Another day in paradise

January 10, 2022January 10, 2022 / FloatsOurBoat / 2 Comments

Would you like to hear a story about a regular old day for Capt. Mike and I? Just a Sunday that started our perfectly normal, and ended up a little bit special? Well, here goes!

Sunday January 2nd started slowly on anchor in Admiralty Bay, Bequia. The holiday buzz was over, and our energy levels were a bit low. Capt. Mike eventually motivated to cook leftover lobster into a red pepper-onion-lobster omelette, and I perked up a bit after a cup of strong coffee. Friends on SV Camino messaged, asking if we’d like to go for a hike. Why, yes! Of course! So we left the dirty dishes in the sink, grabbed our backpacks, and hopped into our dinghy, Bug.

Sunday roads are always light on traffic, so we enjoyed a peaceful walk away from Port Elizabeth, past several churches, ringing with hymns. Past the local pottery, and up, up, up the hill through the Springs community with its fabulous houses and colorful gardens. Only one wrong turn before we found ourselves at Spring View Park with its stunning views of the rough white caps between Bequia and St Vincent, and of the busy and populated southern coast of the main island of St Vincent itself. We shared the mystery of the massive rock labeled “Ursula” (When the founder of this community cheated on his wife Ursula with their nanny, did she drive over the cliff on her own violation in a state of despair? Or did hubby put a rock on the gas pedal to help get her out of his way?) For the first time ever, we weren’t the only people visiting this lovely park. Mike got the phone number of Meakly who has the key to the grill and kitchen facilities. Maybe we’ll come back with lots of friends and have a picnic next time!

Down, down, down a steep concrete road that has definitely never seen snow and ice, past the Firefly and the so called “Bequia Golf Club.” (You get to choose one club, and you go around the three-hole course twice. It’s pretty much cross country. Try not to lose your ball in the downed leaves, or in the thicket of dead palm fronds at the top of the tree on hole #2.) A quick ramble past an ornery mama cow on Spring Beach, and we were hot, tired, and thirsty and ready to finish the loop back to town. In search of a cold beverage and lunch, we climbed the steep wooden staircase to Coco’s restaurant where a party for a nine-year-old girl was going strong.

Unfortunately, the kitchen was closed except for this private party, but we were able to order cold rum punches and we all admired the little girl’s impressive blue dragon cake and sang Happy Birthday. Her grandfather, Mr Lulley came by to chat about his 30-year career in the US Merchant Marines, and his son who hoped to attend Maine Maritime College. What a coincidence! Our hiking buddies Shawn and Chantal’s sun graduated from Maine Maritime. And their best friend back home in Vermont went to the school with Mr. Lulley at maritime college back in Baltimore. We all exchanged cards and offers of “If you ever need anything…” and took selfies.

After the big party crowd cleared out, the owner of the restaurant, Coco, came out to chat about the business, the holidays, and COVID (we all can’t help but talk about COVID these days, right?) Then he said, “I’m going to offer you something, and I don’t want you to say no. I’m going to let you try my homemade West Indian food, and I don’t want any money for it. You can pay for the drinks, but the lunch is on me.” So, lo and behold, we’re now eating stewed chicken, rice and peas, green salad, and coleslaw, all on the house. Everything was delicious, the view from the patio was stunning as always, and of course we tipped very generously. I can’t wait to visit Coco on a regular business day to have another bowl of his fish chowder – the most delicious thing to eat on the island.

