the whip for disapline in schools in St. Vincent and the girl’s dislike of the “popular” kids.

That evening, we ate the fish we had bought whilst watching the sunset on deck and it was delicious!

As the sun set, some local fishermen attempted to catch a giant shoal of fish, it was all very excting to watch, but it appeared that they missed their chance, and they came back empty-handed. I hope they caught some the next night!

Next we’re off to St Lucia and Daisy arrives!

The Grenadines, Mayreau to Bequia

The Grenadines, Mayreau to Bequia

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A short sail on from our last post and we arrived at our first Eastern anchorage on this side of the Atlantic, called Windward Bay. The submerged reef turned out to be quite a good swell barrier and although this wasn’t the best anchorage we’ve been to, it was a fun experiment.

Sailing boat Danae were also there and we were both tucked into the most norther corner of the bay, the only boats there.

Danae at sunset, Mayreau Island

We went for a little drink with them in the evening and also discovered just how bright our anchor light is when there’s no other lights or moon around, we were anchored close enough together that Hannah Penn’s anchor light at the very top of our main mast was bright enough that it gave light to see in Danae’s cockpit! It does make finding her in a busy anchorage at night quite easy.. she’s always the shortest and brightest.

In the morning we couldn’t resist another quick dip before sailing onwards so threw on our snorkeling stuff and found the sea bed full of starfish of all different colours.

A sand dollar, when alive these creatures are fury

We are really enjoying how clear the water is around here and what interesting things we come across on the sea bed when you can get up close and personal.

Being fairly self sufficient on a boat means you’ve got to do some baking if you want bread and tasty treats, going to the store is not always an option, especially here in the Caribbean, many shops are very basic, some don’t even have fridges, freezers or bread. So our latest bake-off challenge were sourdough bagels!

Bagels do take a long time to make, particularly sourdough, but if thought of in advance they are totally worth it. You’ll be able to read about all our sourdough recipes and other great boat recipes in an upcoming post.

Next we planned on sailing to Mustique which was north east from our location, but it turned out the wind was more of  northeasterly that day than expected so instead of slogging upwind for hours we decided to miss out that island and go straight to Bequia instead. We still had to sail as close to the wind as possible to make it to the island wich meant healing over pretty far, enough that the deck would sometimes be in the water during gusts. It made for a fun sail.

Getting to Bequia earlier than originally planned was a good decision as we had 3 lovely days there with some land ans sea based exploring and more good food!

There was also a very cool floating bar in the middle of the anchorage, which was so rammed one night that they were scared the whole thing would tip up and we’d be in the sea! So we all spread out evenly after that!

Another walk took us up Hamilton lookout with spectacular views over the bay.

After a little more relaxation we moved on from our first anchor location, to the northern end of the anchorage to make the dinghy ride shorter to a wreck we were interested in seeing.


We went to see ‘Bequia Tug wreck’ on the 16th January after being told about it by another cruising couple who said it was their best wreck yet. Although the water could have have a little clearer that day, it was still very impressive, having been down there for quite some time, sea life had completely enveloped the boats carcass creating a mini ecosystem.

The top of this wreck was about at my limit of free diving depth so you can see in one of the videos Adam helping me down so as to not use up precious oxygen before seeing anything cool!

That about wraps up the Grenadines, and now we are on to St Vincent, but that’s all for the next post.

The Grenadines, Mayreau resort

The Grenadines, Mayreau resort

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In the last post we said about a resort day.. Well here we are! We decided to go all out and have a fully inclusive resort day with lunch and dinner and all the cocktails we could drink!.. 10am cocktails here we come.

We made friends with the manager, and after dinner he took us to Dennis’s Bar where we learnt the lyrics to “Rock your sexy body” by Dennis himself. There were goats sleeping on the road on the way back so of course had to give them a cuddle and one last custom cocktail in the resort bar before heading back to Hannah Penn for the night.

