It has been an absolutely glorious three weeks as we cruised around the Grenadines on our way to St. Lucia — our final stop before we embark on our circumnavigation! We LOVE the Grenadines and extolled its virtues in two separate blog entries (see Back through Saint Vincent and the Grenadines — May 12 through May 23, 2022 (subtitle: the great weevil invasion, fun with submerged objects, the joker valve debacle and other adventures! Yee Haw!) and Sailing the Glorious Grenadines — March 27 through April 22, 2022 (subtitle: A drink in our hands and our toes in the sand!) As Jill likes to say, the Grenadines bring together all the best parts of the BVI without any of the bad parts and for reasons we don’t fully understand — other than that they are not easy to get to — they seem to be the best kept secret in the Caribbean. (Coincidentally, while we were in the Grenadines this time the New York Times published a travel article about the islands so the cat may be out of the bag. We encourage you to read the article — written by a professional journalist — which captures the soul of the islands better than we ever could: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/27/travel/caribbean-st-vincent-grenadines.html.) Needless to say we were looking forward to our third tour around the islands as we made our way North to St. Lucia.
Our first stop after departing Sandy Island on December 22 was Union Island. After a quick check in with customs and immigration in Clifton we motored to Chatham Bay on the other side of the island where we anchored. We originally planned to stay 2 or possibly 3 days but ended up staying 5 nights and 4 full days after being reminded how glorious and quiet it is. The beauty of Chatham Bay is that it boasts one of the most magnificent, undisturbed beaches. There are no roads from any other part of the island that reach Chatham Bay. The closest paved road is accessible by a one mile downhill or uphill trek (depending on whether you are going to or from the beach) over rocky terrain. That explains why there is little development along the beach — just two small open air restaurants/bars run by locals that serve fresh (as in caught that day) fish and a small (4 room) eco resort & restaurant, Tenute Chatham Bay Resort, that maintains a minimal footprint by design. We love walking along the white sandy beach and hiking up the path to the road to take in views from up high.
But we must confess that the draw to stay the extra days wasn’t solely the feeling of tranquility and seclusion. It was the delicious meals served at Tenute Chatham Bay Resort coupled with the hospitality of the owner, Antonio, and his assistant manager Iwona. Quite simply, we developed a crush on this place. We enjoyed eating great fresh food prepared by a lovely chef who made a special meal each evening to accommodate Jill’s whole food plant based diet (including the BEST ever Callaloo soup) in their open air restaurant that has this wonderful casually elegant Caribbean vibe. While dining we were mesmerized by our conversations with Antonio and Iwona. Antonio is Italian and Iwona is Polish but they both speak beautiful English. (Being Italian, Antonio loved the name of our boat. He would often repeat Che Figata! with just the right intonation and great enthusiasm.) We were particularly tickled when Antonio shared his somewhat eccentric plans (he would applaud that description) to have 2 horses shipped over from Europe to the island. He longs to ride horses down the beach and as they swim in the ocean — as he did earlier in his life while living in Barbados — and is anxious to give that experience to his guests. By the way, for curious minds, Callaloo soup is a traditional Caribbean soup which is particularly common in the West Indies. When made well it is rich, creamy and bursting with flavor. We joked that we should order bowls and bowls of their amazing version to freeze and reheat during ocean passages.
We could have stayed in Chatham Bay another week but we needed to move on to continue the slow sail to St. Lucia. So on December 27 we lifted anchor and moved on to Mayreau — all of ~ 4 nautical miles from Chatham Bay. Mayreau is another Che Figata crew favorite. Mayreau is the smallest inhabited island of the Grenadines with an area of about 0.46 square miles and a population just shy of 300. It is only accessible by water — there is no air strip — and there is only one street that conects all locations on the island. The single village is perched high up on a hill at the center of the island and if you walk behind the beautiful old stone Catholic Church there is an overlook that offers commanding views of the Tobago Cays, Union Island and Canouan Island.