So the day that started with no plan except for breakfast, ended with a lovely hike, a birthday party, meeting friends of friends, and a free lunch! You never know what the day will bring when you leave yourself open to whatever happens 😀

Christmas in the Islands

January 8, 2022January 8, 2022 / FloatsOurBoat / 2 Comments

“I don’t want an icy Christmas, I’ve had enough. The only ice I wanna see must be in my cup.”
Shaggy: “No Icy Christmas” from the 2020 album Christmas in the Islands

Thank you Shaggy! My sentiments, exactly. While I sure miss my family desperately each festive holiday season, I don’t miss snow and ice one bit. I have fully embraced the sunny beach Christmas. And Bequia is a fabulous place to spend Christmas as a cruiser. The ARC (Atlantic Rally for Cruisers) finishes in St Lucia in December, so there are suddenly dozens of European boats that just crossed the Atlantic and over a hundred cruisers in a celebratory mood. And Bequia is so incredibly welcoming to boaters over the holidays, hosting potlucks and parties and events. This is our second year in a row celebrating Christmas and New Year’s here, and I can see why some cruisers return here year after year.

Of course, even this corner of paradise is not immune from Covid. This year, the Christmas light displays and fireworks were canceled. When I asked around to find out why, I received two answers: “The government wants to discourage large gatherings,” and “The community is really suffering economically due to the pandemic and the resulting loss of tourism. Electricity is the most expensive resource on the island and it feels wrong to light up the parks when so many families are struggling to pay their electric bills.” But the stores and restaurants are decorated, sometimes even in a nautical theme.

The nautical-themed Christmas tree at Dockside Marine

I tried to bring a bit of that Christmas spirit aboard Sanitas through baking festive treats. Now, I hate to bake. I get kind of tense and twitchy just looking at the ingredients and knowing I’ll have to measure accurately to get this thing to turn out properly. Plus, I’m a celiac and eat strictly gluten free and I try to stay healthy by limiting carbs. But it’s Christmas! So I whipped up a batch of gf chocolate chip cookies with red and green m&ms. (I had to buy two packets of m’s and dug through to pick out the red and green ones). I bought colorful dried fruit and peel in syrup from Knight’s Trading and baked it into a gf Irish soda bread. And I spread a thick layer of mince meat over an almond flour tart to approximate mince meat pies. I kind of think I nailed it. 😀

Now, every restaurant on the island was competing for our business for holiday dinners. But I accidentally wandered into the Porthole one afternoon and ordered a soda water and started chatting to the owner. The Porthole restaurant and mini mart is a Bequia institution, operated by Mr and Mrs T for 40 years and famous for its delicious rotis. The couple have gotten older and struggled to keep it up (not to mention Covid) so their son Gladwyn and his partner Linda moved back home from New York City to take over. They’ve put a ton of work into painting and modernizing and the place looks fantastic. Linda told me they were planning a grand opening party for Christmas Eve with lobster and Mrs T’s traditional recipes for salads and sides so I jumped at the chance! We shared a table with three other cruisers and had a lovely evening – Elvis played Christmas songs on the steel pan, the food was delicious and the wine flowed, and we finally experienced some Christmas cheer. Even if the dinner we were promised at 7:00 didn’t actually get served until 9:00. Island time, lol!

Poached lobster, breadfruit salad, stewed pigeon peas, cinnamon yams, green beans and christophene, green salad

The main event of a Bequia Christmas is without a doubt the Cruisers’ pot luck at the Fig Tree. The owners, Cheryl and Lafayette open the restaurant to sailors free of charge and light of the grills. And folks from all countries and all languages gather to grill meats, share sides and desserts, and drink festive cocktails. All within feet of the lapping waves against the Belmont Boardwalk. It’s a total blast, and I’m so grateful for the Fig Tree’s hospitality.

Last year on New Year’s Eve we partied like it was 1999….and then four out of the eight people at our table came down with COVID and had to isolate on their boats for weeks. This year, since we’re vaxed and boosted, we planned to go to the Frangipani for steel pan music and a DJ – we even bought tickets. But on the afternoon of New Year’s Eve, two of the most popular tourist restaurants on the island shut down suddenly because staff tested positive for Covid. We hemmed and hawed and decided not to risk it. Instead, a friend invited us over to his catamaran and we had a lovely little 5-person party on the deck with charcuterie and champagne. We could hear the music just fine from the anchorage – we didn’t miss a thing. And as midnight struck, the boaters made their own firework show, lighting off expired flares in the harbor (Cap. Mike did not like firey things raining down near Sanitas at all)

All in all, it was a lovely holiday, spent with good friends, and I enjoyed every minute of it! I hope you and yours had a wonderful holiday also – maybe even with a little snow, if that’s your thing.

