Ten Reasons to Feel Awkward at the Willy T

Well, we survived our trip to the Willy T...just. It is everything that we thought it would be: drunk and debaucherous - just like an episode of Girls Gone Wild. Gary had to walk carefully to make sure he didn’t trip over his tongue that was hanging extraordinarily far out of his mouth.

We got ourselves a drink, after elbowing our way through a gaggle of scantily clad girls and their men of the minute (an hour is far too long).  It was once we had sat down that we began to feel rather out of place, and even awkward, given that we had forgotten to bring our blow up monkey.  So we took it upon ourselves to create the master list of 10 reasons to feel awkward at the Willy T:

1. You are fully clothed;
2. You are sober;
3. When choosing your outfit you left something to the imagination;
4. Your T shirt doesn’t read “your boat or mine”, ”ship-faced” or “it’s not a weekend, it’s a lifestyle”;
5. Your bikini isn’t fluro, frilly or failing;
6. You forgot to wear a tutu/captains hat/aviators/beer goggles;
7. You can measure your relationship in years not minutes or, heaven forbid, hours;
8. You’re not in line to jump off the top deck naked to get free drinks;
9. When offered a Quick F&%$ or S** on the Beach, you were expecting a beverage;
10. You leave with the same boy/girl you arrived with.

Gary described the Willy T as the ultimate Piedy party with girls.

The Willy T really is a fantastic place for the unmarried or really adventurous type.   We are just 8 years too late... and too married.

Bottom Dwelling Stuff

If you recall the blog Trinidad - the catch up where Kate is rather critical of my ability to keep items on the boat (or lack thereof), I have found that I am not alone in my crusade to throw everything over the side. 

We are back at Norman Island where ‘the tourists go’.  The spot around the corner called the caves has a bunch of day moorings for those that wish to snorkel and dive.  Being the inquisitive sort, I took a swim under the moorings to see what was there.  I found:

3 snorkels  - useful if I grow a few more mouths

1 mask good condition - sorry Larissa, finders keepers

1 Flipper - so I can swim in circles

1 head band - very useful if I decide to adopt the French sailor look

1 towel hardly used - although a little wet for immediate use

1 pair of pliers - quite possibly dropped in the same incident that resulted in...

1 three blade propeller approximately 16 inches in diameter.

Part two of this might be to swim around the moorings in the bay and see what other treasure I can find...

Oh and another thing,  the Bight at Norman island (the main anchorage) no longer has free wifi so we have been ‘forced’ to make a trip to the infamous Willy T.  Our trip there has nothing to with the antics that may or may not happen there... honest mum...

Christmas at the Bitter End

As Christmas approached, the bay filled with boats from 40ft charter boats to massive super yachts.  Richard Branson's Necker Belle was in at Bitter End, as was another yacht with it's blow up slide.

Many boats had decorated their masts with fairy lights, and on Christmas Eve the bay looked very festive.  From the shore, a steel pan band played Christmas tunes and from the boats people yahoo-ed their enjoyment, some honking their horns or blowing on conch shells.

On Christmas morning we woke to sunshine and presents.  Gary spent the morning playing with his new sextant and putting line on his new fishing rod while I stowed my moisturizers and cleansers that I had been in desperate need of for some time - Thanks Santa.

We headed in to the Bitter End early and had a stroll before sitting down to our Christmas dinner of seafood and salads, gingerbread and chocolate dipped strawberries.  

Thank You Santa

Dear Santa

Thank you for managing to find us while we are still on the other side of the world.  You must be a very good navigator.  Thank you for the sextant that you delivered to Toodles in the night.   I tried to use it this morning but I have not found the on switch yet.  The box was fun to play with though.

Santa,  also thank you for the new fishing rod to help with catching dinner while sailing downwind.  I know that this new rod will be well up to the challenge and hopefully now we are not at risk of loosing all the line before we can stop Toodles.  I really like the rod you got me as it came with 27kg line - good enough for marlin  although she-who-must-be-obeyed says I am not allowed to catch one. 