Our first stop was Twassante Bay, a small bay with a gorgeous undisturbed beach which is also the home of Mayreau Beach Club. Mayreau Beach Club is another one of these magical places that combines a cozy open Caribbean space with good food and welcoming on-premise owners, Lars and Margit. We stayed in Twassante Bay for 2 nights/1 day taking advantage of the free moorings offered by Mayreau Beach Club. During our full day there we walked the full length of the beach to a path that takes you to the top of the island and then onto another path that takes you back down to the next bay (Salt Whistle Bay) and, ultimately, around the entire island. We had great fun circumnavigating Mayreau on foot, getting in our steps and visiting every spectacular bay this small but mighty island has to offer. The only downside to Twassante Bay is that is is not well protected so it can get very rolly. Our first night was okay — some rocking and rolling but manageable. On the second night, however, the the wave action kicked up a bit making the dinghy ride back to the boat after dinner a little bit of a challenge. Nothing like trying to climb out of a rocking dinghy onto an similarly rocking sailboat. If the dinghy did a zig the sailboat seemed to do a zag and we had to wait for the perfect alignment — and then seize the moment — to step from the dinghy onto our back transom steps if we wanted to avoid a late night swim. On a positive note, Twassante Bay’s reputation as an exposed anchorage means that fewer boats choose to anchor or pick up a mooring there. There were only 2 other boats in the bay during our visit.
As beautiful and quiet as Twassante Bay is after our 2 night stay we let the mooring loose and headed around the corner to anchor in Saline Bay — another slice of untouched paradise. Though there are a few local establishments near the entrance of the beach, there is no development at all on the beach making it a lovely place to anchor. Plus the bay is very protected, so it is much calmer than Twassante Bay. The added bonus of beautiful Saline Bay is that it is walking distance to the Ranch Escapade, a locally owned restaurant with a minimalist vibe on Windward Bay which boasts one of the most exquisite beaches in the Grenadines. With nothing around you but beach, no boats in the anchorage (being on the windward side of the island and fairly exposed it is not a popular place to anchor unless you enjoy being tossed about) and just the expanse of the ocean as you look out into the horizon from the restaurant, you truly feel like you are on a deserted island somewhere in the South Pacific. (Well, we haven’t been to the South Pacific yet but we imagine that this is a bit of what that will be like. Hopefully, we will be checking that box soon!) In addition to visiting Ranch Escapade by night we enjoyed snorkeling during the day and had another octopus sighting thanks to Zack’s eagle eye. This guy had no where to hide so, after sensing our presence, he hunkered down on a rock and didn’t move. Once he got himself in stealth mode he became indistinguishable from the rock and we never would have seen him if Zack hadn’t first noticed him moving across the ocean floor.
Mayreau is another place we could have stayed much longer but it was time to continue or journey so we left Mayreau on December 30th and headed towards Canouan. Another short ~ 4 nautical mile hop. We choose Canouan for several reasons. First, we didn’t visit the island in either of our prior visits to the Grenadines so we thought it would be nice to explore a new place. Second, they have a new marina on the island, Sandy Lane Yacht Club, that got rave reviews. We are not ordinarily marina people — we prefer to pick up a mooring or anchor — but we had some items on our to do list that could benefit having a dock. Plus the marina had nice amenities including a small but highly rated food market and laundry facilities. The food market was a particular draw because we were getting low on provisions and our planned next stop — following Canouan — was the Tobago Cays. Except for a beach BBQ hosted by several locals in the evening, there is no place to eat in Tobago Cays (this collection of small islands are uninhabited and totally undeveloped which, of course, is their beauty) so we needed to have enough food to have all our meals — breakfast, lunch and dinner — on board for 2 days. Canouan here we come.
Wow. What an impressive facility! No expense was spared in designing and building the marina. The marina was built around what appears to be a long (about 1/2 mile deep) artificial inlet. Boats could tie off on the cleats that adorned both sides of the inlet. A cobblestone path (laid in an intricate design pattern) went up one side of the inlet and down the other. The custom made power stations (to hook boats up to shore power) were made of sparkling stainless steel and were decorated with a cut out of the marina logo: 2 seahorses. The laundry room had 8 top quality front loading washer and dryer units that you would expect to see in a high end home. (Of course they also charge $30 US for each load of laundry!) And the bathrooms had large shower rooms — with solid doors — that each contained a separate dressing area, including a sink, and a large spa-like shower. Both the dressing area and shower were constructed with stone and tile and were beautifully designed and impeccably clean. We have been to nice marinas but never one as luxurious as this. It was something you would expect to see in Monaco but certainly not the Grenadines.
