America's Great Loop

It's official!! We have crossed our wake on March 23, 2009 at 1:30 in the morning completing the loop we started on July 19th 2008.

Our friend Fred, in Ithaca ,thinks we should call it complete when we get there, since we started there the summer 2008. However, people take years to complete the loop. Since we've been this far up the west coast of Florida previous years, I'm going with that. We can also celebrate with Fred when we get home.

Montserrat Volcano

Ok... This is the final posting of our five week cruise in the Caribbean with our friends then on to our current travels.

On Feb. 16, my birthday we headed south from St.Kitts past Montserrat. It was an awesome way to spend a birthday. Sailing past the volcano and seeing first hand the devastation caused by the eruption over ten years ago, was quite the sight. There is a two mile safety zone that we needed to obey and trust me we obeyed it. The cruising guides suggest sailing down the east side so that smoke and ash don't land on you, but since the volcano wasn't spewing, we got adventurous and sailed down the west side. We listened to Chris Parker, the weather guy and he didn't mention any volcanic activity. The picture shows the ash covered houses.

We stopped in Guadeloupe WI for one night. Took a walk in town next morning for fruit and veggies. We tried to check into customs but no one was around, so we gave up. We left here at 10 am and headed for Les Saintes and spent about ten days here. These French Islands are like living in a fairy tale. The only way we could get EUROs was to buy a loaf of French bread using a twenty dollar bill. The banks were closed because of the French Islands strike going on at the time. Otherwise we were happy here hiking and touring the island.

Next and final stop was St. Lucia. This island is know for it's Pitons and beer named after the pitons. Here we visited a collapsed volcano which was amazing. The steam comes spewing out of the street gutters a block away and the sulfur smell was worse then a rotten egg.

The day(Mar. 9th)before Bruce and I left to come home we decided we might want to try zip lining. If you know me at all, you know I do not like heights. I've been on a few roofs reshingling and it is not fun. We had rented a car for touring this island, so the four of us drove to the Rain Forest Sky Rides place. The guy said no zip line today because there weren't enough people. Oh well, I was actually dissappointed. Instead we took a walking tour through the Rain Forest which was nice but all the trees sounded the same. I was impressed with the incense tree that makes the incense for churches and a pretty red and black seed they call donkey eyes. Anyway, after that hike we got a free rum punch. It sure came in handy!!! Bruce saw that a bunch of people came in for zip lining and he asked if they had room. Before I knew it I was put in my zip gear and on a tranopy up through the rain forest. It was beautiful. These guys kept us moving from one tree to the next and after the second zip I stopped shaking and actually enjoyed the scenery below. The worst was standing on the platforms around the trees 150 ft above the forest. Even worse was having to step up on the edge and get fastened to the zip line for the next zip along. We went from 1500 ft to 1300 ft in ten zip lines. After our ten zip lines we hikes back up and took the Tranopy back down. That's when Bruce gave away my second coupon for another free rum punch. Bummer!! Zip lining was the highlight of our trip not to mention the volcanos.

