Dominica Nica Nica

Purple Turtle Beach near Portsmouth

Dominica is the first place where we encountered "boat boys." In the Caribbean, the term refers to the local men that come out to your boat and offer various services or items for sale. It's not considered a derogatory term, I'm told. In some places they can be somewhat tenacious, as in they won't go away if you don't give them something.

Still carrying the baggage of my American sensibilities, I was not really looking forward to dealing with this unaccustomed invasion of my personal space (so to speak). On a side note, Mark has a habit of getting inches away from people when he's talking to them. Usually, strangers seem to think it's funny, but he's only six. We're working on this with him because it won't be too cute anymore when he's nine.

Saturday morning market in Portsmouth.

In Dominica, the boat boys have organized themselves and offer valuable services in a friendly and relatively laid back way. They put in moorings and virtually eliminated the dinghy theft that was common before they started patrolling the harbor.

 

As we approached the harbor, a boat boy came speeding toward us in his panga. We were sailing in at a brisk 8 knots so he had a hard time pulling alongside. Even though this is standard procedure, it was a little disconcerting seeing a wooden boat seemingly speeding right for you.

After we anchored, Titus came over and talked to us about the various tours he offers. Over the next few days, other boat boys came by to offer services and fruit for sale. They were not persistent and we found them to be friendly and polite. We have heard that the boat boys in Dominica are the easiest to deal with in the Caribbean.

Why me?! Why do I have to walk?

The Internet is a great thing and offers a wealth of information to cruisers. It's nice not to have to reinvent the wheel every time we go somewhere new. However, prior research can be a little misleading because reports tend to skew towards the bad things. Despite the poverty, Dominica is a beautiful place that is much friendlier and safer than our hometown of Chicago.

House that looks like an ark.

I had the following exchange with a local woman at the beach the day we got to Portsmouth. I thought it was amusing.

• Me: Hi.
• Woman at the beach: Hi, are you still here?
• Me: Oh, we just got here today.
• Woman at the beach: I did laundry for you, remember?
• Me: That must have been someone that looked like me.
• Woman at the beach (confidently): No, it was you. I remember you.
• Me: Well, we just got here today.
• Woman at the beach (less confidently): You just got here. And you've never been here before?
• Me: Nope.
• Woman at the beach: Well, you look just like her.
• Me (joking): Yeah well, all we Asians look alike.
• Woman at the beach (sincerely nodding): Yes!

We made great time from Guadeloupe to Dominica. The winds from just slightly north of east gave us the first nice beam reach sail we have had in a long while. This time, Matt did not believe the 15-knot wind prediction. It is almost always predicted to be 15 knots but then turns out to be 25 knots or more. He put two reefs in the main, which is a good thing because we saw gusts of 40 knots true.

Trafalgar Falls

We took a bus from Roseau to Trafalgar Falls. The buses here and elsewhere are really small vans and they look just like the taxis. The fare for the buses is reasonable (they're what the locals use) but the way they speed around hairpin turns on the hilly roads, honking frenetically to warn cars and pedestrians around the blind corners, is scary.

 

 

Trafalgar Falls is a set of two waterfalls, one of which is 200 feet. There are hot spring pools and cool water pools that you can climb down to and swim in. No one slipped and fell but it was just risky enough that it probably would be roped off in the U.S. because of risk of litigation.

 

On the way down, we harvested some sweet bananas and passion fruit. We have been finding all kinds of fruit here. Conrad is sick of mangoes, poor kid. We have heard Dominica described as the poorest island where no one starves because of the abundance of fruits that grow everywhere.

Water fight!

Hot springs.

Guadeloupe

An impressive mural on the side of a truck in Deshais.

Guadeloupe is another French island, which means more great bread and chocolate croissants. Deshaies was our first stop and most people do not speak English. We got to practice our French and the locals got to try to figure out what we were talking about.

We had a fairly miserable ride over from Montserrat. Once again we had too much wind, too far forward and big seas.  During the early part of the sail, we discovered that one of our water hoses had come lose and our pump had dutifully discharged 80 gallons of fresh water into the engine compartment. The bilge pump then dumped it into the sea. At least we know the bilge pump is working. This meant that we were now out of water (except for the 5 gallons we kept in a jerry jug on board). Also, the starboard engine got air in the line and conked out twice, once while anchoring. It's amazing how you can get used to anything. What used to cause a bit of a panic is now almost routine.

We tried to sail but with the wind almost on the nose and a strong current against us, we weren't making very good progress. We motor sailed with one engine for awhile. There were squalls popping up that would give us big bursts of wind (from the wrong direction). When we saw 40 knots of true wind (in the midst of big seas), we decided to take in the headsail, turn on the other motor, and get to our destination without unnecessarily stressing our rigging. Hopefully most of our trips from this point on should be at a better wind angle.

