Once the kids had departed, Nicki and I could have a little time to relax and do some sightseeing before my cousin Rainer and his wife Almut arrived for the final leg of the 2024 season.  We explored Fort de France and visited the Jardin de Balata botanical gardens close by.  

Hotel de Ville, Fort de France

The Admiral on the high wire!

We had a great sail to our first stop, Rodney Bay in St Lucia.  The main purpose of stopping there was to check in and to acquire duty free diesel.  At $1.34 per liter, this is the best price in all of the Caribbean and I didn’t want to miss that opportunity.   Unlike in January when we wanted to fill up here as well, this time they actually HAD duty free diesel to sell.  But Rodney Bay did not deliver on one front, albeit to no fault of Rodney Bay:  I’ve been trying to get some Eastern Caribbean Dollars from an ATM for some time and again, the Bank of St Lucia ATM gave me another error message.  Same for the card of the Admiral.  So again, I called Wells Fargo who had previously told me all was fine with the card, it must be the fault of the local bank.  This time, I told them specifically to check whether the ATM card was authorized for foreign withdrawals.  After some back and forth, the agent reluctantly admitted that it was not and that all ATM cards the bank sends to customers, by default, are NOT authorized for use in foreign countries.  Really?  I tried to withdraw money again 12 hours later – again it didn’t work.  Grrrrr!   So we kept using the Bank of Koewing – Almut & Rainer had no problem getting money out of the ATM with their German cards.

The crew for the last segment of 2024, the Admiral, the Vice Admiral, yours truly and Rainer, the First Officer and Chief Mechanic

Our next stop was Marigot Bay on St Lucia.  A beautiful bay full of moorings and a lot of activity.   Here, I had to visit immigration.  St Lucia permits you to check in and out for customs at the same time if you stay for less than 72 hours.   I had done that in Rodney Bay.  However, you still have to visit immigration for checkout and that’s what I did – by paddle board to boot.  Immigration opens at 0800 it says on the door, but when I arrived at 0805, the door was locked.   Someone told me to check back at 0830 and that’s what I did.  There he was, the customs officer, sitting there in full regalia and questioning a poor soul from a German yacht.  “When you arrived last night, why did you not come and check in?  When you arrived there was another boat that arrived as well and they checked in right away.  Instead, I saw you take on water when you came in.  What did you do after you took on water?”  Poor soul: “Well, sir, we went ashore and had dinner at the restaurant.” Officer:  “Really?  Going ashore before checking in is a US $5,000 fine!” 

At that point, I was readying myself for a longish spectacle but the officer luckily interrupted the session with Poor Soul and asked me what I wanted.  When I told him he said immigration wasn’t there today and I could depart without the stamp from them.  I quickly left so missed the rest of the conversation with the German guy….

On the way to checkout at Immigration

The next island in the chain going South after St Lucia is St Vincent.  It has a very bad reputation for safety although if you check the website of the Caribbean Safety and Security Net (CSSN) which reports all incidents involving yachts, it is no worse than some of the other islands, notably St Lucia.  Dinghy theft is the key problem, like everywhere in the Caribbean.  We tried to make it all the way to Bequia but it was just too far for the conditions and we had to stop at some port of entry on ST Vincent and decided on Wallilabou Bay.  This bay is famous for having appeared in Pirates of the Caribbean and is truly spectacular.   It is also a check-in point for St Vincent and the Grenadines, which includes the neighboring islands such as Bequia.    We took a mooring rather than anchor to make sure that the locals would be favorably disposed to us and there were 3 other yachts on moorings.  Nonetheless, we did not feel very safe but nothing happened and we had a quiet night. 

The West coast of St Vincent is spectacular

Leaving Wallilabou Bay; someone is burning trash at 7 am!

The next morning had us leave early and head for Bequia.  Interestingly, the cruising website Noonsite discourages people from visiting Bequia because of its poor safety record but again, if you look at CSSN, there is no apparent reason for this advice.  When we arrived, the anchorage was quite full of yachts but we found a nice spot not far from the Princess Margeret beach.   We really loved Bequia as it has a bit more to offer than the poorer independent islands.  There are places where you can buy high end food items, there is an elevated walkway along much of the bay, the Princess Margret Beach is terrific and there are some good restaurants.   And the water is clear and relatively calm for swimming.  What’s not to like?

Arrived in Bequia!  Rum punch is the staple …

We would live of Doris’ offerings for many days!

The Ocean Cruising Club of which we are members runs several Facebook and Whatsapp groups for its members devoted to specific regions of the world.  On the OCC Whatsapp Group for the Caribbean I read that there are two places not to be missed between St Vincent and Grenada:  Tobago Cays and Sandy Island on Carriacou.  True!

When we left Bequia, we first headed for Charlestown bay on Canouan which was quite deserted.  The few boats there seemed to have seen better days and were anchored very far apart.  We went ashore and immediately felt unsafe.   The whole place looked closed and run down.  Another instance of the Doyle guide telling us about “charming town with brightly painted houses” which turned out far from the truth.  We now call it the “Märchenbuch”, which is German for fairy tale book!   We voted with our feet (or rather sails) and left for Tobago Cays where we arrived shortly before sundown.  What a difference!   After taking a mooring on the West side of Petit Rameau island in the evening, in the morning we moved to a mooring off the little island of Baradal where there is a turtle refuge.  We could snorkel and watch the turtles and many tropical fish right from the boat.  Phantastic!  In the evening, we treated ourselves to a lobster feast which was spectacular!

At the mooring in Tobago Cays

Water taxi on the way to dinner

After Tobago Cays we had to sail to Clifton on Union Island to check out of St Vincent & Grenadines.  We stopped first at another recommendation from the OCC Whatsapp page: Chatham Bay on the West side of Union Island.  Quiet, calm waters and a lovely beach bar – we had such a good time that we came back for another night after checking out in Clifton which is not a place I would recommend. 

Clifton on Union Island

Our favorite bar in Chatham Bay on Union

The island of Carriacou  belongs to Grenada and Tyrrell Bay on Carriacou is the place to check into Grenada.  It is also just a few miles from Sandy Island.   The Märchenbuch said one had to take a mooring at Sandy Island but then none were available.  So we anchored just like every other boat there over 45 feet, including an Amel 50 from New York.   The scenery is really quite extraordinary and the snorkeling on the Southeast side of the island was excellent! 

Sandy Island off Carriacou

The last sail of the season was a beautiful reach along the East side of Grenada to Marina Le Phare Bleu on the South side.  The marina is located just two bays over from Prickly Bay where we will put up Kincsem for the hurricane season.   

Last evening with Rainer und Almut at the restaurant at Le Phare Bleu