More Friends

 Friday 26th February 2010. 8,331 miles, day 497.  Carlisle Bay, Barbados.  13 deg 05'.35 N, 059deg 36'.68 W
Friday 5th March 2010.  8,475 miles, day 504.  Prickly Bay, Grenada.  11 deg 59'.96 N, 061deg 45'.68 W

Do you remember those wonderful friends of ours, who took an apartment in Barbados last year, to give us a surprise Christmas lunch after our Atlantic trip? They have come back to the island, so it was our turn to sneak up on them. This meant a bit of a detour off our route from Dominica to Bonaire – but what’s 500 miles between friends?

(This, by the way, is the reason the blog has been so out of date, we were trying to cover our tracks.)

We waited for a weather window before leaving Dominica, and were rewarded with a good sail for the last 24 hours, with the wind giving us a close reach all the way to the island. The current was against us, but that just seems to be a fact of life around here. Surely it’s not possible that our log is over-reading? Just as we left Dominica we came across a small pod of dolphins grazing in the shallows; one left his colleagues to join us for a way, apparently because we could give him a better back scratch than they could.  (Sorry, can't get the video to load.)

We managed to explore Barbados a little more than on our previous visit, getting away from the mega-rich developments on the coast into the beautiful central hills, covered with rolling sugar cane, and with spectacular views down to the surrounding ocean. Over towards the east of the island is St Nicholas Abbey, not, in fact, a religious establishment, but a marvellously well-kept Jacobean house, in the centre of its sugar cane estate. The house, which dates back to 1658, was bought a few years ago by a Barbadian architect, and the restoration of the gardens and the distillery is clearly a labour of love, overseen by two fine Moluccan Cockatoos, Lance and Baby.

We travelled up there by bus, a rather more organised and calm experience than the rambunctious free-lance minibuses of the other islands, noticing on the way that all the little bus shelters have girls’ names. Why girls only, we wondered, and who chooses them? The bus shelters are tidy and uniform little structures, painted white, picked out with the blue and gold of the Bajan flag.

Tomia anchored again in the beautiful clear waters of Carlisle Bay – not that we had any choice, as the only other place where yachts are permitted is the berth-holder only marina at Port St Charles. The whole of Barbados is a bit like this: stunningly beautiful, but largely exclusive. The surf crashing onto the beach gave us our usual wetting as we tried to come ashore to drink at one of the beach bars – at least we have learnt from our previous visit, and the mobile phone is securely in its waterproof pouch.

And then, after only five days, it’s off again, a further 130 miles to Grenada, a convenient stop off on our way to Bonaire, where Anthony’s son will meet us. To our delight, several friends from our previous visit are there, and we make the most of our time in a sociable way, as well, of course, as stopping off at the local chandlery to cosset Tomia a bit – no chance of her taking a back seat for long. The main expense this time is charts for the east coast of the US; after Bonaire we will be on our way north, leaving the Caribbean sunshine. While life will become easier there in many ways, and we shall be overwhelmed with culture and history, we shall leave a part of ourselves behind here with much regret.