Carriacou to Grenada

Our passage was a pleasant one. I had charted out the rhumb line at 36.1 miles, so I predicted six hours duration at an average of six knots. This includes the ins and outs at each end which are much slower. We left at 7:45 am and arrived at 1:15 pm, five and a half hours later.  This included several miles at eight knots and a peak of 8.5, but several miles toward the end, in the lee of the big island, at much lower speed. We averaged more than 6.5 knots, sailing under full main and small jib on a broad reach most of the way. Our courses were between 215 and 240 magnetic and the winds were north of east except when coming out from behind the lee of islands when they were south of east. We passed west of diamond rock down our port side. This photo also shows The Sisters, further away, in the center of the photo between the shrouds, which we had to pass on our starboard side, and the north coast of Grenada is a gray smudge above the water.

And here are the sisters, closer up.

These rocks caused the variations in our course. A more direct route, slightly further to the west, would have avoided these obstacles, but is forbidden by law because it would have taken us over the top of Kick em Jennie -- an active volcano whose peak is currently 500 feet below the water. The government has imposed a 1.5 kilometer exclusion zone around this hot spot, presumably so they won't have to rescue sailors if the volcano erupts.

The first sure sign of the city of St. Georges was a cruise ship docked at the pier that extends out from the western shore to the northwest. We sailed down this coast and then past the pier.

We could have anchored in Grand Anse (Big Bay in French), in the open sea, outside the harbor, which is near the medical college, the protection of whose students was the ostensible reason for our invasion/liberation of this nation during the Reagan administration (you can see some boats anchored there to the right-center) but it was rolly and would have been a loooong dink ride into town, to the left.

Here is a view of the passage into the harbor. To the right, the white spot is mega yachts in our marina, the largest of which is Bacarella , which we saw in Virgin Gorda and in Antigua.

There was a great big bay to the south of the entrance but almost all of its water has been taken over by Port Louis Marina, shown here as more of a closeup. Bacarella is to the right and if you blow up the photo by clicking on it you can see our two headstays, the black diagonal lines slanting down to the left, on the left side of the photo above the right most red roof.

We had made a reservation but they put of on the wrong dock. Wrong because the dock where we ended up has 110 volt electric (which we decided to use to be able to run the air conditioner to keep out the mosquitos which are prevalent here). We are currently "Med Moored" This is a means of packing in as many boats as possible at limited wharf space by having them back into the face of the dock, with the bow tied to a mooring off shore to prevent the stern from actually hitting the dock, and no piers separating the boats from each other.
We enter and leave the boat by "Walking the Plank." It is the same plank that was used to tie four jerry cans of diesel fuel on the side of  the deck during the eight day passage from Virginia to Tortola, and that remained lashed to the side stanchions from arrival in Tortola until now, in anticipation of its use in this situation.
Our three fenders are hanging off the stern to prevent collisions with the concrete dock.



The next problem was the perennial one internet access. They said that their restaurant had wifi but it did not work. For boats, for a refundable deposit of $300EC, they gave us a modem and a cable to give us direct cabled internet by wire.  But the first two of the boxes they gave us did not work!!!  Frustration!!!!  But, as evidenced by the publication of this post, we are up and running.

Yesterday we spent $200 US at the supermarket which we visited by dink, and then dinked to town to visit the bank to get more ECs. We parked our dink on the far side of the Carenage shown here, and walked around to this side where the fort is.

We visited the Fort, high above the town, built by the English, which was traded back and forth with the French and is now used by the paramilitary police and is where the high elevation photos were taken. It was the site of the execution of the leader (Maurice Bishop) of the nation just before the US military intervention here during the Reagan years. Here is the wall of the courtyard of that fort against which he and much of his cabinet were shot. The pole that supports the basketball net shows bullet holes.

We lunched at BB's Crab Back restaurant where we met Audrey (a native of Staten island) and Mike from Oregon, of  Serenity, a 60 foot Morgan who joined us. We had met them earlier in the day because they are moored next to us - quite a coincidence. Here is a picture of them, with BB and Lene.

Mike and Audrey will we chartering their boat starting next month and have several charters booked already. Click on the Serenity link, above, to see a slide show of their beautiful boat, inside and out.  They had breakfast with us today.

I had planned to work on the boat yesterday and today, but it doesn't take much to shift me from work to fun these days.