ST. LUCIA -
Thursday, October 29 -
There were storms behind us and storms up ahead of us, but
somehow our timing was perfect and we missed all of them. We neared the famous natural wonder of the
Pitons near the southern end of St. Lucia at about 1:30pm. The rain clouds were mostly covering them up
at first, making it hard to get a good photo, but then the clouds started to dissipate.
A huge pod of small dolphins (maybe
spinners) came by and played alongside the boat for a few minutes! About an hour later ANOTHER pod of dolphins,
bigger in size and in number, swam past us to hunt a huge school of fish. Four different dolphin encounters in one
day. Unheard of!
In other exciting news, we caught our first fish today! We had a hand line dragging behind the boat,
and a jack grabbed our lure! Not a
very big fish, but big enough to eat, and a good start for us. Skeeter had no trouble pulling it up. We thanked the poor little guy for his sacrifice and Skeeter ended his suffering.
I hadn’t been fishing in over 20 years, and
Skeeter in over 10 years. We aren’t
super confident about our fishing abilities, and don’t want to catch something
out of our league. I have this fear that
we will catch a huge fish and it will pull one of us overboard. Plus, we don’t have autopilot and a bigger
fish could take two of us to haul aboard. Also, we don't want to be wasteful and kill something that we can't eat.
While this was happening, I thought it a good opportunity to
have Dad take the helm. I gave him
instructions on how to hold a compass heading, and then I went to the back of
the boat to take pictures and to bring Skeeter the never-before-used filleting
kit.
Skeeter filleted the fish. It was his first
time filleting an ocean fish, and I think he did a much better job than I could have done. I had no idea how to fillet a fish, and wasn't mentally prepared to cut into a recently living creature. I should probably be a vegetarian if I can't handle this kind of thing. But I think I'll eventually get over it.
Dad
stayed at the helm for a while, getting better and better at staying on
course. Steering a sailboat for the
first time is harder than it seems, since you have to anticipate how the boat
is going to move because there’s a lag between you turning the wheel and the
boat’s response. Next time we had to
trim the sails we let Dad take the winch handle and sheet in both the main and
the Genoa. He was becoming a real
sailor.
Now Skeeter and I had a chance to relax and take it easy, because Captain John had the helm.
We arrived at Marigot Bay at 4pm, beating the sunset. As I motored into the bay it felt like we
were being attacked by vultures. A boy
in a dinghy zipped up to us at high speed, and a drunk guy wearing a Santa hat
in a kayak full of bananas & his bottle of booze paddled toward us with all his might.
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| Drunk Santa (Noel) |
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| Another fruit vendor |
The boy was not an official marina staff
member, like we had been hoping, but he led us to one of the marina’s moorings
in the inner bay. He took our mooring
line from Skeeter and ran it through the mooring, helping us tie up. He asked for a tip, and Skeeter gave him a
small tip even though tying up to a mooring is something we could easily have
done on our own.
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| Capella Marigot Marina |
The inner bay was very
calm and protected, so calm that it is considered a hurricane hole and boats
come here if there is a storm. The only
waves were created by other boats and the water taxi that constantly shuttled
resort guests to the beach during the day.
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| Calm, protected waters |
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| The water taxi shuttled resort guests to the beach |
Drunk Santa (really named Noel) suddenly appeared next to us
and started opening up bananas. He handed
one to me, one to Dad, and one to Skeeter.
I was really hungry, so I took it and ate it. I called it a banana bribe. Normally, he said, he charges tourists $30EC
for a bunch of bananas, but we get the local price – $20EC. I laughed.
$20 EC is equivalent to $8 US.
There is no way locals pay that much for bananas here. He definitely took us for fools. Bananas are dirt cheap in this part of the
world, and he probably just picked them off someone else’s tree. I bargained him down to $10EC and got him to
throw in a couple of limes too. Still an
expensive bunch of bananas, but after his banana bribe I felt obligated to give
him something.
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| Drunk Santa trying his banana bribery on another boat |
We had heard about Marigot Bay and Capella Resort from our
friends Gayle & Todd on My Motu and Mark & Sheryl on Peaceful
Lady. For $20 a night you get a mooring
in the inner bay, and use of the 4.5 star resort’s facilities: internet, pool
with waterfall, towels, gym, and hot showers.
It was an impressive resort.
Nicer than any resort I had ever seen.
We were super impressed by the staff, too. They were incredibly welcoming, and had the
best customer service skills I had seen.
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| Capella Resort |
We went for an evening swim, took our first hot showers in a long long
time, and then went on a mission to find dinner.
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| Evening swim |
We left the resort premises to find a local place called
“JJ’s.” The short walk “up the hill”
ended up being more of a hike up a mountain.
JJ’s ended up being closed, but some local guys pointed us in the direction
of another place with local food called “Julietta’s.”
