English Harbour at Christmas

During our previous week in English Harbour we had spent quite a lot of time with a group of people who make up the core of the Royal Naval Tot Club of Antigua and Barbuda.  We had bumped into them when we had visited Antigua in April and this time around we enjoyed their company so much, including the hacking and slashing of the ‘Keep Fit’ session, that we decided to try to join the club. ‘Try’ because to join this particular club, one needs to (1) find a sponsor amongst current club members, (2) drink 7 tots (each 1/8 of a pint or 1/2 of a gill) in 14 days and (3) swot up on sufficient Nelsonian history to pass a 1 hour viva on the subject.  So with several people willing to sponsor us and our livers already partly pickled from the tots we had drunk so far, our biggest concern was finding someone who could lend us the official Tot Club crib sheet so that we could do some pretty rapid cramming.  Happily, Mike Briggs had the paperwork to hand (and a copy of his own shortened version) so we spent much of Christmas Eve learning about seminal battles in which Nelson had played a part, memorising dates and the disposition of ships and, almost more importantly, making sure we had the daily toasts off pat.  After the Christmas Eve Tot at the National Sailing Academy, Richard Fear and ‘Des’ (David) O’Conner held our feet to the fire and found our knowledge sufficiently up to scratch for us to become full members of the club.  So, Christmas Day would see us drinking our joining tot (the 7^thwithin 14 days) as well as proposing our Mismuster Tot – to celebrate our joining the club.

Dressed overall, Christmas 2018

Christmas morning dawned a beautiful day and after a cheery exchange of Christmas wishes on the OCC SSB Net we dressed BV overall in celebration.

BV and the rest of the ‘fore-aft’ crowd from Galleon Beach

Christmas in paradise

 

After a lazy breakfast we took a stroll along Galleon Beach….

Tot Club preparations.  Top left: (L-R) Mike Rose, Gordy Howells, Nicky, Linda Howells, Anne Morcom.  Bottom left: Mike consults the 'Royal Navy Day by Day’ book for suitable Christmas Day dits. Bottom right: preparing Nicky and my final pre-membership tots.  Before becoming a full member a guest’s tot must be poured for him/her by the Rum Bosun. Members pour their own tots. Bottom centre: Mike prides himself on being able to pour a tot of the correct volume by eye.  Zoë called on him to prove it – and he did!

…..and then headed off to the Copper & Lumber for the Tot Club’s Christmas Tot.  As you can imagine, it was a very well attended event, with around 50 people present.

Our Mismuster Tot on Christmas Day in the Copper and Lumber, Nelson’s Dockyard, Antigua.
And, yes, John Duffy was fined for wearing a hat at the Tot!

Only about half that number stayed for Nicky and my Mismuster Tot to celebrate our joining the club, mostly those who were staying for the Christmas party at the Dockyard.

The newest members of the Tot Club with Mike Rose, Founder and Chairman.  Apparently, we’re the first members to join on Christmas Day

Mike Rose, the Founder and Chairman of the Tot Club, then presented us with our Tot Club shirts and a pennant for BV. That prompted a quick change for us and celebratory photo with Mike.

Christmas Day in Nelson’s Dockyard. The Tot Club regroups at Andy Howell’s Hot Hot Hot Spot (café shown in bottom right picture).  Bottom left: Mark Clinch (left), Nicky and ‘Des’ O’Conner 4^thfrom left in white polo shirt) plus others

Now that’s what I call a glass!

With tots various complete and the glasses all cleared away, we moved to the Hot Hot Hot Spot, run by Andy Howells, to continue the party.  And it was a very good party.

The band plays and Nelson’s Dockyard’s is open to all

Zoë who sponsored our membership of the Tot Club

The band played, the sun shone and, to be honest, it didn’t feel much like Christmas.  But Andy was serving up roast turkey dinners like they were going out of fashion and even offering Christmas pudding as an option.  Part way through the afternoon we returned to BV for a light meal on board before returning to meet some of the stalwarts after they had eaten their fill of Christmas buffet at the Copper and Lumber.

Boxing Day walk to Falmouth.  Top left: Inner lagoon at English Harbour.
Top and bottom right: Antigua Yacht Club

On Boxing Day we walked over to Falmouth Harbour.  Whilst we had been talking to Mark and Alasdair Clinch, at some point in a somewhat alcofrolic afternoon, there had been talk of the Antigua Yacht Club’s Christmas race series, the last 2 races of which were due to take place on Boxing Day. Nicky had said that it would be fun to take part and we had been invited to join their crew.  But in the cold light of Boxing Day morning, looking at the list of jobs we needed to do before we set sail that evening, it was very obvious that what had seemed such a great idea the day before was no longer.  But we needed to return Alasdair’s sunglasses to him so we tootled down to the club, made our apologies (no bad thing, there’s really only room for the normal crew of 3 on the boat, we’d probably just have been handicapping dead-weight), gave Al his sunglasses, said our goodbyes to him and Mark and returned to the chores.

