13 May 2011 Saint Anne
It was a little rolly last night but OK. We had a quiet morning catching up on a few things.
We’ve been pretty lucky for the past two weeks as we’ve managed to get free Internet connections in Rodney Bay and Bequia. It looks like the hotels here are a bit more technically savvy and I can’t get a connection. I miss receiving email and having an Internet connection. In particular, I’ve been getting the weather forecast from various web sites, so I now have no idea if a tropical storm is developing in the Atlantic…
We went for a walk at half past ten. There is an interesting little walk up to a shrine at the top of the hill behind the church. The path winds its way up through tended grounds and at every turning point there is a small shrine depicting the various stages in the crucifixion of Christ. I think that there are about ten of them on the way up and each one has candles and rosaries left behind by penitent worshippers. At the top there are more shrines depicting the resurrection and a small chapel.
After a short walk around the little town, we walked along a coastal path to Grand Anse Des Salines. The peninsula is a nature reserve and the path is well maintained. It goes past the edge of mangrove swamps and along beautiful white beaches. It took us two hours to walk to Grand Anse Des Salines which is a lovely beach on the windward side with crashing surf and coconut palms. We had lunch in a small beach side café. It was revolting - all deep fried in grim tasting cooking oil. Even the chips tasted foul. We walked back along the road across the peninsula which took about an hour.
Back on the boat, it was very rolly and the grim lunch started to make us feel a little ill, so we mostly lounged about for the rest of the afternoon. I ran the generator and started the water maker. I noticed that there was some water dribbling down behind the watermaker. Further investigation revealed a leak on top of one of the osmosis filters which turned out to be a leaking high pressure fitting. I undid the connector and found that the O-ring is badly distorted and split lengthwise. The leak must have been happening for a while because the seat for the O-ring is corroded. I couldn’t find any spare O-rings, so I put some silicone grease on the original one, re-tightened the fitting and prayed. The operating pressure is 850psi, so I didn’t hold out much hope, but amazingly there is now no leak. I’ll buy a few spare O-rings and get the connector changed in St Lucia.
As dusk approached, I got out my fishing rod and Barracuda bait. I made a small bait bag out of a bit of mosquito netting, filled it with bits of fish and dropped it into the water to try to attract some fish. I managed to catch a couple needle fish, which are 2 foot long, 1½ inch diameter with long jaws with lots of sharp teeth. They are feisty little fighters on the light fishing rod and it was good fun to catch them. It’s amazing how catching one fish sets off a frenzy of activity in the other fish around. There must have been a big shoal of needle fish because there were lots of splashing and leaping going on. Rain stopped play early and I gutted the fish to put in the fridge. I’m not sure if we’ll eat them or use them for more bait – they look like they will have lots of bones. We had a light dinner of risotto and retired.
14 May 2011 Saint Anne to Anse A L’Ane, Martinique
It was a dreadful rolly night, with no wind and the odd spots of drizzle. I seemed to spend most of the night either hanging onto the bed or getting up to close or open hatches.
I was worried about the weather in the morning and tried to pick up a forecast from the SSB radio. Unfortunately, I was getting terrible reception from all of the weather stations that I tried. The SSB antenna is the back stay and there is an antenna tuner which is supposed to maximise the reception and transmission of the SSB radio. I must talk to someone about how to check that it is working – the manual is confusing.
Then, in a blinding flash of inspiration, I remembered that my phone will connect to the Internet. I dug it out of the drawer and ten minutes later, I had the Caribbean Offshore weather forecast from the National Hurricane Centre in Florida. Job sorted.
We dithered about after breakfast and eventually decided to go to Anse A L’Ane which is opposite Fort De France. The wind was fairly light and we initially motored downwind, rolling our guts out. Eventually the wind picked up enough for us to sail and the boat settled down to a reasonable motion. We sailed close to Diamond Rock which is a very steep-to small island which in the 1800’s was a British Naval Base with cannons to keep the French at bay.
We arrived in Anse A L’Ane just after lunch. It’s a nice sleepy little bay. We anchored quite a long way from the beach and chilled out. Later in the afternoon, we went ashore to buy some bread. It didn’t take long to walk around the little holiday resort. Thirty 30 minutes later we were back in the boat – been there done that.
Glenys cooked some chicken in the oven and has been struggled with the efficiency of the thing. It doesn’t seem to get hot enough to cook properly and because it is so slow, the galley gets very hot. On our previous boat, we had a cheap Flavel Vanessa cooker which was designed for a caravan and it was very efficient. I need to sort out what is wrong with this oven because a new cooker will cost about $1,000US and we can’t guarantee that a new one will be as good as Glenys remembers her old one.
While she had the oven on, Glenys cooked a couple of pieces of the needle fish. The flesh tasted nice but as suspected, there are lots of sharp sturdy bones – I’ll make the rest into bait. No fishing tonight because we’re in a marine park. Our plan is to chill out tomorrow and catch a ferry to Fort de France to do some more shopping before returning to St Lucia on Tuesday.
15 May 2011 Anse A L’Ane, Martinique
Reasonable night – not a lot of wind and it kept raining, but at least we weren’t rolling. It was hot and humid and we were visited by at least one mosquito. My strategy of spraying myself with insect repellent is working – Glenys had four bites and I only had one…
We lurked around all day. Glenys played with her oven and we decided that the seal on the front door is no good – another job for me to sort out. I played with my laptop most of the day – creating eBook versions of the Alba Chronicles. Not easy, but a nice intellectual challenge.
We went snorkelling just off the Iles a Ramirs, which is part of the Marine Park and was very good. There was a surprising amount of fish life considering that this is a French island – they normally kill everything that swims. We spotted a nice Spiny Lobster that I would have grabbed if I’d only taken my snare.
A nice chilled out Sunday.