A quick spin through the southern Grenadines

January 5, 2022January 5, 2022 / FloatsOurBoat / 2 Comments

Phew! We finally finished all of our boat maintenance and received all of our parts and packages and untied the lines from our mooring in Grenada. Hooray!!!

We picked a tight little weather window in the heavy Christmas winds and headed north with the goal of making it to Bequia in time for Christmas. First stop, Carriacou – the little sister island to Grenada with a much more laid back, island time feel. With only a couple nights in Tyrell Bay, we made sure to hit our favorite spots. Paradise Beach Club is absolutely amazing. It’s owner, Allison, remembered our names and Sanitas’s name, even though we last visited almost a year ago 😲 We spent a wonderful afternoon on the beach during Paint and Sip, admiring the wall of boat signs and enjoying delicious seared tuna Greek salad and fresh lime margaritas.

We were among the first to paint a sign. Now the entire wall is full!

Well fortified with that delicious meal, I prepared for our first international border crossing of the cruising season. I don’t know about you, but I sure never thought we would still be dealing with border closures and COVID restrictions at the dawn of 2022. This year, things are honestly a bit easier for fully vaccinated travelers – there are fewer requirements for long quarantines, for example. To travel by sea from Grenada to St Vincent and the Grenadines Team Sanitas took the following steps:

Submit an on-line pre-arrival form for each passenger
Submit a “Request for entry and quarantine aboard” form
Create a SailClear departure declaration for Grenada
Create a SailClear arrival form for SVG
Submit digital vaccination certificates
Document recent travel history
Get a PCR test at the clinic where swabs are sent the Grenada’s main island for processing. Wait impatiently for results
Wait for permission to enter SVG on our desired day
Upon arrival at Union Island, grab a quarantine mooring and dinghy ashore for health checks and processing

Processing at Clifton, Unions Island went quite smoothly, although it was slow and expensive. We joke that they slow-rolled the paperwork so that the Bougainvillea restaurant would get more of our tourist dollars as we sat at the bar waiting for nearly two hours. Hmmm, maybe it’s not a joke 😜 By contrast, friends who cleared into SVG at Bequia found a somewhat chaotic process and were required to stay in quarantine for over 24 hours. Pandemic travel is still not easy!

We’re not afraid of these tests anymore but they still aren’t fun!

If you ever visit The Grenadines, you must, must, must visit the Tobago Cays Marine Park. It’s a little slice of paradise on earth, with a cluster of small uninhabited islands nestled within a protective coral reef. Even with our high wind conditions, we were able to squeeze Sanitas right in between the two largest islands and picked up a park mooring ball. We were snug as a bug up close to the beach, where we could swim with turtles, linger on the white sand beach, and climb to the top of the island for stunning views. Last year, we and our sailing buddies had the park almost completely to ourselves. This year, tourism has picked up slightly. The number of French charter boats has increased quite a bit, and there are definitely more huge mega yachts in the grenadine waters. On the beach where we used to cook casual beach barbecues, there are now catered lunches for wealthy clients, complete with a steel pan band! We sunned ourselves on the small beach next to passengers from a French cruise ship where champagne corks were popped and everyone received a chilled glass before tenders fought them back to the ship. Too bad my French isn’t good enough yet for me to fit right in and sneak a glass! Of course, we met back up with our favorite hustler Romeo for a delightful lobster dinner on the beach. This is one of my favorite experiences in the islands – toes in the sand, sunset over the water, fairy lights, and an absolutely delicious feast of grilled Carribean spiny lobster, seasoned rice, veggies, garlic potatoes, and fruit. If you go, tell Romeo that Mike and Jenn of Sanitas say hello!

