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18th January - 22nd January 2005
motion under a brisk sea; the wind howling in the rigging and rustling your hair; dodging the salty
spray thrown off the bow-wave; watching the glow of morning appear on the dawn watch after a
night passage; new horizons each day, unfamiliar landfalls waiting to be explored… so finally,
time to cast off and head back to sea again….
After final farewells to Gerald and Terry Hinxman (en route back to London) and Molly McDaniel
(our St Lucia hostess), we concluded preparations and set off from Rodney Bay Marina mid-
afternoon on the 18th January. With a 23-hour passage ahead, we settled back into the rhythm of
being just us two aboard again as we sailed northwards into a beautiful sunset, and then
overnight past the lights of the French island of Martinique, reaching the lush, green and
mountainous island of Dominica at 3pm the next day. On approach, we were met by the local
boat-boys in their speedboats - ever eager to out-compete each other for business - nearly 2
miles offshore(!); after negotiating their services and receiving complimentary bunches of
bananas (Dominica’s primary export) we dropped anchor in Portsmouth Harbour at the NW of
the island, had a quick excursion ashore to clear customs etc, then – being very tired after little
sleep on the night passage – passed out (without dinner!) just after sunset…
The next morning we were up at 6am for an early start with our boat-boy Martin “Providence” on
a guided tour up the densely rain-forested Indian River – in the pouring rain! Despite the deluge it
was very interesting to get deep into heavy lush vegetation, on a rowing boat, by ourselves, with
the canopy completely enclosed overhead and wildlife all about. We followed this with an all-day
trip around the north-half of the island by minibus taxi, with an interesting drive along the windward
coast, visits to the indigenous Carib territory (bequeathed by the British a century ago), and a
short hike into the rainforest to reach the beautiful Emerald pool & waterfall.
We loved the laid-back atmosphere on Dominica, the least developed place we've been to in the
Caribbean, and could well imagine spending more time there, so maybe one day... It's
mountainous interior is a 'World Heritage Site' for the variety of it's unique flora and fauna,
including their various famous species of brightly coloured parrots, but sadly we had no time for
serious jungle trekking; another time? Only one problem with the island; the rainforest lived up to
it's name, and it rained on-and-off constantly, while out to sea we could see permanent and
enticing blue sky!!!
From there we set off early on the 20th and sailed across to Les Saintes - a really lovely group of
islands off (and part of) the French territory of Guadeloupe, with peaceful picturesque
anchorages, and an odd collection of French locals who seem to have made it an artists colony
of sorts. We dinghy’d ashore to explore, and discovered the whiff of Paris – bright cafes lined the
little street, boulangeries emitted their irresistible smell, and the mini-marts were stocked with
imports from the homeland. We stocked up on French wine & mustard, commodities that were
hard to come by elsewhere, then returned to Skardu in her lovely little anchorage.
Les Saintes, Guadaloupe
Eager to make progress, we advanced plans, upped anchor, and set off at 8.30PM for the
overnight sail past Guadeloupe towards Antigua: this proved to be a hard sail into the wind, and at
3am we had the alarming discovery of an engine that wouldn’t start! This is never a good
scenario on a yacht, particularly at night, when your sailing into a shifting wind along an unfamiliar
coastline – emergency procedures may depend on propulsion, and battery power is recharged
by an electric alternator on the engine (the former runs all our vital systems such as navigation
lights, depth-sounder, chart-plotting software, radar, autohelm etc. – without them we are unsafe
to be sailing at night!). It took us three hours of groggy rationalizing and troubleshooting in the dark
and cramped confines of the engine compartment to discover the fault and purr our beast back
into action – alarm over!
Passing the looming volcanic outline of Montserrat to our port, we reached Antigua the next
afternoon, and docked in English Harbour just in time to refuel and clear customs. That evening
we walked across to the adjacent Falmouth Harbour and wandered along the pontoons at the
high-end Yacht Club, and the Mega-Yacht marina, admiring the beauty of some of the world’s
largest and finest superyachts in their traditional home – this is where the air smells of serious
money, and vessels of great beauty and prowess are lovingly tendered to by an army of
permanent crew every day of the year. We gazed and assessed and compared and dreamed
– and concluded that for our current purpose, with a crew of two, Skardu would do us very nicely
thank-you! Of course if you were giving one away, there were a couple of lovely 65 footers we
wouldn’t mind trading in for… mere minnows compared to some of the 150 footers on the dock,
but still just manageable with a modest crew. Ah well, another dream to be shunted to the back
recesses of the mind!
As we returned ‘home’ that evening we reflected on a remarkable 5 days – a cross-sectional
path that had uncovered the broad diversity and striking contrasts of the Caribbean islands.
Les Saintes