Dennis’s Bar near Mayreau beach resort

It was a very relaxing and enjoyable day and night, though the night resulted in a very lazy next morning!

But here began the next round of dinghy pains 🙁 And a fix that unfortunately didn’t hold. The three of us paddled home in a very sad dinghy that night, because at some point during the day it had got caught under the jetty and punctured a tube, luckily we found the hole with some soapy water and repaired it quickly.

All patched up

With our dinghy fixed, we went to explore a wreck nearby to the resort

That strange looking fish is a porcupine fish, a particularly big one, they can puff up their bodies much like a puffer fish can. This was the first time we’ve seen lobsters too 🦞
We have since been to clearer wrecks so more pictures to come!

Next we are heading around to the east side of this island to anchorage only protected from the Atlantic ocean by an underwater reef, fingers crossed we get some sleep!

Find out more next time…

The Grenadines, Tobago Cays

The Grenadines, Tobago Cays

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The Grenadines were a beautiful group of many islands that we managed to explore for just over 2 weeks, although the same amount of time again would have been even better. There were lots of Islands that we didn’t manage to see. This post is only the beginning!

It’s the 7th of January and from where we were in Clifton harbor where we caught up with some of our boat friends from the other side of the Atlantic, we are off to the Tobago Cays. From our own research and some local knowledge from a very helpful cafe owner, we knew this was going to be a great experience and the underwater life did not disappoint!

On the way from Union to the Cays we caught a barracuda, and I genuinely didn’t think I’d ever eat barracuda but it was one of the tastiest fish we’ve caught so far!

We had the barracuda for two main meals including tempura battered fish tacos with couscous and peach salsa.

Fully reefed sailing towards Tobago Cays
An excellent Baracuda catch, we tie a string through the tail when filleting so we don’t lose it overboard
Battered barracuda tacos

We picked up a mooring buoy in the channel just north of Petit Rameau island, anchorage fees here are the same as a mooring buoy so we thought it best not to risk damage to the underwater ecosystem and get a mooring. On arrival, we saw Danae had already got there and Artemis came in just behind and to our excitement, there were 3 buoys all in a row which Danae got an excellent picture of with their drone.

We got in the water to discover what couldn’t be seen from above, right under the boat we had turtles and more barracudas and further away we saw turtle after turtle after turtle, all totally relaxed about us being in the water with them, then came sting rays, Eagle rays, and beautiful fish. Anna even spotted a reef shark!

Sting ray with trunk fish all around
Same sting ray!
Spotted Eagle ray foraging
This little one had an itchy face as he swims away! Rather cute

Whilst at the Tobago Cays a boat came by to talk to us about a place with free moorings (not a common thing around here) at a resort with 3 pools, multiple bars, and a lovely beach, we decided to take them up on the offer of free mooring and pool use when we were definitely in need of a real shower!

But that’s for the next post 😉

Barbados to the Grenadines

Barbados to the Grenadines

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We set off for our 100nm sail from Bridgetown, Barbados in the afternoon to give us a little daylight before sailing through the night and arriving with plenty of daylight the following day. This was Anna’s first night-sail experience so we were keen to have a fairly relaxed downwind sail. She took it all in her stride without even a hint of seasickness, Woop woop!

We set out with a fully reefed main and gull-winged genoa as we expected a brisk 20 or so knots, all went perfectly to plan and we were in view of the islands as dawn came around. We did end up a little farther north than first planned, due to wanting to maintain our sail plan, which meant the wind pushed us to where it wanted! Although this actually made the transition from deep water to shallower water around the islands easier, and then the sea was flatter on the west side of the various islands.

We stopped at the island of Canouan to check in, get some local currency (now Eastern Caribbean Dollars) and stop at a little beachfront cafe for some lunch. They even had a cute treetop table that we had to try, but aborted halfway through eating when a torrential downpour came through and everyone made a beeline for the cafe interior.