All too soon, we had to leave this paradise to continue our sail north to Bequia just to make sure we’d get there in time for the holidays. Winds were still quite fresh and between 30-50 degrees from the north, and seas about two meters high, but consistent. We kept the main double-reefed, and Capt. Mike chose a sail plan that kept us in deep water and sailing as close to the wind as Sanitas can manage. It was an exhilarating salty sail, and we arrived in Bequia just before sunset, ready to settle in for a month in our favorite grenadine island.

Highlights of a month in Grenada

December 20, 2021December 20, 2021 / FloatsOurBoat / 2 Comments

It has come to my attention that my last two blog posts about COVID travel and boat maintenance were a bit of a … well … downer. Don’t get me wrong! I’m not complaining. (Well, I am complaining just a little bit about the cost of a brand new water maker 😲) We also managed to fit in a lot of fun in the sun with friends from the tight knit sailing community.

I love me a tropical birthday celebration! And with this year being a biggie, I decided it was perfectly acceptable to celebrate all month long. A beach day at Le Phare Bleu with Karen and Steve on Soulshine, Sunday barbecue with live music at Aquarium with Music and Virtual Reality, and then the party-to-end-all-parties at Dave and Michelle’s gorgeous pool.

Dave and Michelle are sailors, usually living on a Catalina 42 sailboat named Half Baked. But this fall, they’ve had a sweet gig house sitting for friends stuck in the UK. They got permission to throw a massive pool party to celebrate Michelle’s birthday, and we decided to join forces and wallets to throw the party together and to celebrate both of us. What a blast! By the time we hired a bartender and a band, and spent a few days shopping, cooking, cleaning, and decorating, we had pretty much guaranteed that a good time would be had by all. Including the birthday girls! We’re so grateful for good friends and for their generosity. ♥️♥️♥️

Each time we visit Grenada, we try to explore a different corner of this beautiful country with its gorgeous mountains, rain forests, and waterfalls. This time, Steve and Karen drove us the Grand Etang national park and to Seven Sisters waterfalls. Pro tip: Even if you’ve recently hiked across the entire state of Vermont, and you’re feeling kind of cocky, you should still accept the offer of a bamboo walking stick when offered one. That jungle mud is slick! There’s nothing like a swim in the pool under a beautiful waterfall! Especially when you can end the day by celebrating your exertions with jerk chicken on a beach.

And even though the holidays look a little different here in the islands, we still celebrate them! We had a fabulous time attending our first Christmas party of the festive season with Petit Calvigny Yacht Club. Yes, Capt. Mike is now a member, how posh! Christina did a fabulous job with the holiday decorations and we all got into the spirit!

So, see? No need to worry about me. We’ve managed to balance the nasty boat yard repairs with friends, fun, and sun. And after all that, we even managed to provision Sanitas and to get her ready to start sailing again. ‘Cause that’s why we’re here, after all. Next blog post, we’re heading north! But for now, I’ll leave you with yet another beautiful sunset. 🌅

Grenada or bust! 🇬🇩 (aka more swabs up the nose)

May 17, 2021May 17, 2021 / FloatsOurBoat / Leave a comment

Way back in March 2020, we said to ourselves, “Let’s just sit tight through this Covid-19 thing, and we’ll be able to cruise again next year.” Cue 2021, and we’re STILL sitting tight and waiting for the world to open up again and to let us travel freely again. I’ve seen a lot of friends recently posting warm weather travel pictures on Instagram – and you’re mostly visiting US states territories such as the USVI, Puerto Rico, Hawaii, or the Florida Keys. So you get it! While travel is possible again these days, testing costs and quarantine requirements still make travel between countries tricky and expensive. Or maybe I’m just trying to convince myself that we made the right decision to spend five whole months in the Grenadines 😜

June 1st is the official start of hurricane season in the northern hemisphere so after our extended farewell party circuit of the Grenadines, we dug out our boat paperwork, To-Do lists, and links to government websites and started planning our trip back to Grenada. On May 1st, Grenada issued a new policy stating that fully vaccinated visitors could bypass most of quarantine. Hooray! Instead of the two-week quarantine we performed last year, vaccinated visitors just need to get a PCR test within 72 hours of arrival in Grenada, submit a bunch of health forms and documents, get tested again on arrival in Grenada, and quarantine on the boat until we get negative results from the arrival test – from 24-48 hours. This makes a lot of sense, and hopefully will allow the Caribbean islands to fully reopen to tourism in the fall. We used the two weeks after our second shot to say goodbye to all of our favorite places, as described in my last post, and then I went to work planning for a smooth transition between countries.