The Admiral’s Inn and Pillars Restaurant (originally the sail loft)

We took the opportunity to route back into the Dockyard through the Admiral’s Inn and the Pillars Restaurant to see the remains of the old sail loft from the landward side.  The inside of the Inn is also well worth a visit with a bar made from what looks to be a piece of timber from an old sailing vessel and some great pictures on the walls.

The Admiral’s Inn and Pillars Restaurant (originally the sail loft)

And, of course, we needed to clear out, so we completed the formalities at Customs and Immigration, having checked a few days previously that they would be open on Boxing Day.  In fact, the officer Nicky spoke to had said that Customs and Immigration would be open as usual on all the days over the festive period including Christmas Day and New Year’s Day.  Quite amazing!

We planned to depart at 2200hrs so we spent the afternoon sorting out BV for the departure.  By late afternoon everything was complete so we joined our friends at the Tot Club in a final tot for this visit.  Having only just joined it felt almost traitorous to be leaving so soon and we had made so many new friends we really didn’t want to leave. But the forecast was for some very strong winds in a couple of days’ time and, given our plans for the remainder of the winter we really needed to be making tracks.  We’d had a lot of fun in Antigua and stayed much longer than we had originally planned but we will be back and will be able to renew our friendships with the Tot Club crew when we return.  Whilst sailors of old might have had a girl in every port, between the OCC, the CA and the Tot Club we probably have friends in every port instead!

English Harbour, Antigua

Back to English Harbour for Christmas

Jolly Harbour in the rear-view mirror

We made a reasonably early start from Jolly Harbour on Saturday 22 December as we wanted to get back to English Harbour to refuel before the fuel dock closed for the day.  Once we were clear of the high ground we had a good breeze from the east and, with a reef in the main and full genoa and staysail, we had a brisk close reach to the southwest point of Antigua followed by a good beat along the south coast.

Entrance to English Harbour with Charlotte Reef between us and the yachts at anchor in Freeman Bay

We made decent time and reached the entrance at 1235 and were alongside the fuel dock at 1300.

The cliffs between Charlotte Point (with trees) and Harman Point (just out of the picture)

Charlotte Reef with yachts at anchor in Freeman Bay and Galleon Beach behind

What we hadn’t realised was that the fuel dock shuts at 1300 on Saturday, but since there was a superyacht alongside still refuelling, the fuel berth attendant took pity on us and let us refuel too.  We took 124litres (in US gallons).  The superyacht (a sailing vessel) took over 10 times that amount.

The anchorage was crowded so we joined a few other yachts in anchoring fore-aft at the southern end of Freeman Bay

We had noted how busy the anchorage was as we motored past up to the fuel dock.  Disappointingly, when we returned it hadn’t become any less empty. The holding at the northern end is variable – the bottom is quite rocky – and at the southern end the wind is fluky and comes from all directions so boats at anchor there spin in circles and not infrequently collide or get uncomfortably close.  However, there were a few yachts anchored fore-aft right at the southern end, all of which had been there when we were last in the harbour a week ago.  We thought that they had the rights of it and so set ourselves up to join them.  It was a little tricky as there was a catamaran free anchored a bit east of where we wanted to be but we eventually juggled making BV go backwards in a straight line with dropping the main anchor on our nominated patch of sand and picking up the line on our previously positioned kedge. It’s been a while since we moored ‘Turkish style’ (with a line ashore) but the technique came back [Ed: sort of!]. Once we were more or less settled, Nicky hopped back into the water and sought out the anchors of yachts we thought might be concerned by our presence.  I used our golfing laser range-finder to measure the distance to her so that we could decide if there really was likely to be a problem.  The owner of the catamaran was concerned by our location, though we were just far enough away from him.  However, he was more concerned when Nicky pointed out to him that his anchor wasn’t dug in at all and was just lying on the seabed. When his crew returned he joined us and the rest of the fore-aft brigade, which made things very easy for us. And, in fact, we found being anchored fore-aft at that end of the bay so relaxing (no concerns about other yachts anchoring too close) that we will definitely do it again when we return to Antigua.

