St Helena Island

We leave St Helena for Ascension Island at lunch today after 9 days on the lovely paradise. It first looks like a barren rock but is full of exceptionaly friendly and interesting people and the history is to be marvelled at. It goes back to the 1600's and most recently was Napolean's exile after Waterloo.

The locals are a mixture of people with what appears at first to be English accents and which were originally but it has evolved into something worse than the Australian dialect and very difficult to grasp.

St Helena is expensive but worth the stop. No beaches, just rock and history. The RMS (Royal Mail Ship) St Helena is their only form of transport into and out and it arrives every few weeks bringing cargo and mail. No airstrip so no flights. Not a good place to get sick. There is a hospital and a dentist that we used and several shops winding into the narrow gorge that is Jamestown.

The main source of foreign income seems to be visiting yachts although a cruise ship arrives today swelling the population from 5000 to 6500. Should be interesting.

Ascension is 700nm further on so we are planning on stopping there before the Caribbean as we need visas to land in Brazil. Only Americans and Australians require them so I guess the Australian beaurocracy has up set these people at some stage.