We knew sy_danae and sy.artemis were already a little way south of us on Union Island so naturally we set off again for a few miles more to reach Chatham bay. It was a busy anchorage but luckily there was room for us to squeeze in close to Danae.

We were very glad that the sea bed was sand (the best holding for an anchor) as the bay was incredibly gusty, one minute there would be no wind and Hannah Penn would bounce forward on the anchor chain and then there would be 30+knots. Interestingly when a gust comes and the boat was not already pulling back on the anchor, the bow will get pushed downwind, meaning you’ll turn sideways onto the wind, and then as the chain tightens, the boat gets slow motion whiplash as the bow is pulled back around.

This happened every half an hour or so all day and night, so we definitely set our trusty anchor alarm!

After being happy with how the anchor was holding, we headed to shore with everyone to have a great catch-up on how everyone’s Atlantic crossing went, and how many things got broken! We think Danae did the best in terms of not breaking anything but it catches up with them at a later date, stay tuned for our time in St Lucia for the story!

So during our chatting, we got onto talking about dinghies flipping over, which Artemis had experienced a couple of times now.. with their engine on…

The next morning a couple came by and knocked on our hull, about something, and you’ve guessed it, we forgot to take the engine off the dinghy before we went to bed, a gust had flipped it in the night and we looked out to find a sad looking little propellor sticking out of the water.

Time for the dinghy engine resuscitation procedure!…

I cleaned the seawater out with lots of fresh water and then got to work taking it apart and meticulously cleaning and re-greasing everything to prevent corrosion. For a while, the gear had been fairly stiff and we thought this service would be exactly what it needed. So all back together and working perfectly we set off to pick up Michel from Artemis for a snorkeling session, we got to their boat and changed from forward to neutral, loaded him and gear in, and went to change to forward only to find it was jammed in neutral :|not ideal!

Getting memories of our outboard engine oil change back in the Isles of Scilly.

We all went in his dinghy and afterwards I took the engine apart for the second time that day!… now we have a dinghy engine permanently stuck in forward, so slightly more useful than neutral but still not ideal. Beggers can’t be choosers I suppose!

After a mildly stressful day we were looking forward to a Full moon party on the other side of the island so we sailed (with motor too because we were running late and didn’t want to arrive after dark) to clifton harbor. The mooring field was packed and as the sun had just about set we got ourselves on a bouy instead of worrying about anchoring.

View from southeast side of Union island, heading towards Clifton Harbour

It turned out the party was canceled for some unknown reason so we all went to the Happy Island Reef bar instead and had the place to ourselves, it was a lovely time to talk to other boats we hadn’t seen since before the Atlantic ocean

More island exploring to come as we head to Tobago Cays and lots of others.

Barbados

Barbados

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Barbados was the first Caribbean stop for us.

Arrival

Celebrating with a cocktail

We were very happy to see land and flat seas to anchor in on the west side of the island after our 20 day Atlantic crossing.

The first stop on the list was Port St Charles in the north, where we anchored upon arrival, and had the first full night of sleep in 20 days!

We started the check-in process that day and also headed to the closest restaurant to spend some relaxing time on land celebrating our achievement.

Nothing like tasty fish and chips, and a fancy pizza after 20 days at sea, the last few of which we mainly ate easy food like instant noodles.

Christmas

The next thing on our minds was how to celebrate Christmas, which was coming up in a few days time.

In style of course! We booked an AirBnB that we could dinghy to from the boat for 2 nights and started preparing for a sunny Christmas celebration.

We had decorations, a beach view, air conditioning, Christmas movies, but most importantly a full roast dinner, with all the trimmings, homemade of course!

Exploration

After Christmas, there was exploring that had to happen ahead of the arrival of our next guest, Anna, who would arrive on new years eve.

You can anchor down most of the west coast of Barbados, but you’ll find most people stopping for the night either in the north at Port St Charles, or down south in Bridgetown.

