Rock Side Cafe, Kearston Bay, St. Vincents

We checked out of St Vincent on Saturday, shortly before noon, to save the $64EC overtime fee for Sunday checkout that customs charges --  good tip from John of "Windrifter", thanks. Customs let us stay until Sunday at 11 am. But we hauled anchor and sailed off at 9:30, after breakfast, checking the batteries for water level, removing 15 cans of cat food from the battery area where they are deep stored and raising the dinghy. Our intended destination for the day was Chateaubelaire (such a pretty name) the northernmost bay on the west coast of St. Vincent to reduce the mileage of the next day's inter-island passage. Yes, we planned to overstay our customs and immigration allowed time in that nation by one day, an infraction that harms no one and that the merchants of the nation welcome.  The sail was rather boring in light wind and Roger should have changed the small jib to the Genoa, but was too lazy; can you believe that!

We had to use the motor for an hour for the fridge, and did so in a period of light wind, but the motor wouldn’t start with using only the starting battery, so we combined the “house bank” with the "starting battery" and it started right up. The problem, Roger believes, is that we usually keep the two batteries separate and so, when the engine runs, it charges only the house bank and the solar panels also feed only the house bank, so the starting battery had simply run down a bit. The temporary solution, until someone gives us better advice, will be to combine the batteries while running the engine, to fill the starting battery.

Reading in the cruising guide, we learned that our intended night’s haven is "untenable" when the surge is from the north. And because the waves were from the north, we searched for an alternative and saw that the small anchorage area of little used or heard of Keartons Bay is on the north side of that bay, close to a steep rocky hill, very well protected from a northern surge, with a free mooring if you dine at their restaurant.

With no expectations, we moored there -- in a most unusual way. Our bow was fixed to a mooring buoy and facing west, out to sea. you can see the tiny mooring ball under the bow and the line running off to the left of the photo from the stern, under Ilene,

to a strong point at the back of the bay, 250 feet away. 

There was an unpleasant loud argument between the agents of the Rock Side Café, who would have done this mooring service for free (or a tip) and some independent entrepreneurs who got to us first, tied us to the “wrong” mooring ball, and  sought (and were paid) compensation for their "help". 

We snorkeled (actually we used the masks but neither the tubes nor the fins) in the 50 feet of water between the hill and our boat, and the 15 feet of depth we were anchored in carried at least 30 feet in toward shore.

We swam out 150 feet past our starboard bow and about ten feet into the entrance to a cave there, but it was getting dark in there so we did not swim further in. 

         We saw a variety of brain, fan and pipe corals with the latter green in color. The bottom was pretty thick with spiky black sea urchins and there were a number of fish to follow; good snorkeling.  Returning to the boat we saw a bare boat chartered catamaran with six Austrians had become our neighbors, similarly securely moored, about 20 feet off our port side. The Rock Side Café is built at the back of the bay at the side of the rocky hill, to the right of this white house on a big lawn with  a trelis covered dining pavilion.

 It is operated by Rosi (pronounced Rosey) who is from Germany, and her husband, Orlando, who is Vincentian. Lene told Orlando, who helped ferry us ashore,  that we knew Tabou, of his nation, who is married to Rona, Lene’s 25 year friend from Massachusetts. (They had hosted us so generously in the spring but are on vacation now, or our Vincentian stay would have been longer).  Orlando said, “I know Tabou! He was Chief Engineer on the same Windjammer boat on which I served as Chief Cabin Steward.” And his smile was very genuine.

 Pictures of the Windjammer grace a wall of the place.

This was our fourth barefoot restaurant in a row after (1) Happy Island, (2) the beach lobster, and (3) Frangipani.  Your feet will get wet when you land a dinghy on a beach. And we do not wear shoes on board, either. (We keep rubber shoes in the dinghy so we can put them on if we take a land walk.)

The dinner was so excellent, starting with rum punch drinks at the table with the Austrians.  Five of them spoke excellent English and they were accomplished: physician, factory owner, opera singer, etc. They own small boats on Austrian lakes but were enjoying a two week charter together, and like most charterers, were enthralled to hear about living aboard for eight months.

Then we were moved to separate tables under a trellis for the dinner itself.  Rosi had printed up a menu with our names on it, cloth table cloths and napkins, bread and butter. The dinner, after the drinks, consisted of  four more courses and cost a total of only $80 EC per person, before tip, and that with a free night’s mooring and the labor involved in ferrying us and helping us moor.  They have a guest book that describes how they met, married and built the place, which Lene signed with a gushy review. And a still night. One of the unexpected happy surprizes on cruising.