English Harbour, Antigua

Jolly Harbour Antigua

Antigua’s west coast ahead of us

Great sailing – straight out of
a tourist brochure!

We made a reasonably prompt start out of Barbuda on Friday 21 December.  Firstly, we wanted to leave with the sun behind us so that we could see all the shoal patches and coral heads, though it also needed to be high enough to light up the water so we couldn’t depart too early.  Secondly, we wanted to arrive at Jolly Harbour, about 35nm away, early enough to be able to do a supermarket run that afternoon.  On the OCC Net on the SSB radio at 0730 that morning we had arranged with Alastair and Ester Hill (Cranstackie) that we would meet them and some of the other OCC crews at anchor off Jolly Harbour for dinner that evening, so that provided us with our timeline to achieve.

North end of Antigua

We had a cracking sail south from Barbuda, with a good 15kts of wind on, or a bit forward of the beam.

Passing St John’s

BV made a good speed and with bright blue skies, turquoise seas and the lovely colours of Antigua as we got closer, it really was tourist brochure sailing at its best.

The final few miles from St John’s to Jolly Harbour are very shallow (mostly about 5-6m deep) and the water here is very turquoise.  Perfect for pictures to upset your Facebook friends!

Approaching Jolly Harbour

We made good time and by early afternoon had worked our way in through the outer approaches and dropped anchor close outside the harbour entrance.

Working our way into the anchorage outside Jolly Harbour

We made a quick trip ashore to visit the excellent Epicurean supermarket and stock up on things that we could not buy (eg Marmite!), or could not buy as economically, at the small Covent Garden supermarket in English Harbour.  On our way through the marina and its environs we noted how much more active the whole place seemed compared to our visit in March.  Then, there was still a lot of destruction left over from the hurricane the previous year.  Now, all the businesses are open and the marina is nearly full of yachts.  The anchorage outside is also a lot busier too.

Cranstackie and Ruby Tuesdayat anchor

We returned to BV and managed to put all the food away in time for our scheduled meet.  As we pottered across to see Alastair and Ester we realised that the yacht between us and them was Ruby Tuesday with Elsie and Lionel on board.  We had last seen them in Beaufort NC from where they had set off for Antigua via Bermuda.  We stopped off to see them and to invite them along to the OCC gathering but they already had plans for the evening.  It was a shame but we had a quick catch up with them before joining Alastair and Ester and the crews of Coho (Louise and Gordon), Kinetic (Andy and Lisa), Exbury (Alfred and Julie) and Passport (Anne and Ernie, only just arrived from Bermuda – good stamina!) at Castaway’s restaurant for an excellent dinner and lots of great conversation.

Early morning over Jolly Harbour anchorage

We could easily have stayed longer but we had plans to be back in English Harbour for the run-up to Christmas so the following morning we made a relatively prompt start, did a quick circuit of the anchorage to say goodbye to people and headed off.  We know that in time we will catch up with some, or all of them again, and between now and then we’ll keep in loose touch with the OCC SSB Net.

Jolly Harbour, Antigua

Gravenor Bay Barbuda

A great sail, just what the Caribbean is all about

After 3 nights off Low Bay, on Thursday 20 December we decided to move around to Gravenor Bay on the south coast of Barbuda.  We motored south along the west coast – cautious again in case we should meet any uncharted shallows (though again there was no need) – and then hoisted the sails for a couple of hours’ beat to Cocoa Point, about half way along the south coast.  It was a great sail – a good breeze, blue skies, little puffy cumulus clouds and lovely turquoise seas.

Motoring in towards Cocoa Point

Our chartplotter chart showed an apparently clear sector leading in towards Cocoa Point from the south, marked by a couple of transits on the point, so we were sailing hard on the wind up into this sector when Nicky, keeping a sharp lookout using polarised sunglasses, saw a shallow reef fairly close ahead of our track (shallow reefs show green and brown through the water).  Time to get the sails down and start motoring slowly through the coral heads!  We moved to the eastern side of the ‘clear’ area and followed the transit in on 035ºM.  Happily, we saw no more unexpected heads though we knew that we were quite close to Palaster Reef out to the east of us.

Cocoa Point

Once we were inshore of Palaster Reef and close enough (but not too close) to Cocoa Point we turned due east towards Spanish Reef, the southeastern tip of Barbuda.