After fixing the water issue and replenishing our port tank, Matt got some baguettes and chocolate croissants. We walked around Deshaies and, inspired by a crewmember on a fellow cruising boat, foraged for coconut and mango. As it turned out, we didn't need to tromp around the jungle for an hour: As we sat outside the grocery store waiting for it to reopen after the lunch break, mangoes kept dropping to the ground all around us. They were deliciously sweet and juicy. We also tried breadfruit, which is apparently the solution to a lot of the world's hunger (each tree produces about a bazillion pounds of fruit). The only problem is that most people don't care for it. We fried it and it was okay (anything fried and all that) but a little too sweet because we let it get really ripe.

Pretty but vicious. This Tetrio Sphynx caterpillar
kept lunging at Matt's hand to try to bite it.

We also spent some time near Pigeon Island and Plage de Malendure (a beach). This was one of the first places that Matt snorkeled when he was a kid and he remembered it being better back then. Mark and Conrad endured another hike and enjoyed the big surf at the beach.

We spent about a week in Guadeloupe. It has a very European feel to it, including the siren cadences, pay porta-potties and mid-afternoon closing of most business.

Le Bourg (the town), Terre-de-Haute (the island), Les Saintes
(the group of islands), Guadeloupe

When a volcano destroys your Capital, keep calm and carry on

Soufrière Hills volcano.

Carry on...and perhaps do a bit of evacuating. Actually, since the volcano went from dormant to active in 1995, the population of Montserrat went from over 10,000 to around 4,000. The initial eruption and subsequent pyroclastic flows destroyed the capital city, many other settlements, and the main airport. Two-thirds of the island is now uninhabitable and off limits to the general public. But that being the case, the island keeps on going and the volcano doesn't seem to intrude on the locals daily thoughts too much.

Buildings buried in ash.

We were able to sail close to the ruins of Plymouth, the old capital city. In the past, there has been an exclusion zone that required sailboats to stay 2 kilometers away. But the volcano has been relatively quiet since 2011 so we were allowed to sail past without stopping during daytime hours. As we sailed downwind of the ruins, we could smell the sulfur from the fumaroles.

The abandoned houses near Plymouth.

Lovely hills just around the corner.

There is a big port expansion in the works that seeks to revitalize Montserrat's economy. There's also a plan for a new capital and many new public buildings.  It's ambitious and slow moving, mostly because it relies on foreign aid and loans.  Beyond the construction dust, it is a beautiful island that is nicknamed "The Emerald Isle of the Caribbean" because of its terrain and the Irish settlers that came to the island. St. Patrick's Day is a big deal here and gets a week-long celebration. Not certain if they drink green beer during the week.  And we're almost positive they don't dye the bay green. (Note to any Montserratians reading this: If you DO want a green bay, we can hook you up with some Chicago folks that'll make it happen.)

We enjoyed our stay on the island. We took a bus/taxi to the Montserrat Volcano Observatory. The ride itself was an adventure through narrow, winding roads. Roads here have two directions: Up and Down.  The boys enjoyed learning about the volcano. The highlight of the trip for them was the beach near our anchorage. They got tumbled for hours in the surf and still wanted more.

On the way to Montserrat from Nevis, which was an uncomfortable motor-sail with one engine, we caught a huge King Mackerel. Unfortunately, the area we caught it in is a documented hot spot for ciguatera so we didn't eat it. Our next stop is Guadeloupe.

Nevis (St. Kitts and Nevis)

Pinneys Beach in Nevis is one of those seemingly endless, sandy beaches that you see in movies. We were there on a Sunday and there were lots of locals having a rollicking time in the water. With all the time we spend on and near the water, it's surprising how infrequently we have seen adults in the ocean. Everyone we have met here is very friendly and justifiably proud of the island. And they seem to know how to have a good time.

We haven't seen baobab trees since Tanzania.

Mark and Conrad had fun playing with a local boy. We don't know his name because names are way down on the list of priorities for new friends in the under 9 set.

We also did a fun hike with sugar plantation ruins and monkeys. We were excited to see the monkeys but apparently they're a nuisance locally because they raid the local farms and eat everything they can get their hands on. The boys were not happy about hiking in the heat with gnats flying everywhere. Thank goodness for the reward of cool ocean waters and rum drinks (ocean for them, rum for us... although perhaps there'd be less complaining if we switched?).

Vervet monkey. Not a great picture but the highlight of our day.

Our next stop is Montserrat.

The cow whisperer.

We live in a PBS nature show

Swallows coming home to roost--in our boom.

Granted, it's not one of the thrilling ones like jumping great white sharks. It's more the kind of nature documentary you'd watch when you're looking for something to help you nod off. But when you live on the water, you can't help but notice the animals all around you. On the overnight passage from BVI to St. Martin, one flying fish jumped on top of our cabin and another one flew up about 18 feet, hit our mainsail, and landed on Matt's head.

There are the remoras that sometimes take residence under our boat and dart out when we throw food scraps overboard. Mark had fun by sticking his finger in the water and quickly pulling it out again as the remoras came and investigated. We were pretty sure that remoras don't have sharp teeth and this was confirmed when Mark didn't pull his finger out fast enough and got nipped by one.

