Guadeloupe One

We finally decided to leave Antigua on Sat morning and head 40 miles to the French island Guadeloupe. We left first thing in the morning and had a really wicked sail, averaging about 6.5 to 7 knots the whole way. Well the sail was wicked but me we got really worried about Wolverine. His heart was pounding so quickly we thought he was going to have a heart arrack. We thought it may be heat exhaustion as he is so furry, we put him in the aft cabin with a fan over him and he seemed to get better, by the time we arrived at the anchorage he was fine. We had a few patches of rain but that was cool its not like the dreaded rain back home, you kind of look forward to it to cool you down, its really refreshing. Anyway we arrive at a really nice anchorage on the north west of the island called Deshaies. The anchorage was so picturesque and the water was far better than Falmouth Harbour. We decided to stay for the weekend and leave on Monday morning.

It felt so nice to be here. It was so quiet and peaceful, especially after the last two weeks where everything is busy and it’s full up with mega rich yachts. We spent the weekend snorkelling, swimming and chilling out. The snorkelling was the highlight, we followed an Octopus around for ages and a turtle swam lesuirly past the boat. We played a few games of Scrabble where Sym stuffed me. I was not impressed, he beat me by a whole 100 points. That’s what you call a real thrashing. We rowed into town and beached our tender on the white lush sand. The town was really quaint and as you can imagine everyone spoke French – no one could understand a word of English. Can you believe here of all places we found a Spar. We got some meat and had pork chops and salad for dinner. It was quite expensive though, as everywhere seems to be these days, at the mo the pound is terrible and buys us one euro more or less.

Monday morning we went to go and do the dreaded check in with the authorities. This process usually takes hours and tends to cost a lot of dosh. Well- it was by far the best one ever, the paperwork was done in about 10 mins,( one paged form ) no questions asked and top of all entirely free. Even the water and rubbish was free. So far way better than Antigua. We left the anchorage for a short 14 mile sail around the corner to what was described as “diver’s paradise”. We dropped the hook in amazing waters and as usual jumped in the water to cool down and check anchor and saw loads of star fish.

We decided to put the engine on the tender and hop over to the small adjacent island called inlet Pigeon and do some snorkelling. Well it was the most breath taking place in the world and the variety of fish was amazing. We saw loads of puffer fish one mad box one that Sym had never seen before, we saw loads of parrot fish, gar fish , a yellow trumpet fish, stone fish an octopus and the best of all a sea turtle. Well recommended to anyone who wants to go diving in the Caribbean. As it was a popular dive site for tourists the fish were used to human contact and so not prone to legging it off. It was really cool day. We have just arrived back at the boat and had a hot shower and a beautiful dinner. We decided to stay for a few more days and chill out with the fish

St Johns

St Johns
After a few frustrating days of trying to use our ancient piece of crap computer we give up with it and search on line for a new one, wanting to spend as little as possible. Well it works out about 100 pound to send it from Britain and then we have to pay tax when it arrives. Despite how bloody expensive it is here we are left with no choice but to go to St Johns and buy a new one. St Johns is the biggest city on the island and is a really loud busy place full of character and definaley worth a visit. We end up eating fried chicken and rice from a local food place which was lush. a hi to Marlene from the store. Anyways we have a walk round, where sym goes to the shop unsupervised to get a bit of shopping and as he was leaving he picked up a couple of "free" newspapers. I noticed when he got back that they actually shouyld of cost 4 pound a piece. Sym lucky not to be arrested for shop lifting. We catch the lovely air conditioned bus back. The weather has been boiling here the last few days so hot that sym has rigged up our bimini to keep us in shade when on the boat. We finally managed to get a lap top and had a long chat with my sis on Skype. Is such a releif to have this, cos now we can chat as much as we like without spending a penny. Phonecalls has been so expensive since we left Britain. After a few rum punchs in the Mad Mongoose using the free wifi we go over to Aliisa where Aninna cooks beautiful chili potatoes and burn to a crisp meatballs. Ha ha. Well done Annina.We when got back to Quartemoon we took our bedding out on the deck and slept outside where it was lovely and cool, until early hours of the morning when it started chucking it down and we had to leg it in quick.
Caribbean life rocks!!!!

