Brown Boobies etc. (St.Vincent - Grenada)

 

We arrived at our selected anchorage, the jungle rimmed bay at Chateubelair on the island of St. Vincent about an hour after dark. With no moon to help us we crawled our way in close to the few lights showing on the beach and dropped anchor. The engine wouldn’t allow us to reverse for some reason, so not an ideal anchor set, but good enough for the one forecast low wind night we plan to stay here for. I checked the propeller (all good), topped up the transmission fluid in the gearbox, and made sure it operated both forward and reverse - all seemed good. Both had an early night after the long day’s sail down from St. Lucia - it was a cracking sail that was really good for our confidence and enjoyed by both of us.

I wake to the sound of coffee being made and a cheery ‘Happy Birthday’ from my lovely wife. I take my first look at the ‘town’ which we’d arrived in the previous night. It’s an overcast humid morning, and wafts of morning vapour are rising from the jungle that rises behind. It’s mainly a fishing village by the look of it, a little rundown and worn, but a really beautiful spot to wake up in regardless.

Having not checked into St. Vincent, we need to continue on down South for another few hours to reach the island of Carriacou, where we can check in to Grenada. So an early up anchor and away. The wind kept a pretty constant 18/20 knots from the East all day, and riding a little swell (about 1.5 to 2m) when we were out of the Lee of the islands we passed down the side of the Grenadines on our left. It was our second good day sail in a row - and if that’s not a good birthday present, I don’t know what is.

We made good time - averaging well over 5 knots for the day, and arrived into Tyrell Bay mid afternoon. It’s a wide well populated bay with three hulks rusting at the outer edge, further in, there’s a small sea of masts, within which we select a suitable spot and drop first time in 5m of sand.

We spend a few days there taking in the town, it’s the usual ramshackle mix of shed like bars and restaurants along the front. 3kms out of town lies Paradise beach, it’s all that name conjures up: turquoise water, perfect white soft sand and a small palm island just off shore as the view. We splash in and out of the water for a while, knock up the standard dribbled sand sandcastle - which promptly falls over. On our return from the beach our path is crossed by two wagging, collarless Labrador crosses who are gleefully making a beeline for the sea - they wade into the cooling water and you can see the happiness on their faces. Once they’d finished their swim, we told them both that they were ‘good boys’ and headed on our way.

There’s a lot of bird life in the bay: Brown Boobies, Laughing gulls and Pelicans. They flit from bow to bow looking out for fish below. Once a shoal is spotted, they all begin squawking and circling the spot. We had one of these frenzies right next to the boat; the bigger birds - the pelicans and boobies - dive below the surface at the fish below, the gulls circling above waiting for any scraps. As they passed the bow, we got a good look at what was being hunted in the water. Firstly there’s the small panicked shoal made up of anchovy sized silver flashes, these in turn were herded by perhaps 3 or 4 mahi mahi about as big as my forearm, and following them was a vicious looking pack of 8 or so barracudas - long thin teethy killing machines. It’s was an amazing spectacle, seeing so many varieties of animal working together both above and below the water.

We met an Aussie couple, Mike and Nikki, with whom we had drinks and shared sailing stories - their boat had once been seized by the AFP (Australian Federal Police) carrying what was at that stage a record haul of illicit drugs - the boat was then auctioned off and a few owners and sailing miles later.. here it is.

We’d planned to leave with them for the next leg down to Grenada, but checking the upcoming weather decided that departing a day earlier was prudent.

..and that brings me to now gliding down the North coast of Grenada having had a brilliant mornings sail so far. What I can see of the island has a King Kong / Jurassic Park feel. I realise since arriving in the Caribbean I’ve probably used the word ‘Lush’ for every single island, well, I’m not sure if lusher is even a word, but Grenada is.