While we were marina guests there was only a small number of other boats — maybe a half dozen mega yachts and a dozen cruisers — visiting the facility. That is a small fraction of the several hundred boats this marina could hold. The emptiness of this large and opulent marina gave it a ghost town feel — like someplace that used to be bustling but, for some reason, was abandoned. You might be wondering what all of this costs. Interestingly, the marina rates were quite reasonable. We paid a daily rate of $2 per foot. That is a bit more than you would pay at most marinas in the Caribbean but easily commensurate with the amenities of this facility. Where they got you though is at the restaurants. Let’s just say that the prices were what you would expect to pay at a trendy NYC restaurant. For example, the New Year’s Eve dinner — which we respectfully declined (we enjoyed a lovely quiet evening aboard Che Figata) — was $265 per person ($530 per couple). Definitely not within budget for most cruisers.
Still, we really enjoyed our stay. We took full advantage of the facilities (did we mention the amazing shower and laundry facilities?), re-provisioned with fresh produce at the market and completed a lot of tasks on our to-do list that would have been hard to do while anchored or on a mooring. (This included Jill hand coloring our boat name on our life rings. We are required to have our boat name on our life rings for the World ARC. We had tried stick on letters but they peeled off so we needed a more permanent solution. Jill executed her assignment with great panache!) When we weren’t busy ticking off items on our to do list, it was fun to walk around the facility to get an up close look at the mega yachts and large custom sailboats.
Nonetheless, on January 2, after 2 full days at Sandy Lane and now re-provisioned, we were ready to head for the Tobago Cays for a relaxed few days of snorkeling and eating on the boat. As we mentioned in our previous blog entries, the Tobago Cays are an archipelago with extensive coral reefs located in the Southern Grenadines near the islands of Union, Mayreau (which is technically part of the Tobago Cays) and Canouan. Though it is a very popular spot for cruisers, making the anchorages a bit on the crowded side for our usual tastes, the 5 tiny uninhabited islands that form the center of the Tobago Cays are breathtakingly gorgeous and are accented by the shallow crystalline water, in several different hues of blue, that runs between them. It is another place that we imagine is very South Pacific like.
We stayed in the Tobago Cays for 2 nights/1 day. During our full day in the area we snorkeled. One of the most fascinating things we saw related to loose sea moss, shaped somewhat like a football but probably only a quarter of the size, that was getting tossed about in the current like a tumbleweed. There were probably 15 small fish feeding on something in the crevices of the sea moss and as it rolled around in the current these fish held on and rolled around along with it. We observed this on two different pieces of loose moss. What made this particularly interesting was that the sea moss that was still attached to the seafloor didn’t seem to attract these small fish in the same way. There was something about the untethered sea moss floating in the current that attracted the fish. At any rate, we enjoyed watching these little fish spinning in the water along with the moss, conjuring up the imagine of a spoke and wheel. During the evenings, Jill served up two of our favorite dishes: home made marinara with mushrooms on night one and tomato and white bean stew served with freshly baked bread (courtesy of our new mini bread machine) on night two. It was a great way to “detox” from our stay in the lavish marina! We felt like cruisers again!
Following our visit to the Tobago Cays, on January 4, it was time to move on to Mustique — another Che Figata crew favorite — as we inched our way towards St. Lucia. As avid readers of our blog recall, Mustique (a private island) is the playground of the rich and famous. Though it is well known for its wealthy homeowners — which includes royalty, musicians (like Mick Jagger) and successful business owners (like Tommy Hilfiger) — what attracts us and most of its seasonal visitors is the pristine beaches void of any development. The magnificent houses built on the island are all way above sea level, leaving the beaches as they were hundreds of years ago. As visiting yachties, for the small fee of ~$82 US for 3 nights, we have full access to the shoreline of this private island. You can read more about Mustique and what makes it special in the earlier blog entries referenced above.
While most of our island hopping in the Grenadines has been more like short steps (e.g., 4 nautical miles, give or take), the trip from the Tobago Cays to Mustique was about 15 nautical miles. Ordinarily, we would place that in the short hop category too but when you are sailing almost directly into the wind with 5 to 7 foot seas, that little hop can be 3 unpleasant hours. And so it was. Close your eyes and imagine riding a bucking bronco for 3 hours while someone, just for good measure, throws large buckets of water directly at you, and you will get a good picture of what the passage to Mustique was like. Fortunately, we have a sturdy dodger (our equivalent to a windshield on a car) but that doesn’t prevent the real monster waves from going up over the dodger, flooding the cockpit and splashing down into the salon of Che Figata. Ah, the joys of sailing. We were quite happy when we reached Mustique and were secured to a mooring ball in a premium spot near the shore.
