Sailing round St Vincent & the Grenadines

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One of those days! Got up early, watched the sun rise over St. Vincent. One of the neat things about these wet islands is that practically every morning there's a rainbow at sunrise, probably because it usually showers just before sunrise. I noticed that we'd dragged a bit, so when Peter got up he took the dinghy out to reset the stern anchor off the yacht. The stern anchor is necessary because the current between the mainland and Young Island runs at about 3 knots, slewing us one way, then the other, and with other boats around, all kinds of mishaps occur. We had a tough time setting the anchor, finally found a spot where it set, but it is 'way off the stern.

We then went into Kingstown, a surprisingly attractive city. A number of the buildings have the second story overhanging the sidewalk, making a cool, shaded place to browse. The Anglican Cathedral is particularly lovely, with one of the most ornate and delicate bell towers I've seen. I bought oranges and veggies, still no pineapples, and then we started our treasure hunt, trying to find replacement tips for the Stanley screwdriver. We're down to three tips, one of which is so nicked it's almost unusable. I'm amazed at how many hardware stores there are in Kingstown - we must have gone into ten - and they have lots of things, but no replacement tips. We've been looking for a long time on a lot of islands. Finally, just before the stores closed for lunch we did grocery shopping - it's getting to be an obsession with me, but it's interesting how different is the food offered on different islands. On Guadeloupe I found tinned unsalted butter. Here I found tinned Bacon Grill (bacon round) by DAK. In Antigua I bought Tulip Bacon in a can and it was awful, so we'll try this. Fresh fruits and vegs. are much cheaper here than on other islands.

Then we started looking for a place to have lunch. First place we looked at seemed a bit too fancy for our mood, so we started trudging. But fortunately we saw Leo and asked him if he knew of a place. He guided us to DANO Restaurant, on the second floor of the alley/street with all the department stores. It was very reasonable, sandwiches EC$3 - ED$4 (Eastern Caribbean dollars), fish dinners EC$10 [we were getting EC$2.71 for US$1.00].

Then we took the bus back to the yacht 'Melon and a dinghy ride to see the boat building yard. But we passed by it, not worth seeing. We went to Blue Lagoon to see if CSY had a chandlery - no. (we're about positive we can't get in there, and we're not particularly interested in weaving through the unmarked reefs anyway.) But they had cold Pepsi, so it wasn't a total loss.

Between the time we got back from shopping and left to dinghy explore, we saw a VIA 39, a yacht out of Pointe-a-Pitre hit the reef. I don't know if they weren't aware of it, weren't paying attention, or if the bloody current did them in, though that reef is blazing white. Anyway, a bunch of St. Vincentians in outboards and rowboats swarmed all over the boat, they got off, and with lots of help they anchored just forward of us. I watched with some concern as the boys dropped their stern anchor close to where our bow anchor is. And a CSY charter is anchored inshore and behind us with their bow anchor over our stern anchor. I didn't have to go over to check, the CSY fellow swam over to tell us because he was worried that we might want to leave early in the morning.

I told him not to worry, we weren't going anywhere soon. Because our day was topped off by our return to the 'Melon to see our compass fluid leaking out onto the deck. Peter took the compass apart to find that the o-ring was shot and the aluminum mounting base was severely corroded. I groaned, thinking of emergency calls to Boston to get stuff here. But our trusty O-ring replacement kit, courtesy of our dear good Rhode Island friend, came through. That, plus some good kerosene chased down by some pleasant boat boys, and drastic jury-rigging of the screws on the mounting base got it back together, although I have a feeling it is no longer in adjustment. Oh well, we'll finally have to make up a deviation card. Three hours of grunting, muttering, hacksawing.

The boat boys, Suty (Sutcliffe, in his 50s), O'Neill Johnson, and Marc. Came by to try to sell us some scrimshaw just as we started pulling the compass apart. As politely as I could I explained that I did indeed want to look at scrimshaw, but not now. They were very polite, said they'd come back tomorrow, and then Peter asked them if they could find clear kerosene. They went off and came back with the kerosene. By then I could look at the scrimshawed whale teeth - Suty does - they're quite good. I bought one that was the best scrimshaw though not the best tooth. EC$20 was amazingly cheap for the work that he did. He also had black coral jewelry, and they showed me some brown coral that he was going to make into bracelets. It looks like a dead twig. I asked him how he did it: boil the coral so it softens, then put it in a round can to shape it, put in the sun to dry and harden, then polish with 380-400 grit sandpaper, final polish with Brasso. How open they were. We have found that, with the exception of a few pushy individuals, the St. Lucians and St. Vincentians are quiet, generally polite, and rather nice.

Our day just had to end on a sour note: the tide turned at about 9 this evening, and the stern of the VIA 39 started coming closer and closer to us. They all sat in the cockpit watching, and offered the helpful suggestion that our anchor was dragging since it was hanging loose on the bow. Before this intelligent comment Peter had hopes that we could manage without drastic measures, but he then changed his mind.

We couldn't haul the stern anchor because we'd pop the CSY's bow anchor. Peter therefore buoyed it and set it loose to be picked up tomorrow. We then backed away from the VIA to get out, away, forward, and in position to set a second anchor out in the channel in a Bahamian moor. The engine stalled. We wrapped stern anchor line left on boat around prop. Peter cleared it (good thing, it was his "fault"). Finally got second anchor set at 2215.

More lessons...

One never has anchor problems in daylight.
If a bareboat that has run aground on a clearly charted and very obvious reef at midday anchors within 2 miles of you, MOVE.

We probably should have reset our anchors this morning, except that there was no reason to then, and it was too late once CSY anchored over our stern anchor. The CSY fellow, incidentally, is very nice. I apologized for not checking sooner, he said no problem, scope was flat and it was his problem anyway, not ours. So not all bareboaters are jerks (I know that, but my mood ain't so hot right now).

We'll head on down through the Grenadines to Grenada. The islands down here are much nicer than the Virgins and St. Martin. We remain cautious sailors, but we don't miss many places because of it.