 

 

There are also tons of pelicans that dive bomb for fish all around us. They make a super-loud splash and it's very disconcerting if you're not used to it (like us). The seagulls then swoop down to see if they can steal some leftovers, sometimes landing right on the pelican's head. The pelicans are pretty cool about it and it's almost enough reason to forgive them for the jumbo sized poops they leave on the boat. Almost.

Birds on a wire.

As we neared the mooring field near Pinneys Beach in Nevis under sail, one of these swallows started bumping into the black dots on our jib sail . We couldn't tell if it was trying to attack the dots or mate with them. The swallows continued to circle the boat even after we rolled up the sails.  After we picked up our mooring ball (you can't anchor here), the swallows moved in and started building a nest in the boom.

 

At first we let them do their thing but decided that since we weren't leaving for 2 days, it would be a very rude awakening when we moved the boat and they would have wasted a lot of effort. So Matt waited until a bird flew out and then stuck a shoe in the hole at the end of the boom, effectively blocking access to their new home. The birds became very angry and we thought they were just upset that we had messed up their new nesting area. Birds kept coming by and squawking at us.

 

A little blurry, but I think the emotion comes through.

The next day, Conrad noticed a bird head sticking out of the hole on the boom that was on the opposite side of where the nest was being constructed. Apparently a bird had gotten trapped in the boom. Matt took out his shoe to free the bird from the boat detention facility. After that the swallows stayed away from our boat.



St. Barts to St. Kitts

Cero mackerel that Conrad finally agreed to hold.

We had a nice fast sail from St. Barts to St. Kitts. The 60 degree apparent wind angle made things much more comfortable than the 30 degree wind angle the day before, even though the seas were just as big.

We skirted a couple squalls that churned the seas up even more and had us reaching 10 knots at times, with a reef in. Just as one of these squalls passed through, we caught this black fin tuna and had to slow the boat down. We managed to get him aboard and the kids immediately started lobbying for sushi.  The kids like to play a game where we estimate what our dinners would cost in a restaurant. Have I mentioned that we don't have a TV? We decided that the sushi the first night and the seared tuna with wasabi-ginger mashed potatoes the next night would have been a few hundred dollars for the family. Even better, we have kids that like sushi and wasabi-ginger mashed potatoes.

When you visit a country on a boat, it is a sign of respect to fly a courtesy flag for that country. We have been making our own courtesy flags using canvas and fabric paint. You're supposed to iron the fabric to set the paint. Since we don't have an iron, Matt improvises with some pans on the stove.  The main challenge is figuring out where we're going so we can make a flag beforehand. We were painting the St. Kitts and Nevis flag the day before we arrived in St. Kitts and Matt put the grommets in after he checked in with customs. The flag for the Dominican Republic went unused since we ended up going all the way to Puerto Rico.

At $20-30 a pop for commercial flags (that don't hold up so well anyway),
we're happy with homemade. From a distance, you don't notice a difference.

We walked around Basseterre (St. Kitts) and bought some produce and bread. Although cruise ships stop here, it is very much a working town. I was surprised by the open sewer lines running through the downtown area. Conrad picked up a coin from one of gutters before he realized he was touching poopy water. Good thing we carry hand sanitizer with us.

We will spend a few days in St. Kitts and Nevis while waiting for the weather to settle and then head south.

St. Barts is kind of good but can we go now?

Why did the chicken cross the road? It was stuck to this car...

We decided to leave for St. Barts on the morning of Ascension Day, which is a holiday in these parts. Supposedly all the shops are closed, but everything we needed was open. Matt bought some coffee at McDonalds to use their Wi-Fi to check the wind and weather. Then he headed over to Customs to check out. Most importantly, he got some chocolate croissants and a baguette.

The trip to St. Bart's had us heading straight into the wind as we slammed against big, confused seas. We sailed about halfway and then turned on the motors. Mercifully, this trip was relatively short and positioned us for a better wind angle to St. Kitt's. We only stayed one night because the anchorage was very roll-y and it's 22 Euros a night just to anchor (for us anyway because they charge by the square foot). On the upside, there are free showers, if you can brave the mosquitos.

We walked around town, which is decidedly upscale, but most of the shops were closed for Ascension Day. There also seemed to be a very high ratio of restaurants to residents, and most of them were well outside any budget we might hope to keep.  I guess the mega yachts and wealthy tourists keep them in business.  We did manage to find some really expensive gelato though.

People are always commenting that Mark and Conrad are having such a great experience by sailing to different countries and seeing other cultures firsthand. I think that this is mostly true, but it is also sometimes against their will. Judging by their complaining, walking around new places ranks just above learning multiplication tables. "I'm hot!" "I'm tired!" "My _______ hurts." "Can we go back to the boat?" "Is this our daily torture?" (That last gem is from Mark.) As we walked around St. Bart's on game day (the day of the week that they get to play iPad games for an hour or so), Mark spent the whole time asking what time it was so we wouldn't get back too late for games.  Let's hope some of the experience is gained via osmosis, 'cause it isn't always being ingested voluntarily.

Old fort being used as a police station.

Of course, they love the beach and jumping off the boat. So they're kind of like other kids who go on vacation to Europe but only want to play in the hotel pool.