We stayed in St. Lucia for a few days, and met a Swedish kid boat there! The boat was called "Swede Dreams" (get it?). It was a beautiful boat. There was a family of four onboard: the mum was Lola, the dad was Carlos, and the two children Luna and Paco. The family had only been on their boat for a year and had already made it from Sweden to the Caribbean. They say they aren't very experienced sailors, but I don't think you need to be experienced to go cruising, right? Besides, on our first year we didn't have much of a clue of what we were doing ourselves!
We'll hopefully meet up with Swede Dreams again in Grenada.
We did a night passage the next night from St. Lucia to Bequia, the first of the Grenadine islands.
The anchorage we went to in Bequia was really crowded, but we found a good spot to drop anchor and swim. Afterwards, we went ashore to look around the town.
We met the author of local children's poetry books, and bought a book from her. After that, Mum went to look in the supermarket, and we ended the day sitting at a cafe, drinking beer and eating ice cream.
The next day, a man took us to a turtle sanctuary in his van. There were at least fifty turtles swimming in pools, including baby ones, some of which had a purple substance on them which the guy who worked there said was to prevent infections whenever other turtles bit them.
"These'll bite your fingers off if you aren't careful," he told us, indicating the turtles in the largest pool. "But the green turtles, they only eat fruit and vegetables. They won't hurt you."
He also told us they let some of the turtles out back into the sea after a few months of them being there, though some may never be released.
He took a large turtle out of the pool and handed it to Paul to hold. He passed it to me a few seconds later. It was so heavy, I could barely hold it for a couple of seconds, and put it back into the pool.
Just before we left, Mum and I saw another pool at the end of the sanctuary which we hadn't noticed before. We stepped up to it, and found lots of baby turtles inside. As we came closer, the turtles suddenly crowded around us, looking up at us as though they had never seen such a strange creature as a human before. I never got round to asking the sanctuary employee why these turtles crowded around us and the others didn't, but if anyone has any ideas why they would've done, let me know.

When we got back, we noticed Higgins was in the anchorage. Higgins is a British kid boat we've been trying to catch up with ever since Totem had mentioned them, but whenever we tried to they were either off their boat or had left the anchorage before we could get to them. Finally, we got to meet them. I enjoyed playing card games with them, while we told each other tales about our trips. I was delighted to hear they were headed for Grenada like us, so we'd see them there.
We also met another British boat called (and I'm not trying to be funny here, though I suppose they were when they named it this) Wet Dream. Thankfully, it wasn't a kid boat (so there would be no awkward conversations with the kids about the boat name), but Paul noticed they were from Hull, and he was always more than willing to talk to people from Yorkshire. So we met Mark and Tracy, a lively couple who were also Grenada-bound. Mark told me he was trying to sell his paddle-board, and offered to sell it to me once we met up in Grenada. Brilliant! If you read my last post of Barbados, you'll know I went paddle-boarding once and thoroughly enjoyed it. Imagine having your very own paddle-board! I do hope I'll be able to get it. :)

After Bequia, we arrived in Mustique, a quiet island home to the houses of some of the rich and famous like Brian Adams and - get this! - Mick Jagger. These people only visit the houses once or twice a year. The island is a place for them to get away from the publicity of their home country.
We got to go inside one of the local houses after we asked for some water. They kindly showed us around and offered us drinks. He even gave us a lift in his buggy to show us a bit of the island, pointing out some of the V.I.P's houses. He invited us into the house he worked in, and it was pretty spectacular, with a beautiful pool and everything. He even let us swim in the pool! It was a shock to taste fresh water after being so used to brine, it was very pleasant, drifting from one end of the pool to the other.

We met a couple in Mustique we had seen in Montserrat on a boat called Vega. They were a lovely couple named Annie and Hugh, who joined us for a walk around the island, and then, on Paul's birthday evening (which was on the 18th May) we dined out with them at this really posh hotel called The Firefly. We had an excellent meal and swapped interesting conversations. We met up with them again briefly in Tobago Cays. We'll see them again in Grenada, if not sooner.
Tobago Cays might have been the absolute perfect place for snorkelling if it wasn't for the strong current from the Atlantic Ocean. Even so, we had a lovely swim to and back from the beach, seeing plenty of colourful fish and lots of plant life. I even saw a turtle and my very first stingray! Still, it wasn't surprising I saw a turtle: there must have been hundreds in the bay.
There was a beach bar which we went to one night with a Canadian bunch. We had a fantastic mini buffet and great conversation. David Frost (who looked slightly like President Snow from The Hunger Games) was a character, with loads of fascinating stories to tell.
We also met Kiera, an adorable water baby with that kind of look that told you she hadn't quite figured out how the world worked, but she was fast getting there. She seemed too busy studying this strange place to cry, which she did rarely, according to her mother. Mum and Paul went over to their boat for a while that night, giving me a few hours to myself. :)

We're in the Union Island now, so I'll write about it in the next blog.