St Lucia 24 May

We are now in a marina in St Lucia and made a few more friends. Rik an Miriam have gone to Canada to be with their son for his graduation. Yesterday we took a tour with our new Swiss friends Marco and Rachel. We saw waterfalls and one is the diamond falls where some of superman and romancing the stone was filmed. The water comes from the vulcano and is hot and has sulphur which has made the wall all sorts of colour. We took a bath in the hot springs and covered ourselves in the mud. Supposed to be good. The photo with the little red kind of apple has a brown thing on the bottom. This growth is a cashew. Dee walked through the most amazing gardens with huge flowers. There is also a photo of Rachel and I. One of Vision our guide in front of his Rasta house. Another on of the Pitons.

St Lucia 14 May

We put the dinghy down and by the time we got our things to go ashore we caught another fish in our dinghy. This was not a flying fish but one that must have been chased by a flying fish and jumped. This was still I'm Martinique. We bought quite a few French cheeses and wine (very cheap) and left for St Lucia where we are now in the harbour. Rocky has gone ashore with Rick to clear in as only the captain is allowed. Normally we say that we are both captain because we heard that if anything happens to the captain nobody can take the boat out and some people had a hell of a time sorting this. Rocky and I are playing backgammon or dominos now at night so we do not go to bed too early. Just now 2 different fruit guys came by with their colorful boats. Pineapple about 4 dollars and also 6 mangoes for $4. I told them to come back tomorrow when we are settled in. I took a photo of both boats. Also 2 photos of Rodney bay in St Lucia.

Australian in Martinique

Today we were sitting in the cockpit having a coffee and a home made Anzac biscuit when this guy paddled over on a kayak calling out 'did you sail that from Fremantle and is that an island Packet '. He was born in Sydney and came from the little 23 feet yacht anchored close by. I invited him for a coffee and Anzac and he proved to be very entertaining. He lived in Belgium where he bought his boat that was build in the Isle of White. It was a Yamiuth (or something like that). He had sailed it everywhere with hand held gps and not many electronics and by himself. With everywhere I mean from Europe and around here and Brasil. He had plenty of stories. His girlfriend of 6 years had chosen for a big house and car over him. He had made enough money to start a marina in French Guyana and he had been negotiating with the government there for the last 6 months but should start building in September. He had lots to say about the French and English islands here and we were entertained. The other funny thing that happened today was that we took a bus to the Casino because we were told that here was a very good buffet lunch. So we asked directions went by bus walked a lot through the heat and arrived at a big supermarket called Casino. When we finally got to the real casino the buffet was not on on Mondays. Here is a photo of David's 23 foot yacht. On the far right corner you can see his kayak which he paddled to shore to meet a girl (a friend of a friend) in neat long trousers shirt and proper shoes. He said that he does not look for what most cruisers look for he looks for the girls. I say good luck David

Leaving Dominica for Martinique

The last night in Dominica we visited the markets as in fruit and veggies. Very colorful and friendly people. Our boat boy Pancho (should have taken a picture of him gorgeous man with long dreadlocks and one of those red scarfs around his head,wearing a t-shirt with cannabis pictures and high written on it. He waved hello and said it was the environmental high) was not impressed with Australia winning the cricket from the West Indies. We spend another night rolling on a mooring ball. In the morning we banged into our friends boat next to us on a mooring as well. So much for well spaced balls. Then Rocky told me to have a look at the front and I saw the flying fish no longer flying but stiff on our deck. We heard about people getting knocked over the head with flying fish and getting fish flying aboard but sofar we have not had this. Now I should tell or maybe I have already about the huge flying fish that was chasing a small one. We were sitting up on the deck cabin watching the sunset with a drink (amaretto rum which might have accounted for seeing it if I would have been the only one). Anyway the big fish chased the little one dipping in the water occasionally. Then the little fish turned around and the big fish chased again.
Anyway after about 7 hours of calm water sailing we are now arriving in Fort the France the capital of Martinique. I baked Anzac biscuits on the way. There is also a photo of Ford de France it is a big city and a little yellow bird which I think was tired and sat on our boat in different spots for a while. We anchored our first night in Trois Ilets where the Josephine (napoleons wife) was born.

Dominica 3 May

Yesterday we arrived in Dominica. We had to go a long way in our dinghy to get to customs. They charged us 10 EC which is about 3.50 US and that was in and out at the same time. Today we hired a car with driver/guide. We travelled all over the island. It has 7 vulcanos and is very mountainous we saw rainforests and boiling springs. There were 2 waterfalls next to each other and one was hot and the other one cold. As in very hot and very icy. The guide gave us a flower which I put in my hair. We had lunch in this lovely place overlooking the valley and a waterfall. All in all Dominica is a fantastic island. Tomorrow we will sail south to the other side of the island. This is about 22 miles. From there we go to Martinique the day after.