Needless to say, our exploration took us into the water with snorkels, masks and fins, and we found the water temperature to be lovely, and the snorkeling to be great!

We were seeing coral for the first time, lots of tropical fish, and the visibility is great! (Though writing this 1 month after being there, there is much better snorkeling to come!)

Best of all, some turtles, busy eating right next to our anchored boat!!!!

Our explorations were not only water-based, and we headed to land one evening to go and watch the new Avatar film in the cinema which we loved 🙂

New Years

We discovered that with our RYA membership, we could get a 1 week reciprocal membership at the Barbados yacht club. They also happened to be throwing a new years eve party which we decided to attend.

Anna arrived on new years eve, and after a little trouble getting a taxi to the right place, we were celebrating in style with a DJ on the beach and enough rum punch to drown a small goat.

Best of all, fireworks at midnight (though one of these did slightly melt part of our dinghy)

Off we go

We explored the coast more with Anna, and on the 4th of January after around 2 weeks in Barbados, we put our sails up again and headed on to St Vincent & the Grenadines.

2 weeks of fun in Mindelo

2 weeks of fun in Mindelo

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We weren’t planning on spending 2 weeks in the Mindelo marina, but we ended up deciding to do a bunch of boat jobs, including fitting a new solar panel, while also waiting for a weather window that started off with some days of less than 2.5m swell.

We also planned on heading out to the anchorage to wait for this window, but with everything, we were doing aboard, the extra convenience of being able to walk off the boat onto the dock was amazing. And the marina was too expensive.

Mindelo marina, pontoon B, featuring Extres and Danae

Turtles

A short taxi ride from the marina on the south side of the island was a little bay well known for its turtles.

We are not sure if the turtles naturally like coming to this bay, we heard that the locals of the beach treat them a little bit like pets feeding them etc (not ideal), which probably explains why they are always there and why the spot has touristy “turtle tours” etc.

Nonetheless, we went to check out the beach and turtles without the tour, and we were not disappointed, getting some of our best underwater turtle pics and vids yet.

This beach and experience were slightly ruined by a “crazy lady” that was at the beach swearing at people and even throwing rocks at 1 group of girls… No idea what was happening here, but everyone left the beach safely at the end of the day…

Santo Antão

Santo Antão is the westernmost island of Cape Verde. We didn’t anchor there (not sure if you are actually allowed), so instead got up early in the morning with a group of Dutch friends to get the ferry over to the island.

We were once again following other folks to and around the island, meaning we would have to do less thinking for ourselves! Great!

Arriving at the island we headed for a coffee before then hunting around for a decent price taxi to get us to the top of the island.

And it was a great idea to get this taxi, as the journey took us up rather high and would have taken hours to walk or bus to etc.

The road up to the top of the island was rather beautifully paved but was cobblestone, so riding in the back of a pickup truck was interesting at times.

As we got higher the air began to cool, it was wonderful.

Once at the top of the island we could walk up and out of the canyon, an down the other side of the island, where the same taxi would be waiting for us at the beach.

The walk was absolutely beautiful, the canyon was full of greenery, and as we descended the far side of the island we were surrounded by irrigated fields, trees, plants, and animals.

We stopped for lunch at a little restaurant in a town before the beach where we had spaghetti for 10. Realizing we were slightly behind schedule we had to grab another taxi for the last 45 minutes of walking, down toward the beach we were being collected from.

Spotting our actual taxi (the pickup truck) halfway toward the beach, we got out and switched over.

The journey back around the island was just as beautiful. We would see the rather small swell coming in from the north, ideally, this is what we would be setting off in in the coming days.

General shenanigans

While we were in Mindelo, the world cup was in full swing.

This led to multiple trips to the local Irish sports bar to watch the Netherlands play with our friends (and England of course).

Just up the road, there was a very tasty ice cream shop.

We also had multiple meals out in various groups, and many many many beers at the floating bar in the Marina.