Ps,  I know asked for a chilli bin too but I do understand that a chillibin big enough for a marlin may not have been able to fit in your sleigh, or our boat.... maybe I should have asked for a bigger boat too so that the chilli bin would fit?

your sincerely

Gary

Back to the BVI: Home for Christmas

We left St Martin lagoon at the last bridge opening for the day.  As we waited for the bridge to open, we hung by the super yachts, watching the crew of each boat either polish the metal work or glass, or scrub the decks.

The smallest boat here is 100ft

We zipped through the bridge and anchored out in the rolly anchorage that overlooks a beautiful beach with high rise hotels on all sides.  We had a short sleep, falling asleep to the sound of a reggae band playing on the beach.

At 3am, still groggy and tired, we left St Martin for the BVI.  I cuddled up in the cockpit and watched the lights of St Martin disappear over the horizon.  

After a long days sail we arrived in the BVI, crossing through the passage between Virgin Gorda and Fallen Jerusalem that we had left so many months ago.   We had come full circle.  Coincidentally, we had arrived in the BVI on the exact day we had arrived in the BVI by plane one year ago.

Fallen Jerusalem

The Baths at Virgin Gorda

We checked in at Spanish Town.  As we tied the dinghy up, I looked over to the boatyard where my Dad had spent six months doing up his boat before his voyage back to New Zealand back in 2008.  Somehow it seems so right to begin our voyage back to New Zealand from the same spot.  

BVI feels like home to us.  Everywhere I turn I am reminded of the time I spent here with my Dad, and also the memories of the months Gary and I spent here on Toodles at the beginning of our adventure.  

We headed straight for North Sound making it just before night fall.  We passed the Sandpit, a beach set up for cruise ships, where Gary and I had played late one night once it had been abandoned.  We anchored in our usual spot by Bitter End Yacht Club.  To celebrate our year anniversary, we headed in for dinner.  We tied up at the beautiful dinghy dock, such a contrast to what we have now become used to, with underwater lights and no exposed rusty nails.  The boardwalk looked just the same, and it reminded me of the picture of me and my Dad walking along it that Gary and I attempted to replicate earlier this year.

We had dinner under the stars by candlelight, with sand at our feet.  

In the morning I was greeted to a beautiful sunny day that was cool enough to enjoy sitting on deck in the sun reading a magazine.

We are home.  Just in time for Christmas.

Cakes, Collisions and Criminals

We are truly back in civilization here in St Martin, and to be honest, we are loving it.  We haven't been spending the days trekking through rainforests or walking along deserted beaches.  Instead we have been having much more first world experiences.

When we go into town, we tie up our dinghy at the very nice dinghy dock outside the customs building.  Being a small island, the customs building is also the police station and local jail.  We often see cars parked outside yelling up to the small barred windows, having a good conversation about family gossip or how the kids are doing in school.  The recreation area of the jail is on the second floor and overlooks the main road.  If you happen to walk past at rec time, the extraordinarily polite inmates will call down, usually to Gary, informing him what a lucky guy he is to have such a wonderful woman.  

The Simpson Bay Jail/Police Station/Customs 

We often watch the big boats pass through into the lagoon when the bridge opens.  Yesterday, we watched a big barge heading into the lagoon to work on the causeway.  It was going to be tight, with only centermeters to spare.  Unfortunately, whether there were centremetres or millimeters to spare didn't matter in the end as it hit the concrete side of the canal anyway, taking out a big chunk as it went.

We are having trouble with the Internet, another disastrous first world problem, and are having to go into a cafe to get access.  Gary is finding this particularly difficult as he has to order a cake or pastry every time to justify our use of their Internet.  It's a pretty hard life.

St Martin: Simpson Bay Sludge and Leap Frog

Firstly, I must apologise for the title as it sounds more interesting that this blog will actually be, but read on.

In our first blog on St Martin (Life on the Lagoon) we wrote about the lagoon.  A lot has changed since we were last here, namely the large shallow anchoring space has been made a ‘no anchoring’ area while they build a causeway right across the lagoon.  Unfortunately for yachties that cannot afford the super yacht marina prices, we are all forced to congregate in a small area in close quarters to each other.  Which brings me to the title.

