June 2016

Date: 13th June 2016

Position: Pirate’s bay, Charlotteville, Tobago,

Hi Landfolk and Salty Sea Dogs,

Bonzo here again, from a stunning bay on the north end of Tobago. It’s beautiful here, but let me update you in the correct order. After having left many friends behind to explore the Windward Islands, we made landfall in Portsmouth, Dominica (complete with a large Mahi Mahi). Dominica is famous for excellent hiking through unspoilt rain forest – so we stayed 10 days and the crew did just that, carefully though with Carla’s back issues.

Since there are a few newcomers to this publication, let me introduce myself. My name is Bonzo, I am the Captain of sailing yacht Ari B and I am a rather handsome white stuffed dog. And yes, I know all the associated jokes already..... . Stuffed rabbit Pip is my sidekick (named after the real dog Pip on Wild Bird that I have the secret hots for).

Back to Dominica:

The team hired a car as well for a couple of days and explored this beautiful island. The people are amongst the friendliest we have encountered and they are very proud to be from Dominica. They don’t have a lot after the last hurricane wreaked havoc over the island, taking out virtually every single bridge – and they have a lot...., but the people are resilient and happy it seems – great place!!

Alex and Carla paid a guide a few bucks to help them find Chaudiere pool – a natural fresh water pool you can jump into – and if you are Alex, you do that with a camera in hand – and drop it. Luckily the guide knew someone with a mask and had better breath holding abilities than Alex – so he managed to get it back. Carla didn’t comment on this episode at all – honest!

A short day sail saw us arrive in Roseau, complete with a fresh barracuda (for the boat boy) and an overnight stop before setting sail for Martinique, arriving in St. Pierre in the north of the Island.

St. Pierre had been the capital of Martinique and was branded the Paris of the Caribbean until the 8th of May 1902, when the local volcano expelled a superheated gas bubble that burned the village to the ground and killed almost 30,000 people, leaving only 2 people alive in the entire place. The explosion is said to have been as powerful as a nuclear bomb.

It was thanks to local politics that numerous previous smaller eruptions were ignored and an evacuation did not take place. Still today you can see many buildings that used scorched walls of previous dwellings to rebuild.

We stayed a few days, walking the water ways that were built by slaves to irrigate the fields and plantations around St. Pierre. Very much the same as in Madeira, but a lot warmer :-) .

We continued to Fort de France, still a military post for the French and today’s capital of Martinique and a great city anchorage. It’s very pretty, with excellent holding and even a nice beach that you can swim to. After stocking up with provisions and cheap wine and beer, our next stop was Grande Anse. This is a very peaceful bay that even has free mooring buoys paid for by EU funding. The only problem is that most of them are taken up by local French boats using them as a permanent mooring! What is the EU doing funding buoys in a French overseas territory?

Our last port of call in Martinique was St Anne just outside le Marin. We hooked up again with Jack and Fizzy on Carpe Diem for a few days – nice walking, lovely food and drinks and great company. They left their boat in Marin for a few weeks and we hope to catch them again in Grenada towards October.

As the hurricane season officially starts on the 1st of June (for our insurance anyway), we left Martinique on the 26th of May to sail directly to Tobago (which lies outside the belt) and took a lengthy 40 hours for the 190 miles. The equatorial current sweeps past the NE corner of South America and creates 2-3 knots , partially against you and mostly side on, so that even the 12 miles upwind space we created through going close hauled was lost on the last few hours and the overtime charges for customs had to be avoided with a little engine help.

Arrival in Charlotteville, Tobago was timely and easy going and we settled into the large and very beautiful bay with only 5 other yachts! It’s a shame that many of our friends with dogs cannot come here due to very strict rules, that might mean 2-3 month quarantine with the authorities. Fortunately, this doesn’t apply to stuffed dog skippers – although the number of flea ridden strays on the beach firstly encouraged me to stay on board and secondly made me wonder what the authorities are afraid of – hard to see that the walking flea farms on the beach don’t have every conceivable disease there is already!!

It has to be said that customs here are fantastic – contrary to the stories on websites and books – at least here in Charlotteville. The customs officer spends time with the sailors to go snorkelling and one day after returning from a walk, the team was invited into her house for freshly made fish soup.

Rules for sailing to Trinidad have been relaxed to make it easier for us sailors and the customs officer asked us to tell him what we need – as they don’t understand sail boats. Let’s hope this continues into Trinidad.

Meantime, after planning to stay 5 days, we have decided to stay 5 weeks – this bay is our favourite anchorage in the Caribbean so far – good protection (just a little rolly sometimes), good holding, good fishing (the crew has been fishing squid with great success and Carla speared her first lobster – check out her face on facebook – it’s a picture !).

The village has a great fruit and vegetable stand on Fridays and after helping a fisherman with some chores, the boat now has a private fisherman. His last delivery was a 4 kilo tuna for 10 dollars and a beer – it fed the crew 3 dinners and a lunch!!

There’s plenty of hiking around the village and it’s for us to explore – no sign posts, no maps, all in the rain forest , with 200 species of birds, one more colourful than the next – magic.... and the people are leaving you in peace, but are amongst the most friendly we have come across if you approach them with courtesy and respect – it’s all a bit old fashioned here – and the crew love it.

Plans are to leave here early July, head for Trinidad and haul Ari out middle of July, followed by a flight to the UK and some family visits. Cara’s back has been slowly improving, but is not healed yet, so plans may change at short notice. A weeks visit to Alex’s sister’s hut is planned, but depends on Carla’s back of course - we will see.

The next update will be when we are back onboard in October. Hope to catch up with many of you when we are back in the UK.

Ari B out

Captain Bonzo

Man of War bay, Charlotteville, Tobago