The swab up the nose doesn’t get any easier

Sunrise on Monday May 10 found the crew of Sanitas at the dinghy dock in Bequia, heading to the hospital for our “leaving SVG” Covid test. These tests must be processed manually in a lab on the main island. Test appointments are super early so that the nasal swabs can be put on a ferry and sent north to St Vincent. It sounds so logical but… island time! Capt. Mike and I sat on the ground in front of the tiny hospital from 6am until about 7:15 when we handed over 104ec per person (around $40) and finally were taken into an air conditioned shipping container and got the old swab up the nose. Our test didn’t make it on the first ferry, but they must have made it on the next one – we were thrilled to get our test results via email first thing Tuesday morning. By that time, we’d sailed back down to Union Island, the southernmost point available to clear out of SVG.

Negative test results in hand, I pestered the ports authority in Carriacou until they replied with an email granting us permission to sail to Tyrell Bay exactly five months to the day after we cleared in. How crazy is that? We cleared out on exactly the day our cruising permit expired and made the short nine-mile sail south. The travel gods continued to smile on us, as we passed our health assessment quickly, and before we even made it back to the boat, we got called back for our “arrival in Grenada” Covid test. Before noon on Wednesday, we settled in cheerfully on Sanitas, making the best of our 48-hour wait for results and freedom.

What do we do to occupy ourselves while confined to a teeny boat during quarantine? Well, I’m obviously catching up on blog posts 😀 We cooked up some comfort food treats, like homemade gluten free pizza, and a delicious steak dinner. We reviewed our To-Do list for prepping Sanitas for hurricane season, and started to check off a few items that could be performed in advance. We did more planning; booking our haul-out date and an apartment, and even booking flights back to the US. We binge watched a young adult fairy romance series on Netflix (don’t ask how the algorithm decided we’d enjoy that one) and rewatched both seasons of Derry Girls. We even (and this is a little pathetic in retrospect) packed go bags. So if we heard the Port Authority call us over the VHF radio, we could simply pull on our nicer “customs and immigration clothes”, grab backpacks stuffed with boat paperwork, wallets, and swim suits, and after clearing in we’d be all set to walk over to Paradise Beach to celebrate our freedom. But… Thursday crawled by. And Friday morning turned into Friday afternoon. And other boats in the quarantine anchorage started calling the ports authority asking when we could expect results. About 4:00 I got an e-mail addressed to “Dear Captains” stating that they hadn’t received our test results, so we’d have to stay in quarantine through the weekend. Say what? Our 48-hour quarantine just turned into five days. I didn’t bring enough Netflix or sweet and salty snacks for that much time!

Capt. Mike and I took turns being grouchy and then optimistic all weekend. We have a rule in our marriage that only one of us is allowed to be in a funk at a time. We polished stainless, wiped down closets with mildew killer, ate the rest of our cheese and crackers and chips and cookies, and somehow made it until Monday. Finally, at 10:30 we got the call on the radio to come in for our health clearance certificate. As I write this, it is 11:30 Monday morning, exactly 5 days or 120 hours after our supposedly 48-hour quarantine started. We brought our health certificate over to customs and immigration across town to FINALLY check in. The customs officer told us they are open from 1pm to 3pm. The officer must have seen my face, ’cause he said “ok, I know this is a stressful time. I can process you now” I gotta say, I’ve had my fill of Island Time for a while 🤣 We’re official now, and planning to sail to Grenada tomorrow. Phew!