Simpson Bay Lagoon is a large landlocked puddle about 3m deep with only two entry/exits.  Because of this, and all of the earth works that are going on, there is a large layer of crap (figuratively and literally) that has collected in a 3ft layer on the bottom of the lagoon.  This is the Simpson Bay sludge.

This nice layer of sludge makes it practically impossible, even with our oversize “charter” anchor to get a good holding.  The other day we anchored with a 3 to 1 scope and found ourselves in very short order, about 100m from where we first dropped the anchor.  We realised this late at night and had to up anchor and try again in the dark.   The anchor came up unrecognisable as a big ball of crud.  Re-anchoring required 4 attempts. Now with a 7 to 1 scope, we have reasonable holding, but always are a bit apprehensive when we leave the boat. 

Late yesterday the wind blew.  Fortunately our oversized anchor and storm length of rode held us solid.  But not the boat in front of us.  To add to this, another boat had come in and anchored uncomfortably close to us.  As the evening drew on, and dark descended, we kept hoping that the owners of the dragging boat would arrive home and move before they hit us.  Moving our boat would be more difficult as our anchor was now underneath them.  Unfortunately, they never arrived home.  Perhaps this time the sludge helped us out, because in full throttle reverse we were able to drag our anchor out from under them and move. This time the anchor came up with an unexpected present of a new garden hose.  We played leap-frog and went in front of the dragging boat, taking their original anchoring spot. The boat that had anchored close to us was watching what was going on and before we had time to go and attend to the yacht that was slowly dragging, he was on board and moved them to the back of the herd.  Problem solved for everyone!

Now, with 35m of chain out in 3m of water we feel a little silly, but we still sleep with the anchor alarm on and get up several times a night to check our vicinity to other vessels.  Who would have thought that anchoring in a landlocked lagoon could be so stressful!

St Barts - where the rich are just richer

We have now been in the Caribbean nearly a year and have seen everything from the tourist cruising grounds of the BVI (which are fantastic) to the high mountains of Dominica to the oil and gas mecca of Trinidad.  After our 10-hour sail from Barbuda, drifting in to St Barts and heading to customs, we are again at awe of the amount of money that an island only 5nm long can attract.

The small harbour of Gustavia, St Barts is able to take super yachts up to 200ft.  Currently, as we sit at a retro café listening to French jazz funk music, there are three super yachts in the harbour.  The largest being 187 ft long and almost as wide as Toodles is long.  But these magnificent vessels do not define the richness that this island attracts.  Anchored out in the bay are two vessels that are TOO LARGE to come in to port, and not by a little, but by a lot.  The cruise liner, also in for the day, is only marginally bigger than the private super yachts.  Here, for some, money is endless. 

We love the lifestyle here too, not just the super yachts.  Old and young get around on Vespers, sporting an array of different coloured and upholstered helmets.   The women have big hats and even bigger handbags.  The men wear aviators and style their hair.  Everyone congregates at the local cafes in the morning for their coffee and croissant, and go past the bakery on their way home to pick up a baguette.  I image the population goes back to their mansion holiday homes for lunch, when the shops close, to sit by the pool, sip Bordeaux wine and munch on their baguette and brie.

But for us, as we sip on our shared coffee, juice and croissant, and watch the rich go by, we are still contented with our “little” 50 ft yacht.

The Barbuda Frigatebird Colony

We hitched a ride with Solomon the water taxi guy and headed to the Frigatebird colony, the largest colony in the Caribbean.  Our friends from Ocean Star happened to arrive in Barbuda minutes before we headed on the Tour, so we had the pleasure of their company too.

We timed our trip to Barbuda well, arriving just in time for the Frigatebird mating season.   The boy birds have a red pouch under their chin that they fill with air to impress the girls.   When the girls fly over the boys put on a show, puffing up their pouch and flapping their wings to show off their wing span.  The girls pick the boys based on the show and whether they have picked a good spot for the nest.  Once a boy has been chosen, he sucks his red pouch back in - he only gets one partner each mating season.

When mating season is over, and the young have reached an acceptable age, the boys from this colony fly to the Galapagos to begin mating season there.