The place looked nice, with wooden chairs and
tables with tablecloths and flowers overlooking the marina from the
mountainside. When we got the menus we
saw that the restaurant made local food targeted to tourists. The prices were way higher than what we were
looking for, but at this point we were very tired and hungry and had no more
options nearby, so we stayed.
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| Julietta's is on the mountainside above Marigot Bay |
We all
ordered chicken, rice & vegetables, and drank tap water to quench our relentless
thirst and make the total bill less painful.
Dad ordered a local Piton beer.
The service was very slow, but when the food came out it was all worth
it. It was mouthwateringly delicious,
and the chicken was the most juicy, tender, flavorful chicken we had ever had.
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| Local Piton beer |
On the walk back it seemed that all of the locals knew us
and that we had just come from Julietta’s for dinner. A drunk man who looked to be in his 60’s was
holding a grasshopper he had made out of palm fronds. Suddenly it was in my hand, and he was trying
to get me to give him money. He said he
was Julietta’s brother, and he needed money to feed his children. I gave him his grasshopper back and said that
his sister has all of our money, because we just spent it all on dinner. We dinghied back to the boat, thoroughly
exhausted, and went to bed. The boat was
so still, it felt like we were on land.
Friday, October 30 –
5 star relaxation. Today was a low key day. We checked into customs, explored the Capella
resort in the light of day, and went for a swim in the beautiful pool. A waterfall emptied into the shallow end of
the pool, and another waterfall spilled over the side of the deep end of the
pool. The deep end of the pool
overlooked the marina.
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| Pool overlooking the marina |
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| Lovely tropical garden |
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| Waterfall emptying into the pool |
The weather was a
little bit rainy on and off, but when the sun came out it was blazing hot. Dad found some big leaves that fell off of an
almond tree, and he used them as swim paddles.
At one point one of the resort staff was cleaning up and tried to take
them, and Dad told them they were his swim paddles and even gave a little
demonstration.
The resort staff brought
us a caddy filled with ice and water bottles, and later came by with coconuts
for each of us to sip the coconut water - all complimentary.
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| Complimentary poolside coconut |
We took hot showers, and when we finished there
was a major downpour. We had to wait for
it to stop before dinghying back to the boat.
I made tuna melts for lunch, and
then we relaxed in the cockpit. I
noticed that our scuba gear smelled bad, and realized that there were tons of
dead shrimp all over out BCD’s even though we had rinsed them off. I spent hours picking off the tiny shrimp from
every nook and cranny, and even found some sizable crabs lodged in some
crevices. Gross.
Then we relaxed some more, and watched the beautiful sunset.
I made tacos for dinner, and we
watched one of my favorite old movies, “Captains Courageous.” Dad had never seen it before, and really
enjoyed it. It’s about a bratty little
rich boy who falls overboard and ends up on a fishing vessel and learns some
big lessons.
Saturday, October 31 -
We slept in a little bit, then dinghied in to the
resort. I went to the gym and went for a
run and lifted some weights while Dad and Skeeter went to the pool. It was a nice gym, and I had it all to
myself. After working out I discovered
some even nicer showers than the ones we had found before next to the spa. I joined Dad and Skeeter at the pool. Of course, Dad had his swim leaves
again. After swimming we took the most
luxurious hot showers imaginable in the spa bathroom.
We wandered around the marina, looking at the different sailboats, powerboats, and mega yachts.
At noon we sailed north to Rodney Bay. It was only about a 2 hour sail.
When we arrived, Gregory the fruit man pulled
up to our boat with his impressive fruit and veggie boat. It was piled high, loaded down with tons of
fresh produce. I bargained with him, and
ended up getting a pineapple, 3 mangoes, 2 soursop, and 2 cucumbers for
30EC.
We dinghied through the channel into the inner bay where the
impressively big Rodney Bay Marina is located.
We walked around the marina and along the docks, checking out the
different boats. We saw some party
boats, some pirate ships, catamarans, mono hulls, and powerboats among
others.
We went to the taxi stand and
arranged an early morning taxi pick up for Dad tomorrow morning. We ended up having dinner at the Bread Basket
in Rodney Bay Marina. I got a mahi roti
that was amazingly delicious and a great value, Skeeter got a burger, and Dad
got baked chicken breast. Everyone’s
meal was delicious, and we got to see a pretty sunset. We didn’t have internet out on the boat, so
it was good to be able to use their wifi to check on weather and Dad’s flights.
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| My mahi roti & salad |
Back at the boat I helped Dad pack, then we sat out in the
cockpit enjoying the night.
Sunday, November 1 -
We woke up at 5:15am and took Dad by dinghy to meet his taxi
at 6am. It was a wonderful visit, and I
think we all really enjoyed this time together.
We hope Dad had a great time and will be able to come sailing with us
again in the future! We love you, Dad!
