Circumnavigation! (Antigua)

 

We left simply wonderful Barbuda and headed back to Jumby Bay for an overnight wifi catch up. It was good to sleep in a familiar calm anchorage. Next morning we continued along on our Antiguan circumnavigation - apparently passing Oprah Winfrey’s beach house as we left Long Island - I didn’t actually see it, but the internet assures me it’s there.

The plan for the day is to complete the full circle back to our post Atlantic crossing arrival spot: Falmouth. We arrive in the early afternoon into the welcoming bay having had very little assistance from the wind along the way. Dropped anchor just outside the channel markers, and soon headed ashore. It was less than a month ago that we first stretched our legs here after the ocean crossing. It’s good to be back. That said, the next three days follow a sad pattern - I’ve somehow picked up a bad back from some forgotten over exertion along the way. My only relief comes from laying flat on the bed... so in between lay ins, curative rests and siestas, I didn’t spend a lot of time up on deck. This extra laying around time did give me a chance to do some drawings on my iPad ..some of which I’m actually quite pleased with.

Once the back pain eased, we managed a couple of nice walks ashore, one back into the historic gem that is English harbour. This time sharing the small Georgian town with a gaggle of camera wielding cruise liner passengers - who bizarrely, almost to a man, are rotund and pasty. Our second walk skirted us around the bay to Pigeon beach, which could be slightly more accurately called ‘grazing wild goat beach’. After a there and back paddle/stroll along the sandy shoreline we headed back over the hill to the supermarket at English harbour. Now, slightly more used to the local exorbitant prices, we stocked up on some essentials and fresh veggies.

From there, back to the boat, upped anchor mid-morning, and had a pretty fair four hour sail, with following wind to one of our (so far) favourite spots in the Caribbean: Hermitage Bay.

I tried my hand with some fishing at sunset.. it didn’t go quite as planned. As Chez started making dinner below, I hooked into something massive. After a 5 minute to and fro tussle with, whatever it is putting up a good fight, I slowly but surely begin reeling in line from what I’m hoping is a large eating fish - a barracuda or wahoo perhaps.... As the line between us shortens I eventually get a glimpse at what’s on the other end of it. Its not good news. It’s a large turtle, more than a meter, but less than 2 - not something I would be comfortable (or I suppose legally allowed) to have for dinner, despite how good the soup allegedly tastes.

If you’re to believe the books, the local turtle population are supposedly only ‘occasional opportunistic carnivores’ - I thought that meant, eating an odd mussel or whelk which it nibbled off the coral. I didn’t think it meant taking my jelly-squid lure as it whizzes past through the water. Regardless... I’ve caught a turtle - Oh bugger!

I let out some slack, then cut the line from the rod. With the line alone in my hands I try and get him close enough to be able to release the lure - up close he’s big. By jumping into the tender and pulling the line firmly directly from above, I manage to gather sufficient line to get him close enough to pull the lure free without losing any fingers. Very glad - and lucky - to have been able to both free him and retain my lure for further adventures.

...and just like that, I have yet another sad and sorry tale to add to my ever growing collection of ‘The one that got away’ stories.

We’re joined the next morning in Hermitage bay by a couple who we haven’t seen since a group dinner out in Gibraltar last year - Aussie couple Keith & Linda on catamaran ‘Itiki’. They’re more friends of friends really, but were very welcoming and we spent a nice afternoon on their stern sharing fishing tips (how not to do it!!) and war stories of our respective Atlantic crossings - they had taken on unknown crew (that worked out really well) and they sail a catamaran, so a very different crossing than ours.

Being in Europe for the last few years, the majority of the birds I saw were the same as in the UK. Here in Antigua it’s a very different story - all the bird life is new to me, and the sheer colourful variety is a wonder to see. Some of the most common ones we’ve seen so far are;

‘Bananaquits’ - little chirpy yellow and black small wren/sparrow sized birds with long curved beaks.

‘Grackles’ - these sleek looking birds are like UK blackbirds who’ve gone on a diet and spent time at the gym.

‘Frigate birds’ - big angular winged pterodactyl-like bullies who circle high then steal fish caught by seagulls.

Chez, not sharing my ornithological leanings, having read this, noted that I possibly have been going on about birds a bit too much... she also, unasked for, added a short poem, which both rhymes and is, on the face of it, factually correct:

Fly fly shit and fly

I’m a bird and I live in the sky

......this however doesn’t hold true for ground based birds such as the Kiwi bird native to NZ!