Anguilla – Weatherbound in Paradise

“18:12.049N 63:05.729W”

5496 Miles since leaving Sandwich.

17^th March 2023

On Monday evening we invited Nigel, Jo and their dog Olive from Wychcraft, a Southerly 135, over for sundowners. Nigel brought along his homemade Ginger Beer which was very nice and certainly went down well when watered down with some Caribbean rum from Antigua. After close questioning I realised that I had all of the required ingredients onboard to make my own Ginger Beer and a locker full of rum to mix it with, thus I was galvanized into action, next project, make Ginger beer. Tuesday morning, I chopped up my ginger, mixed it with water, sugar, and added a soupcon of yeast to get things going. It is now sitting in three bottles on the kitchen shelf gently bubbling away ready for the first tasting in a weeks’ time.  

My Ginger Beer fermenting away.

Even with all of the self-induced excitement of brewing Ginger Beer, by Wednesday morning the stay in Marigot bay had run its’ course and we were well and truly suffering from cabin fever. A change of scenery was desperately needed. Pulling in the anchor we fired up the engine and pointed our nose at Anguilla, all of five miles away. It was actually a ten-mile trip as you have to go around the western end of the island and then back up to Road Bay which is the port of entry. Anguilla has some pretty strict cruising laws and heavy fines for breaching them. Essentially, Road Bay is free to moor, anywhere else you have to pay to anchor or even visit and at over $50 per day just to visit a bay it is very expensive. The plan was to stay in Road Bay for a couple of days, visit Elvis’s bar again then do a bit of island walking before heading back to St Martin to carry on waiting for the Starlink to get delivered.  As always Plan A went a bit awry but more of that later. The sail over was a joy, 12 to 15 knots of wind behind or on the side and we barrelled along with the foresail, mizzen and mizzen staysail set making a very pretty picture on the water. As we turned the corner at the western end of Anguilla I got a hit on my fishing line and had soon pulled in a Barracuda to add to my species list for this trip. Bobby the Barracuda was soon filleted and in the freezer for consumption later leaving us just enough time to tidy up all of the mess before we had to drop the anchor.

Bobby the Barracuda came aboard.

Actually, the bay was quite crowded meaning that we ended up anchored right at the back and as it was close to 1600 by then we decided to leave the check in until the morning. The next morning, we were greeted by a couple of turtles swimming at the back of Spectra and as we watched them a small Sting Ray swam by looking very exotic, yep it has to be said this is a lovely spot.

Road Bay Anguilla.

We launched the dinghy and then tied it up alongside planning to have lunch aboard before doing the customs clearances. To set the scene, all waste foodstuffs is put straight out of the galley window when we are preparing food. This cuts down on the chances of getting insects, mice or rats aboard plus feeds the fishes, nice people that we are. As usual as we prepared lunch odd bits of lettuce and vegetable peelings found their way out the window as normal. What wasn’t normal was that the dinghy was floating just below the window. By the time we were ready to go the dinghy had a nice splattering of waste food in it and of course the tomatoes had hit the seat and made a right old mess. First job, clean the dinghy and feed the fish, next job, actually go ashore.

Fresh salad A la dinghy.

After a clean-up we finally made our way ashore and actually had a very pleasant experience with the customs process, lots of smiles and no hassle in an airconditioned office, well done chaps. The only real change with the customs office from our last visit was that the really big, “Welcome to Paradise” sign had gone from the front of the building. I asked where it had gone and the answer was, “Irmer took it”, combined with a pointed finger over the hill. Later that afternoon in Elvis’s bar, an iconic watering hole in Anguilla which is built around a boat half buried in the sand, we were told that the Boat/Bar had also been carried halfway up the hill by Hurricane Irmer in 2017. Luckily enough they had enough warning to save of the booze before it hit. The bar itself was still very much the same, slightly larger but still very welcoming and a good place to meet and greet the other travellers. We didn’t stay too long this time as they had live music planned for later and we decided to come back for that. As it happened that didn’t happen as we both felt a bit icky that afternoon and had a quiet night on board instead. Not to worry the bar has live music 4 times a week, we won’t be missing anything in the long run.

Elvis bar in the afternoon.

A drink for Norma.

Bright and early the very next morning I was in a Paul will fix it mood and set to with a will. I refastened the grab lines on the dingy as they keep slipping undone. This time I first spliced and then stitched them in place which should hold the little devils. Next, I removed the solar panels on the starboard side again and replaced the two stainless steel tubes supporting them with a single continuous tube. This added a remarkable amount or rigidity to the structure which will no doubt come in very useful if bad weather hits. Note I have still not sufficiently girded my loins to tackle the forward heads. On the subject of bad weather, a large lump of it is forecast to hit us which rather scuppers our plan A for a two day stay. There is a steady F7 coming through here for the next 4 days which although not life threatening in any way will certainly make Marigot bay uncomfortable as it will be blowing straight into it. We have decided to stay here as we will be better sheltered. With that in mind as soon as we noticed a Sun Sail Cat pull its’ anchor up we jumped into the vacant slot. This moved us closer to shore and gave us more cover from the predicted wind direction. After moving our position I went for a snorkel to make sure that the anchor was set and as all I could see was the anchor chain disappearing into the mud I must assume that it is well and truly dug in. The only downside of our new position is that it has brought us closer to the cargo dock and if I am honest Spectra’s bum does just go into the fairway when the wind is in the wrong direction. We have some very noisy local coasters that look like WW2 landing craft coming and going but as they have come nowhere near us so far, I’m guessing that we are good to go.  Having said that it is hardly Piccadilly Circus with only 3 to 4 boat movements per day and the crews have without exception given us a friendly wave every time they catch our eye.

Still no green flash.

It is now Friday lunchtime and the winds picked up at 0400 this morning just as predicted. The only excitement of the night was an incident with a Catamaran that had anchored far too close to the island Search and Rescue boat in the bay. The Search and Resue boat was moored to a fixed buoy about 100 meters away from us and the Cat managed to circle them as the wind shifted wrapping its anchor chain around the buoy and lassoing the two of them together. I don’t think that there was any significant damage, but you could hear the thump, thump, thump of the two hulls knocking together from where we were watching. They must have radioed the Search and Rescue team as a couple of guys in a dinghy turned up with a diver and between them, they got it all untangled without any shouting, arm waving or general histrionics which was nice to see. Red faces all round on the Cat I would have thought. Meanwhile on-board Spectra as we sat under our smug cloud, I listened to Norma telling me that she knew that was going to happen, and they shouldn’t have let so much chain out because they didn’t allow for the swing etc, etc, etc. I think my response of, “Yes dear, there but for the grace of God”, covered it rather well.

Up to now we have not moved an inch and the winds have gusted to F7. There is a bit of an uncomfortable swell working into the bay but again nothing too drastic. Tonight, the winds are due to peak at 30 Knots and then it will be a slow decline from there over the next few days. On a side note, I was warned about the local Barracuda having Ciguatera poisoning from a fisherman at Elvis bar and having checked it out on the interweb since have decided not to take the risk with Bobby.  

The current Plan B is to stay here until Tuesday or Wednesday by which time Marigot bay will be calm again and we can go there to continue our wait for Mr Musk to deliver our Starlink. Once we have that in our eager little hands we will head for St Croix and meet the beer drinking pigs.   

Our neighbour in St Barts, 150ft of very shiny loveliness.

Our neighbour in Anguilla.