Bill
08/02/2012, prickly Bay, Grenada

Well, this made me nervous also!

She has reached the point where she is climbing everything... and is quite capable... yikes!

We travel with the dinghy on the bow rather than towing it... because we can go faster, and we don't have to worry about it being blown around or flipped by a wave. Isobel loves to have it on the deck as it makes a wonderful trampoline. In this configuration it has made a great play house/cave... and now a mountain to climb... (we put it up to act like a wind scoop and to let light into the V-berth and head)

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Bill
08/02/2012, Prickly Bay, Grenada

Wow, I guess we are at the end of the runway!

Well, we had another wonderful sailing day. We were up early (although we didn't want to be!) and on our way by 0600!! First the current pushed us at more than 8 knots to the west around Union Island then we set up the whisker pole with the Genoa to windward and the main prevented out. With this arrangement we sailed for 4 hours in 15 to 20 knots true wind... giving us a wonderful flat sail... the girls sleep and I read for most of it... very nice. Our first down wind sail for more than an hours... very nice... and as we go, the solar and wind are generating electricity and the water maker is running filling our water tank with fresh water.... The monitor steers the boat... Now, this is living!!

The final few miles was a struggle... a worthy struggle... up wind and against the current... We were hoping to clear in this afternoon so we could move around into a more protected anchorage... when we arrived the customs officer didn't want to see us until tomorrow morning... so we are here for the night anyway.

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Bill
08/01/2012, Mayreau

An early morning view of the Pitons on St Lucia. There was some pretty amazing snorkeling there...

At some point in the distant past, I saw a photo of boats anchored between the Pitons and that image has always represented "the Caribbean" to me... to have spent the past few days here has really been a "dream come true" for me. We will be back...

Well, the weather guy said to head south and so we did. We dropped our mooring at Les Pitons in St Lucia at 0600 and sailed a broad reach for 72 miles. Our speed was well over 6 knots most of the day. and 7 knots for some of the day. Our bottom cleaning, rig tuning and new sails create quite a fast old boat!

Tomorrow we have only 50 miles to take us to the south shore of Grenada. A Tropical Depression is moving into the Eastern Caribbean Friday and Satureday... and we want to be on the south side of it. We have been very lucky to have spent so much of the summer in the islands north of here. Many people have been in Grenada since June first...

We will leave here early so we have time to get our sleves settled should the storm shift south, something we don't expect, but want to be ready for.

I will post a photo when we have internet.

12 38.049'N 061 23.894'w

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07/29/2012

Isobel was a really good sport about this...

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Lara
07/29/2012, The Pitons, St Lucia

Another amazing adventure snorkeling here beneath Gros Piton. We think this is a rock fish, but we'll have to do a bit more research. Again we're having issues switching between the 2 cameras and knowing how big the field of vision is for each. There was actually a very cool pink sponge and sea urchin that we hoped to catch here.

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Lara
07/28/2012, The Pitons, St Lucia

The smart together person would be sitting in the cockpit enjoying the view when the sun sets. Instead, I'm usually trying to get dinner together in the galley, or if we're more on schedule, Bill is down below reading a bedtime story to Isobel. It's been almost 3 years now, we'll work it out soon... I'm sure.

From the galley I heard a call of "sunset! nicest one in a while!" I ran up to see the last 15 seconds of sun disappearing beneath the horizon. Bill said there was a green flash but I was looking in the camera and missed it.

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Lara
07/28/2012, The Pitons, St Lucia

Several boats past by this morning loaded with poised men balanced in the boat. I'm pretty sure they were headed out around Gros Piton to dive for fish of some sort, but their impressive stature gave one the impression they were Olympic swimmers headed out for training.

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Lara
07/28/2012, The Pitons, St Lucia

We thought we might go see the sulfur springs and have a mud bath, but our cruising guidebook said that it was a scene straight from hell & frankly it's hot as hell here (might be an exaggeration) so we decided to lay low in this uniquely stunning spot to enjoy the view & do some snorkeling.

Bill badmouthed our Sealife camera a few blogposts back & I just want to say that it was never really given a chance. We've since taken some nice photos with it & realize that we're still riding the learning curve understanding focal lengths, etc. Here's a cuttlefish that we chased mercilessly.

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Lara
07/27/2012, The Pitons, St Lucia

We were thrilled to find that Peter on Livity had avocados for sale. We haven't seen them since Nassau, Bahamas. We asked Peter about his boat name - He said it was about "living the life." And the colors: red for blood, yellow for the sun, and green for the land.

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Bill
07/27/2012, St Lucia

Well! We are in a quite spectacular spot. I suggest you google earth it (13 49.185'n:061 03.996'w) and look at some of the photos that are there.

On both ends of the anchorage are Pitons, 775 and 735 meters tall. The remnants of volcanic plugs. We have been told that they are the only double Pitons in the world...

This is a park with moorings, which is good... it would be hard to anchor here as there is no shelf of shallow water. The pitch of the mountains continues to drop under water. We are about 50' off shore in 55' of water... not too far from the moorings we were "off soundings" meaning that it was deeper than 250'... at that point our depth sounder reads---!

Although you can tell they are rocky, the two pitons are covered with lush green vegetation... filled with birds, from what I can hear. The water is crystal clear. And we are one of three boats in the bay, which is probably over run in the winter! We feel very lucky...

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