Shirley Heights

We have spent the last few days relaxing and lounging around getting used to the caribbean chilled out lifestyle. Its amazing here and we are having not problem fitting in. We spent the last couple of days anchored up in English Harbour. We did not make to to sign in with customs on the first day we arrived cos as you know we were slightly hungover from celebrating our arrival. We were charged $50 for having to get a vet out and to come and visit the boat to check that the rabies certificate was legal. It was a bit irritating really because we have a book with all the countires and legal procedures with the cats, and it did say that there were no additional charges for Antigua. Well nevermind, i was surprised it was only that much considering how expensive the rest of the island is to buy things. We chilled out for a few days doing a bit of swimming and snorkelling and walking on the beauitfull beaches. The view from our boat was to die for. We bumped into some friends of us on Yacht Ayesha ( where we met them in Maderia) They had a really terrible crossing and their mast fell down, 500 miles off the coast of Antigua. Their Auto pilot broke aswell and they got caught out in a 10 hour storm of over 40 knots. Jesus christ, when i heard that story i realised how lucky we were, looking back our crossing went sweet. They have to wait three months for a mast to be delivered so by the time it comes it will be time for them to cross the atlantic again and head back to Britain.Poor buggers. Anyways we start the engine and motor round to Falmouith harbour which only takes about 5 minutes and we anchor by Aliisa.The amount of money here is crazy. We are anchored up by the richest yachts "mega yachts as they are called" in the world. We are anchored next to Maltesse Falcon, reommend you google it. It has computerised sails and its so big they measure the fuel in tons not litres.It costs about 300,000 pounds a week to charter it!Its the most expensive luxurious yacht ive ever seen.

On thursday afternooon we decide to go and do a bit of site seeing up at Shirley Heights, the pictures ill dowmload on here does not to it the full justice , but it was absolutley gorgeous and we had a view looking over the two bays. We end up having a wicked time drinking rum punch and decide to walk back down, ( quite merry ) and go on a bit of a pub / beach shack crawl. On the way we stumble across a man who on his way home from the pub riding a donkey. Pretty cool way of transport when your pissed up i suppose cos at least no one else is at risk. Me and Lauri could help but ask him for a go, and when i get my turn, i try and get on and the donkeys leg buckles and he falls down. Ummm nice, did not realise i was that heafty. Sym has been laughing about it for days now.We end up having a good meal in a local restaurant where i tried curried goat which was really surprisinly good and Annina had Jerk chicken. $100 later wqe decide to roll on home and hit the sac.

Arrive in Antigua / Paradise!!

Well the last day the wind picks up so much we are travelling at about 7 knots with only a tiny amount of sail up. It looks like we are going to arrive in the evening which is not ideal. We found out on the way our paper charts ended just before Antigua begins! Great. We decide to heave to for the night a few miles off the coast and wait until morning. I was not mad for a night entry partly cos after travelling that far i really wanted to actually see the place, arriving at night is stressful and you miss out on eveything! If we had not of slowed up the day before we probably could of made it, but hey whats a extra day after a couple of weeks.

Well , oh my god this place is amazing.The sun is shining , the water is like amazing and we drop our anchor a few metres from a white sand beach with palm trees and hamacks. It looks like paradise. We are both so happy we cannot stop grinning. The first thing we do is dive in the water and then settle down for liquid breakfast. We have decided it does not matter what time of the day it is when we arrive after a long sail we always crack open bottle of sparkling!!Well it knocked me for six and i was pissed by 10 in the morning!! Well we totally deserved it !!

