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Getting back into our cruising routine, the week has
flown by without much activity. We spent most
of it hanging out in Carlisle Bay, Bridgetown,
Barbados. Around the corner from our anchorage
in front of the popular
Boatyard
beach bar and restaurant, a short dinghy ride
delivered us through The Careenage harbor into the
heart of downtown. The natural harbor is where
schooners used to be careened, or turned on their
sides, to be scraped of barnacles and repainted.
The former boatyard is now a marina and well
developed pedestrian area with benches, parks and
plenty of bars and restaurants. A few blocks
north we discovered the main shopping street,
full of locals as opposed to the
cruise ship passengers. We wandered through
the streets on a busy Saturday, the only white
tourists in sight, enjoying the feel of the real
Barbados. We went mostly unnoticed by the
lively weekend shoppers and revelers. The
occasional vendor, his laden cart parked between
storefronts, would encourage us to buy some fruits
or vegetables, not in the least disturbed if we
declined.
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Our occasional traveling
companions, Claude, Rike, Celine and Anouck on
Cenou spent four nights
there with us. They also crossed the Atlantic
this winter, but waited until after the holidays
when the trade winds are theoretically better
established. They landed in Barbados as their
first stop in the Caribbean. We hadn't been
able to spend much time with them while our family
was with us, so the four girls were eager to hang
out together. We kept our school lessons short
and watched as they paired up by ages and kayaked
between the two boats and the beach, sometimes all
four together and sometimes in their twosomes.
Sleepovers were arranged and group dinners shared.
We are always happy when our paths cross and we are
able to share a few days of camaraderie. It is
especially important for the girls to have friends
close in age whose experiences they can easily
relate to.
After one of the many
kayak trips back and forth, our trusty yellow ocean
kayak was left improperly tied up by one of the
kids. Joe was off running an errand in town
with our dinghy and I had all four girls on the boat
with me. At some point I noticed the missing
kayak. I looked around to see if I could spot
it floating away, not that I could do much about it,
being dinghy-less. Moments later, Georgie came
rowing up in her inflatable dinghy, our errant kayak
in tow. We exchanged brief greetings, enough
to discover that we had both come across the
Atlantic recently. Georgie had
assumed that we were a charter boat, whether because
of the children or the catamaran or some other
reason, I'm not sure. At any rate, Joe and I
went to deliver a thank-you bottle of wine the next
morning.
Kevin (early thirties?) is
Canadian and departed from Vancouver five years ago
on his 1974 Whitby 42 monohull. He single
handed most of the way around the world.
Cruising down the west coast of the United States,
he crossed the Pacific from Mexico to the Marquesas
Islands and continued on to New Zealand, Australia
and through the Indian Ocean to South Africa.
Through a personal ad, he met Georgie who is from
near Durban, South Africa. With no sailing
experience whatsoever, she joined him on the
continuation of his circumnavigation around the Horn
of Africa, up its west coast and across the Atlantic
to Barbados. Her first sail onboard "South
Moon" they hit a 55 knot gale and got knocked down
or heeled so far over that their mast touched the
water. It sounds like quite the introduction
to her new lifestyle! Their boat looks a far
cry from Zia, tried and true, sturdy and
certainly seaworthy, with all manner of gear
strapped to the deck. I offer this up as a bit
of encouragement to my would-be cruiser readers and
just one more example of how many different ways
there are to "go cruising."
We decided to sail on
from Barbados on Tuesday, heading north towards a
rendezvous with my parents in Antigua on the
eighteenth. There is a general strike underway
in Guadeloupe in protest of wages and prices on the
island that has lasted for over two weeks. We
have heard that some instances of violence
have been reported in the midst of the chaos.
I'm sure that these are few and far between, but we
decided to avoid that island all the same.
Besides, we had spent a week there on our last tour
through the Caribbean in 2006.
Marie-Galante is a small
island 20 miles southeast of Guadeloupe and as yet
unvisited by us. We set a course for 345° and
196 miles. With an easterly wind, the trip was
fast and relatively comfortable, blowing 15 to 25
knots on the beam. Our timing was perfect as
we arrived in Grand Bourg just after sunup. We
picked up a mooring ball and Joe was there to greet
the customs officers at 8am sharp. After
clearing in and acquiring a baguette, we continued a
little further north along the west coast of the
island to St. Louis. Said to be a better
anchorage and more lively town, we didn't see any
reason to hang around in Grand Bourg.
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There are indeed a few
restaurants and shops in town, but I would hardly
call it lively. We finally managed to get a
somewhat tenuous internet connection from one of the
beach front restaurants "Chez Henri" owned by a
local, Henri, and a Swiss partner who moved here two
years ago. We enjoyed a walk around town and
found a street-side BBQ joint that served some
delicious jerk chicken with fries and a salad.
After our overnight sail, we were a little early for
most of the half a dozen restaurants we saw on
shore. We found a little pizza shack on our
way back that is on the agenda for tonight's dinner.
I'm always surprised at how big the language barrier is
on the French islands down here, but we manage to
get by. It helps that everyone is so friendly.
I think this attitude changes from island to island,
but so far we have had nothing but good experiences.
I will keep my fingers crossed that this continues.
Racial tensions seem to
be one issue that does crop up regularly in the
region. The stark contrast between the lives
of the local black population, often impoverished,
and the relative wealth and luxury of the tourists
and white residents of the islands is impossible to
deny. The legacy of slavery is indeed a
powerful force here and issues of empowerment and
rights are still debated.
I just started reading our new President's first
book, Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and
Inheritance which speaks to many of these
issues as they unfold in the United States. I find myself awed by Barack Obama's
candid description of coming to terms with his
racial identity throughout his youth. I feel
privileged to be afforded such an intimate view of
his formative years and look forward to gaining a
deeper understanding of this inspiring individual,
upon whom so many of the world's hopes and dreams
rely. I can definitively say that the response
to his Presidency among the foreigners we have
talked to is overwhelmingly positive. After
eight long years, we are once again proud to be
Americans. We wish President Obama the best of
luck in the Herculean task that lies ahead.
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