First order of business on arrival was to clean the salt water off Che Figata’s bountiful stainless steel as well as our plastic enclosure. But, following that, we decided that after the sail from H$#%, we earned an afternoon snorkel so in we went. What a treat! In our previous visits to Mustique we were so taken with the coast line that we spent hours walking along the beach, stopping occasionally along the way to swim. We really hadn’t snorkeled and didn’t realize what we were missing. We both agreed that it was our best snorkeling since Sandy Island off Carriacou. We saw large schools of ginormous fish including Blue Tangs, Parrotfish, Angelfish, an Ocean Triggerfish and young Tuna as well as a large stingray buried in the sand and a turtle gliding through the water. Who knew???
Over the next few days we enjoyed repeating our favorite Mustique activities, including the two mile (each way) walk along Mustique’s pristine beaches and a stroll along the nature trail that runs through a mangrove forest and around a salt lagoon. Our feature image for this post is the stone path that snakes around the entrances to two different bays and connects the beaches within. We also couldn’t resist one more snorkel adventure and had an amazing second snorkel spotting fish that are usually elusive including a flying gurnard (you need to google that one), a scorpionfish and a nurse shark in motion. On the new experience front, we were finally in Mustique on a Wednesday evening which meant we could attend the “Jump Up” at Basil’s Bar. Live music starts at 9 PM and homeowners, visiting yachties and other island guests let loose for a night of dancing. In full disclosure, we didn’t make it past 9:45 PM (we rise with the sun on the boat so by then we are starting to fade) but we still got to check off one more item on the Caribbean cruisers’ “must do” list.
The only detractor for what was an otherwise great stay was the rolling on our second night in the mooring field. Che Figata was rocking so much that items were falling off secure shelves, there was a lot of banging as stored items shifted back and forth and the spill proof cups we keep near us while we sleep were sliding across the flat teak surfaces adjacent to our bed. It was like there was a giant holding the top of our mast and violently shaking it starboard to port and port to starboard. The last time we experienced a night like that was when we picked up a mooring in Indian Harbor — a very exposed harbor off the coast of Greenwich Connecticut — over 10 years ago. Not much sleep for the Che Figata crew that night.
Of course, no island visit would be complete without at least one funny or harrowing experience and our stay in Mustique was no different. This time it revolves around a beautiful sailboat (we estimate to be between 65-70 feet in length) anchored just outside the mooring field. We had never seen a sailboat like this before. The body of the sailboat, painted a rusty red, was very sleek. Other than the dodger, there was nothing raised so the deck was totally flat from the dodger to the front of the bow. The hard dodger, painted silver, was low and flat until in slanted at a soft 45 degree angle towards the stern to integrate back into the hull. It was truly gorgeous and, in Zack’s words, he had developed a new sailboat crush. Jill encouraged him to dinghy over to the sailboat to ask who designed it — the sailboat was clearly custom — just as many people have dinghied over to our sailboat to ask what kind of boat it is. Zack, who is generally not shy about this kind of thing, was very hesitant but Jill kept encouraging him so we finally decided to swing by on our dinghy as we headed back to our own boat after a day on shore. Well, it looks like Zack had some 6th sense thing going because as we approached the boat and rounded the corner to the back transom, there are the owners, totally naked, sitting on their small swim platform. Clearly, being outside the mooring field with their stern facing away from shore and other sailboats, they were not expecting visitors. Not sure exactly what to do (do you embarrassingly wave hello?) we opted for the quick retreat back to Che Figata, giggling like two guilty school children as we sped away. On a positive note, the boat has a French flag so while we were mortified, they were probably unfazed. (The French seem to like enjoying their boats in the nude.). Still, we will now never know who designed and built that boat because we did not return.
On January 7, after 3 nights/2 days in Mustique, it was time to move on the Bequia — the final stop in our 3rd tour of the Grenadines. We had a fabulous return visit with two good omens right from the start. The first was that was saw an Eagle Ray glide past the bow of our boat as we were going to anchor. They are such magnificent creatures! The second was that after we anchored we noticed the we were neighbors with Odyssey, a boat we met when we did the Salty Dawg rally from Hampton VA down to Antigua last year. The Odyssey crew, Sandy and Foster, are lovely so we were happy to see them and catch up.