Our friends off Aliisa radio us in the morning and they ve got wine cooling waiting for us to arrive. Sweet!! It feels so good to meet up and see a familiar face after a few weeks.We row ashore and then find out how bloody expensive everyhting is here!! jesus we went and had breakfast and it was £7 for two muffins with poached eggs on top. We met up with Aliisa and had a wicked day.We ended up having a few drinks in this cool bar where we starting getting a bit roudy! The bar lady was so sweet and gave my the recipe for the lush cocktails i was drinking. The people here are so friendly. We leave the bar after few hours cos we figure that if we carry on drinking we will spend our budget for the month.
We go for a few drinks on Aliisa and row past these mega yachts hundreds of feet long worth millions. There is so much money flying aboutits unreal, i wish they would give me some. The distribution of wealth seems so unfair. We learnt that the captain of the boat is on 12000 dollars a month, pretty sweet a!!
We end the night back on Quartermoon where sym knocks up amazing chinese food for us all. Top quality.Then after that is a bit of a blur, i lost my memory after the whsikey and baileys shots !I wake up fully clothed on the sofa at 5 in the morning and the place looks like it been robbed!!!
Brillant night though. Gutted Aliisa are leaving in a few days to head north!!

Last few days

Oh my god, this has definately been the slowest part of the trip. Because we are so close i keep checking the gps all the time even though i know roughly our progress. This I would not advise to anyone cos it makes the trip go so slow!! Day 14 we only had 160 miles to go , so we thought if we nailed it with full sails doing 8 ish knots we would make it the following day by sun down. Low and behold that evening the wind dies down and we are sailing at about 4 knots. It looks like the day after is more likley.
That night on shift sym wakes me up scream like a girl. He was lying down cat napping which he always does on his watch and something landed on his face. He thought it might be a flying fish so after the shock he touches it and it was fury and soft. He shines the torch and its a dead bird!!!!! it had only gone and flown into our wind charger, got minced up and landed on Syms head! That poor bird had to be the unluckiest bird ever, the chances of running into a boat in such a big ocean are so majorly slim. Im just glad it did not land on my face!! im laughing soo much writing this i have tears my eyes!!

Over half way!!!!!

7th January 2009.
We now have only 615 miles to go, which is amazing news, it feels like we have been on this boat forever. We are so excited now, we figure we ll get to Antigua on Sunday or Monday at the latest.
It been a while since ive written in this blog for the pure fact that im really bored and nothing much worth while has been happening. We hit the half way mark a few days ago which was a good feeling, we had a bottle of bubbly to celebrate but the weather was a bit crappy. We were doing about 8 knots with showers for most of the day. As it turned out the following day was hot sunshine and no wind which was the first time in ages so it was really nice to get a break from it. I cooked Sym chicken ( which we bought from La Gomera and it was Vac packed so had a massive date on it - the chicken was a right scam at 5 quid for the size of a sparrow)) but it was well worth it. We wished we bought more!!We cracked open our cava and had a lush day.

The days all seem to role into one really. For example most days I get up about 10 ish we have breakfast, do some exercises ( 100 sit ups and jogging on the spot) which I must admit we have missed out a few times, cos its pretty damn difficult when it windy and the boat is all over the shop ) Anyway, we usually then have a shower on deck with buckets of sea water and then rinse off in the solar shower. Then the rest of the afternoon comprises of reading books, cat napping sunbathing and more reading till the evening, when we out the engine on for a hour to charge up the batteries and settle down after dinner and watch a couple of movies. Movies have been life saver on this trip cos it kills time and it’s the first time in the day when you forget your sailing and chill out ( I don’t know if that’s a good or bad thing ) either way we look forward to them. I must also say that im really surprised how well we have eaten on this trip. Sym is the master in the kitchen and we have been eating some delicious meals even in rough weather. He cooked Chinese last night, ( pork with onion and mushroom with fresh garlic, ginger and chilli, served with egg fried rice. Yum Yum. We ve had pasta with freshly made tomato base some Indian birani dishes. He s cooked a few cakes, fresh bread a few times and weve even had bacon and eggs sarnies for breakfast. We had pancakes wicked pizza baguettes!!Its been lush, but all this food and lack of exercise is turning me into a fat mother and a strict diet is in order when we reach the Caribbean.
We had our strongest squall today of 30 odd knots which is fine, I was expecting worse, but the trip is not over yet I suppose. The weather has been up and down , not much wind today but we are making good headway. Our mate from back home Jewels checks in every now and then with some updated weather information which is well handy and much appreciated. So all looking good so far. Tomorrow we will be about three quarters of the way there. Antigua here we come baby!!!!!!!!!!!!