The Adventures of Little Rosie

Posted from Ocean City, NJ

BEQUIA

We had a great sail from St. Lucia to Bequia.  The wind stayed steady and we only had to motor for about an hour while passing St. Vincent.  We only stayed in Bequia a couple days before heading south to the Tobago Cays. 

The trip to Tobago Cays was good although we were a little concerned about having a squall come through while entering the Cays.  Luckily the weather blew through before we got there.

TOBAGO CAYS

The Tobago Cays consist of a few reefs to windward and a couple islands to leeward.  We dropped the anchor in the sandy bottom and settled in for a couple days of hiking and snorkeling.

Compass Rose anchored in Tobago Cays

You can land your dinghy on a beach and look for iguanas on the island or swim with turtles.

Dinghy landing beach

We dinghied over to the island and hiked around looking for iguanas.  There are plenty to see if you look carefully.

Some iguanas are easy to see…

…and some are not

There is an area roped off where the turtles like to feed.  We went snorkeling there and saw as many as four turtles at one time.

Jackie swims with the turtles

We saw this boxfish while looking for turtles

Sometimes the wildlife comes to visit us like this brown boobie (yes that is really a type of bird).

Brown Boobie perched on the mizzen mast

CARRIACOU

We got up early and made the short jaunt from Tobago Cays to Union Island where we had to check out of St. Vincent and the Grenadines.  The holding was so bad there that I stayed on the boat while Jackie went in to clear us out of the country.

Then it was another short hop to Hillsborough, Carriacou were we checked into Grenada.  We needed to pay an entry fee, but the Grenada immigration officer didn’t have change so he checked us in and told me to come back later when I had change.  I got change when I cleared through Customs and walked back across the street to pay my debt. 

We finished the day with a short sail around the bottom of the island to Tyrell Bay.

GRENADA

The weather was holding so we only stayed in Tyrell Bay for a couple days.  The wind and seas were very favorable so we decided to sail down the windward side of Grenada.  This kept us in the wind the whole way down instead of losing the wind behind the mountains when sailing down the leeward side of the island.

The seas were a little bumpy at times, but the trip when very well.  Not only did the wind cooperate, but we got a favorable current, too.   By mid-afternoon we were anchored in Mt. Hartman Bay, Grenada.

Good old Mt. Hartman Bay where boats drift in odd directions when the wind dies

After a 15 month absence, it was good to be back in Mt. Hartman Bay.  We were able to anchor near our favorite spot on the NE side of the bay.  As we came in we saw old friends from our last visit and new friends that we had met up-island.

New and old friends at Secret Harbor Marina

Jackie headed back to the US soon after arriving in Grenada, but we did have a chance to visit a beach where the  endangered Leatherback turtles lay their eggs in the sand.  They dig holes deep in the sand at night to avoid predators who eat the eggs.  We got lucky because we saw new hatchlings crawl to the water and swim away and a mother turtle lay her eggs.  The pictures are dark because we were not allowed to use flash.

The mother turtle’s tail is to the upper left. The eggs are to the right

Jackie pets the mother turtle

Next: Vacation

This entry was posted on July 17, 2012 at 11:24 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.