Bike ride in Barbuda

We headed up the coast to Low Bay so that we could experience the bright lights of the main town, Codrington.  Low Bay was another beautiful pristine beach stretching for miles.  

We beached the dinghy, then pulled it over the sand bar and into the lagoon.  Across the lagoon and to Codrington we went. 

The local school

For reasons known only to him, Gary decided he should take me on an island tour...by bike.  Despite my protests and strong suggestion that this was not such a good idea seeing that I can’t ride a bike, we rented two bikes sans helmets.

The bike rental place was well located so that my first attempts to get on the bike were witnessed by the entire town that had conveniently congregated at the town square for lunch.  It wasn’t just the sniggering of school children, or the outright pointing and laughing by the adult men and women alike that caused maximum humiliation.  It was also when the helpful bike rental guy called across the street to ask whether I needed my seat lowered so that I could put my feet on the ground. (I joke, but he was actually really helpful). 

After a few false starts we were on our way, off towards Two Foot Bay...well at least we thought we were.  We took a wrong turn, and then a helpful passer by directed us in the opposite direction of Two Foot Bay, thinking we wanted to go to Pink Sand Beach.  So, unknowingly, off to Pink Sand Beach we went. 

I was still struggling with this bike riding thing.  Straight lines were all right, but turns were impossible.  Whether I went around a pothole or straight through was pure luck.  I also have a big bone to pick with the bike manufacturers.  Whoever decided that it was intuitive to back pedal to stop is an idiot.  It is not intuitive.  By the time that I had though “shit, I have to stop, how do I do that?” and manage to stop pedalling, I was already off the road, across the paddock and into a prickly bush.  Alternatively, I would stop pedalling, which usually meant taking my feet off the pedals, and attempt to put my feet on the ground which resulted in one badly stubbed big toe (of course we were riding bikes in jandals, what other shoes do you think we have?.

Along the way we saw horses and donkeys roaming free along the roadside.  Well, I saw them when I wasn’t concentrating on the two metres directly in front of me, or when a donkey or horse happened to be within those two metres.  The land here is communally owned and, while there are fences, it seems that generally animals are free to roam.  The ones we saw all appeared happy, well looked after and well fed – a sharp contrast to Anegada.

We made it to a sign which pointed the way to Pink Sand Beach, and also towards Cocoa Point which we knew was in the opposite direction of Two Foot Bay.  Since we were there already, we took a look at Pink Sand Beach.

We also found a kitten there.  Despite being very friendly, Gary still refused to let me keep it.  

So back towards Codrington we went, a 30-minute journey, then towards the other side of the island and Two Foot Bay.

By this point I was missing potholes at a rate better than chance.  The bike riding became a mental game between me and the pain in my bum.  This meant we needed to make frequent bum rest stops along the way. 

But finally, with cries of joy, we made it to Two Foot Bay Park.  We took the bumpy rail down towards the beach, making only one stop along the way to admire the rocky foreshore.  Unfortunately, all of Europe's rubbish seemed to have accumulated there after floating across the Atlantic.

Two Foot Bay itself, however, was rubbish free and pristine.  

                                     

We made it back to Codrington by nightfall, just in time for the town to be again congregated in the square to witness my hobbling down the street back to the dinghy dock.

Note:  While we had a fun day out on Barbuda, not all cruisers did.  Our New Zealand friends and their three young children unfortunately witnessed an act of extreme animal cruelty.  They saw a dog, only it’s head visible above the water, struggling at the rocky shoreline.  They went to help and after managing to pull the dog out of the water, found that it had been tied to a brick and obviously thrown in.  It’s paws were cut up and bloody from it’s attempts to crawl up the rocks, and the rope had dug into it’s flesh causing horrible wounds.  A local tour guide happened to be at Two Foot Bay also, but refused to help saying that this was just what happened to dogs when their owners got fed up with them.  In good Kiwi fashion, they called up the tourist office and managed to get a ride back into town with the dog.  The tourist office took the dog in and promised to get it medical attention.  Whether this in fact happened is unknown.  We hope that this is an isolated incident and that Barbudans generally have a better attitude towards animal cruelty, or if not, that they get one soon.  The incident has been reported to the authorities and to WSPA.