Antigua, Montserrat and Bonaire

Finally upped anchor and sailed away from Antigua on Wednesday morning 18th – uneventful first sail but Charlotte dreadfully seasick – patched her up with scopaderm.  The volcano oozed steam from its sides as we sailed past it.  We were joined by a pod of dolphins to wish us a great trip and sailed into Little Bay on Montserrat just before dark fell.  Very rolly anchorage.  On Thursday we took a guided trip around the island with Joe Phillip a veritable source of local knowledge.  Incredibly green and lush island with an amazing source of pure natural water which would be the envy of any other Island.  Several earthquakes occurred in 92 in the south of the island and in 94 another large quake.  In 95 after 400 years of peace the volcano erupted wiping out towns – the people were evacuated from their homes and told to take just a weekend bag – they were never to return to their homes.  So poignant driving around the island and taking in the devastation with roofs of houses visible poking out from the ash.  Extraordinary place.

We left on Friday at 10am for the journey to Bonaire.  No wind whatsoever which must absolutely be a first for us in the Caribbean and we therefore motored for 75 hours with just a couple of hours sailing managed.  It was a startling day with flat seas and glorious clear blue skies.  We stopped twice for swimming in the ocean miles from land – I’m afraid I was not brave enough to take the plunge!  We had numerous pods of dolphins joining us on the journey and I perched on the bow seat watching them jumping around in the bow waves – totally magical they are the most wonderful creatures and you can hear them talking to each other just such a privilege to witness.  Night two and I was quietly reading my book on my bed when suddenly out of the corner of my eye I saw something moving.  Plop.  A huge flying fish landed on the bed next to me!  It had launched itself through the open hatch and was a very surprise visitor!

Came into Bonaire in the Dutch Antilles around lunchtime on 23^rd and headed into the Marina which Oscar had been smart enough to book.  There is a fishing competition going on here at the end of the week and the marina is chock a block.  The moorings outside are only for boats up to 53’ so there is no other option for us – that and the fact that there is a big low coming through mean we are in the very safest place.  Trogged off with Malcolm and Deborah to hire a rental car and all we could get was a sort of American pick-up truck!  Everything else is rented to the fishing bods.  I drove it back to the marina and it is like driving a removal van – hysterical! We are going to have to stick Charlotte and Oscar in the back of the truck to go round the national park although they have rented a moped.

Bonaire is a fabulous and enormously popular diving place with crystal clear turquoise waters and reefs right around it.  It has a desert-like landscape with cacti growing everywhere.  You can literally walk into the water at the shoreline and go snorkelling or diving straight away on pristine reef systems.  The reefs are the healthiest and most densely populated ecosystem in the Caribbean – amazing.  We snorkelled out on Klein Bonaire which is a small (1500 acres) island off Bonaire main.  Nesting site for loggerhead turtles and very well protected.  The reef surrounds it not 50 yards offshore and you can snorkel along the side of it – Richard managed his first ever snorkelling – a really amazing achievement for him.  As well as a vast variety of tropical fish there were corals, sponges, sea fans, brain coral which really look just like a brain and anemones – it was truly awesome and I have never seen anything like this even in the Maldives.

Drove right round the island in the pickup to see what was on offer.  Very bumpy roads!  At one end of the island is a huge national park with bright pink flamingos using it as a feeding ground – the world’s largest flamingo sanctuary and one of the few remaining nesting places in the world for the pink flamingos.  I have never seen them in the wild and they were a magnificent sight.  At the other end old slave sheds and solar salt mountains – salt being a major export of the island for hundreds of years.    They look like blinding white hills of snow and inland a series of shallow bogs varying in colour from green to brown to almost pink stretch out for miles.  These are salt pans and as the water evaporates they leave the salt behind. Not far from them are little white stucco huts no more than five feet high – these are slave huts.  When the slaves had worked all day they would literally have to crawl inside on hands and knees as the entrance is tiny.  A very sobering sight.

Huge iguanas as big as three and four feet sun themselves.

An eco-tour kayaking trip was hysterical through the mangroves in Lac Bay with a wealth of bird life and acquatic life.  We at one point snorkelled through a tunnel in the mangrove which was really spooky and the current so strong coming back that it was really tough going.  When we came to get back in our kayaks Deborah nimbly leapt aboard whereupon Malcolm clambered in upending the kayak and pitching Deborah into the water!  Very funny and Malcolm even managed to stay totally dry!!

We had an hydraulic oil leak which we discovered – quite apart from the obvious problem it is hugely damaging to fibre glass.  Once Oscar (ably assisted by Malcolm and Richard) discovered that it was the hydraulics on the furler on the mast we had to take off the boom and dismantle the goose neck to access the pipes.  Antigua Rigging had replaced the vang and the hydraulics in Antigua and just neglected to do up a nut properly – intensely irritating when we have spent such care – not to mention a king’s ransom – to make sure Sophistikate was totally ready to go on her big trip.  The gooseneck was secured so firmly it took hours of Oscar hanging in a bosuns chair to sort out.  The boom is huge and removing and securing it to stay put whilst working on the mast was no mean feat.  Oscar and Charlotte have certainly earned January’s salary!!

We are planning to go to the National Park for the day tomorrow and then get ready to leave on Wed morning heading to Cartagena in Colombia.