Eyeball navigation amongst the reefs. Use polarised glasses and go in down sun, or with the sun overhead.  The turquoise water is safe – about 6m deep.  As the water gets shallower it becomes paler and paler.  The dark patch to the right of BV is an area of reef. Though most of it is probably quite deep, this one is charted as having some dangerously shallow points.  Areas of very shallow reef show up as green/brown

We were in about 6m of water and with the sun high on our starboard side (it was about 1230) so we could see the safe water as a beautiful turquoise.  The route across Gravenor Bay is generally quite easy in good light and though we took it very slowly, looking carefully for the reef areas, we had no particular problems.  The most difficult bit was the last half mile or so working our way into White Bay, the most easterly part of Gravenor Bay.  There was a yacht in the inlet in the reefs just before White Bay, but the latter had been recommended to us by fellow OCC members, Alastair and Ester on Cranstackieso we wanted to try to get there if we could.  In the entrance area there are a few coral heads which we threaded our way between and we also saw several areas where the water looked somewhat shallow with, possibly, coral or rock as well.  Cranstackieis a catamaran with a much shallower draft than BV so Nicky was rather concerned that we might end up in too shallow an area.  In the end, however, it became clear that the bottom there is sand with a light covering of seagrass and it is the colour change caused by the weed that was deceiving us, making the water look somewhat shallower than it actually is.

Anchored off White Bay.  BV’s anchored in about 3.5m here so the water’s a pale turquoise.  The very pale coloured water off the beach will be too shallow for us (but perfect for Alastair and Ester’s catamaran).  To the left of the bow is the beach on Spanish Point and ahead and to the right is Spanish Point Reef

The dark shadow between BV and the very pale water off the beach is an area with a light covering of sea-grass

We made it in and anchored in about 3.5m of water a surprisingly long way off the beach.  It’s a beautiful spot, right on the edge of the ocean but protected from the swell by the reef.  It reminded us rather of Clifton on Union Island, which we had visited at the beginning of the year just without the people and the myriad kitesurfers. And the reef, whilst a fair distance off, was quite close enough to swim to, so no need to go through the faff of inflating the dinghy either!

We’d not really appreciated it in BV but we found a surprisingly strong current flowing through the anchorage – perhaps wind-blown perhaps part of the East Caribbean Current.  Either way, it made for a good work-out getting to the reef. We spent a good couple of hours exploring.  Before we got to the main body of the reef we came across a number of large coral outcrops with some lovely arrays of sea rods, sea fans and corky sea fingers.

We found about 6 spiny lobsters hiding under this overhang

Looking under one overhang we found half a dozen spiny lobsters hiding from us….

Reef views.  Bottom: to the left of this picture is a Doctorfish (brownish with apparently blue fins) and a French grunt (yellow with wavy blue lines). Near the centre is a Blue tang. The juveniles of Blue tang are yellow, so there may be a few young towards the right of the picture

…..and in other places there were myriad reef fish – lots of colourful blues and yellows.

Nurse shark – a rather grainy photo as the shark
decided not to stay around to pose for a better shot!

We swam out to the main body of the reef but it was shallow and there was little to see ……… right up until Nicky spotted a Nurse shark snoozing under a ledge.  I swam over as quickly as I could but the shark moved on before I could get into a good position for a picture.

Top: more sea rod and what we think might be leaf coral (looking like leaves on small bushes).  Bottom:  A couple of French grunts (yellow with wavy blue lines), a Blue Tang (bright blue, close to the rock), a juvenile Beaugregory or Cocoa damselfish (part blue, part yellow) and, presumably, an adult Beaugregory or Cocoa damselfish (far right of picture, dusky brown)

We returned to the coral heads to enjoy the reef fish……

We saw several stingrays.  We even saw one buried in the sand with only its eyes exposed

…..and over the sand between them saw several different sting rays swimming around and even one buried, waiting for something interesting to go past, with just its goggling eyes sticking up above the sand.

Reef views.  Bottom left: hermit crab in a Conch shell (though by the time I got the picture the crab had gone into hiding).  Bottom right: Spiny lobster

Reef fish and spiny lobsters

We swam back to the first outcrop where we had found the lobsters.  A few had moved on but there were still 4 or so waiting there for us. 

BV floating in a swimming pool – and look who who’s sharing that swimming pool with her!

And then, with a whoosh and a zoom we returned down current back to BV, spotting yet another stingray en route.  Remember the scene in Finding Nemo where Nemo’s dad meets all the turtles in the East Australian Current?  That’s how I felt playing on the current in and around the outcrops and swimming back to BV!

Lobster linguini – thanks George!

For dinner we pigged out on the last 3 of our lobsters from George and made a delicious lobster linguini.  We should probably have kept some for lunch the next day but it was just too tasty and with a glass of white wine was the perfect way to round off a perfect day.

Gravenor Bay, Barbuda