We didn't think we'd stay long in St Martin. We arrived on Jan. 21st and here we are five days later with no plans to leave. We anchored on the Dutch side of the lagoon on a nice large watery lot,increased fees, or rumors thereof, driving most boats over to the crowded French side. The weekly anchorage fee is $20 and Lee had lots of errands on this side and thought it was well worth it. We've probably made as many dingy trips over to Marigot on the French side as here, but it's all doable. Sunday we headed over to watch the practice carnival parade. We were ready by two with info on the route, but not the time. We climbed up to Fort Louis, a good vantage for a first sighting of the approaching parade. By 3:30 we were ready to go down and approach the parade. It was a little different from small town NY parades, mostly large flat bed trucks with mountains of sound equipment that manipulated your heartbeat in what felt to be a dangerous manner, followed by mostly teenage t-shirted dancers. The exception was very foreign, around 40 potbellied dancers in grotesque smiling masks of French politicians, doing choreographed dances of back slapping, handshaking, . The stuffed white shirts and neckties contrasted with the obviously teenaged hipswivelling lower bodies, hilarious. We tried to decide how this could be translated into Spencer's parade. Every Tuesday the village of Grand Case throws a street party along its ocean fronted main street. It's known for restaurants and we spent the first hour reading every menu we passed. The decision was made to go back to the missionary sized pot of paella simmering in front of one restaurant, but it's wonderful smell drew in so many people they were fully reserved. We headed across the street to La California, funny name for a French restaurant. The waitress must have taken lessons in being French, she was so lively and bubbly we were charmed, so lucky there was a table for us, on the deck right next to the water. Lee said it was the same view we have from the boat every day. We had lobster pizza!!! and crepes and that wonderful liquor they bring you at the end of the meal. She even made a souvenir picture of us. We had taken the dollar bus from Marigot, bumper to bumper traffic every Tuesday, but at least we didn't have to deal with parking. At the end of the evening we found a similar little 12 passenger bus and rushed aboard to take the last four seats. We impressed the other passengers with boat and island stories until the bus pulled into a parking lot and everyone else got off to jump in their cars. We went from savvy travelers to laughing stock in a matter of minutes, our little bus had turned into a parking lot shuttle without our realizing it. A little negotiation turned it into a two dollar bus and we made it back to Marigot only a little humbled by the experience. Wednesday was the cruisers' get together at a beach bar. We met up with Ron and Debbie, owners of one of our sister boats, and went on the our other must-eat experience, Lal's Indian restaurant. We ordered six entrees and passed them around, meaning, now we have to go back and reorder our favorites. Now that we have the eating out of the way, we'll get on with the rest of our explorations. We did find a beach and neighborhood for our morning walks, something we didn't know about two years ago. I hope every island we revisit yields similar new experiences. There was a perfectly good sign in the windshield of that bus that said "Marigot".

We just dropped anchor in Simpson Bay lagoon, St Martin, after arriving outside last night near midnight. The bridge opens twice a day and we lined up this morning with some ten boats, not nearly as many as two years ago. The five-story megayachts are also fewer in number. We left Virgin Gorda in the BVI's around eight yesterday =morning, our third attempt at the infamous Anagada Passage, AKA the "Oh My God A". The current and constant trade winds make it difficult for boats heading east. Even though we had no more than ten knots of wind, there were still confused seas and Lee spent most of the passage out of commission with sea sickness. Thank goodness we had Bruce and Nancy aboard, experienced catamaran sailors, since I'm worthless also in those conditions, due to sea phobia, not sea sickness. We had tried to leave twice while Marcelo's parents were aboard. His mom really wanted to make the passage; I'd rather have a root canal. Each time the weather window closed on us and we gave up. Lee felt bad (in more ways than one) that I was spending my birthday crashing along. I considered it a present just to have it behind us at the end of the day. I was very surprised when Bruce and Nancy pulled out a rum cake when we anchored and Lee produced presents. It'll go down as a memorable birthday.
I am cheating a bit here because I am posting Sherry's boat trip news but considering I was there I figure it's good. I decided to throw in some facts about what the passage is. Hope it isn't too boring. The Anegada Passage is
channel in the West Indies, connecting the Atlantic Ocean with the Caribbean Sea; it is 40 miles (65 km) wide and separates the British Virgin Islands (west) from the Leeward Islands (southeast). It has the greatest depth (more than 7,550 feet [2,300 m]) of any channel in the eastern Caribbean. The passage is one of the two through which subsurface water enters the Caribbean (the other being the Windward Passage).

Next day we went to Virgin Gorda and stopped at The Baths. This was really neat. We basically waded amoung these huge boulders. There was even an area under some boulders that I swam in.
We anchored in Leverick Bay and that evening went to the marina to watch the Jumbies. These guys were really good. They danced around for about an hour on these stilts then in the end a couple of the guys went over to the pool and fell in. They were very cool.

The BVI's St Thomas

Bruce and I were invited to join our friends on their 38 ft. catamaran in the BVI's. On Jan.28th we flew out of Fort Lauderdale to St.Thomas. Since we were in St. Thomas we decided to spend the day there and see the sites. We booked a B&B called the Crystal Palace. The B&B has been in the same family for five generations and got it's name from the fact that it was the first place in St. Thomas to have glass windows. It was beautiful and once you sit on their varanda with your complimentary drink, you are hooked. Why go anyway else. We had an awesome few of Charlotte Amalie Harbor.
The proprieters where from Michigan where they also have a B&B. Both families grew up together. They were filling in for the owner for a few weeks.

Auntie was making her famous rum cakes which you can get in Ohio also. Bruce asked her "how much rum do you add", and she said "if I told you that, I would have to kill you". we bought one as a birthday cake for our hosts.