We were busy every moment of our 4 night/3 day stay in Bequia with a combination of “work” and play. On the work side, one of the reasons we were excited about the Bequia visit is because there is a great canvas shop on the island — Grenadines Sails & Canvas — that had made us new dinghy chaps in the spring. After using our new sunshade earlier in our Grenadines tour (while anchored in Chatham Bay) we realized that some of the design features, particularly the bungee cord attachments that secured the sunshade to our rails, were not robust enough for really heavy winds. The Caribbean Islands experience what is know as the “Christmas winds” in December and early January — the wind can blow up to 30 knots on a regular basis — so we gave our new sunshade a real test. Knowing that Bequia would be one of our stops we pre-arranged with Grenadine Sails to fit us in to repair and reinforce our sunshade. They did a great job reinforcing the corners that will take the most stress and creating a new system to attach the bungee cords to our rails to avoid abrasion. We also needed to purchase, and then install, new gas springs for our front lazarettes (storage lockers) to replace the failing ones (there’s always a boat project) and, after 3 months, Jill decided it was time for a proper haircut since she got a great recommendation for a hairdresser on Bequia and she did not know when she would encounter a real hairdresser again after embarking on our circumnavigation.
But we still had plenty of time for fun. Our friends on Odyssey showed us a great snorkeling spot at the entrance of the bay with lots of healthy live coral and teaming with large schools of fish. During our two separate snorkels of the area we saw Triggerfish, a large Spotted Eel swimming through the water, Drumfish and a Flounder among the other usual suspects. We also did the 3 mile round trip hike from the Bequia town center to Low Bay which takes you across beautiful white sandy beaches and both up over and around rocky cliff faces. This stunning walk, that we have now done many times, never gets old.
Finally, we enjoyed some magical dinners. On evening one we eat on board but on our second and third nights we dined at the locally owned Open Deck restaurant which is a very casual establishment with tables under a pavilion that extends right to the edge of the water. They have no set menu because each day they offer a few specials based on what is available fresh. (They did their best to accommodate Jill’s diet with what they had on hand). Though it is a lovely (and affordable) place that should have been crowded with cruisers, both nights we were just one of 2 tables so it very much felt like a private dining experience. For our final night in Bequia — our Grenadines tour farewell meal — we treated ourselves to dinner at Firefly Estate which is a small resort at the top of a hill overlooking Admiralty Bay. The cozy and romantic open air restaurant feels like a step back in time to the veranda of an old plantation. You begin the evening with cocktails served to you in one of several private seating areas. As you sip your cocktail, your server takes your order and, when it’s close to serving time, you are escorted to your table. We both had one of the best meals of our Grenadines tour. Zack had stuffed crab shells and a tuna steak cooked to perfection Jill had Callaloo soup, lentil curry, mashed pumpkin and sautéed Callaloo. (Though Jill’s Callaloo soup didn’t quite reach the heights of the Callaloo soup at Tenute Chatham Bay Resort.). Zack topped off his meal with the creamiest house made vanilla ice cream ever topped with a fresh ginger guava sauce. Jill was very (VERY) jealous!
On January 11 it was time to head to St. Lucia. Though we could have lingered a few more days in the Grenadines based on our schedule, the wind prediction was very favorable for the 11th and, with a 68 nautical mile sail to St. Lucia, we were not anxious to repeat the very uncomfortable sail to Mustique. Fortunately, the wind prediction held true and we flew to St. Lucia on a lovely beam reach making it there in about 8 hours.
We will be very busy while we are in St. Lucia. First, as you know, our older son (Tristan), his wife (Maria) and their two girls, along with his wife’s parents (Donna and Gordon) are meeting us at Marigot Bay Resort for a week. Tristan and his family will stay with us on Che Figata. Donna and Gordon reserved a room at the resort. We are beyond excited. Shortly after they leave we will be meeting up with Laurie and Ruud on Blue Pearl to do our crew exchange. Mark will be at the point of no return! Following that we will be in the 2 week rally count down and it will be all circumnavigation prep all the time as we take care of the many final details we need to attend to before we set sail west to Columbia on February 18. You can count on us to share a copious amount (in tedious detail) about all of this in our next blog entry that we will publish just before the start of our rally.
