The trip from Ste. Pierre to Roseau is about 40 nautical miles which includes 26 miles of open water passage between the two islands. When sailing through these open waters the winds and sea state always seem to be more than forecasted so the best thing to do is prepare early for what will come up when you are in the open water. We left with a single reef and full jib but by the time we reached the cut we had to reduce the jib down to about a third. It was a bit of a hobby horse ride across but we made it quickly and comfortably. It seems so strange now looking back to our sailing experiences on Lake Ontario when it was blowing 20 knots that you probably were not leaving the dock. If you wait here for lights winds and really calm seas you would not get very far.
We got the last available mooring in Roseau thanks to another Canadian that had arrived the day before and reserved one for us. You need to be on a mooring here as the water is close to a 100 feet deep within two or three boats lengths from shore. The only other option is to stern anchor which you drop you anchor in the deep water and hope it catches and then tie a line to your stern and attach it to something on shore. We spent the a few days here checking out the town which is the capital of Dominica. Michael went scuba diving again and the highlight of the dive was seeing a seahorse.
From Roseau we headed 20 miles up the coast to Portsmouth. When we stopped here back July we met one of the boat guys and told him when we returned that we wanted to go on a tour up the Indian River. The next morning he picked us up and we proceeded up the river which you can only row your boat. It was an interesting trip and he told us all about the history of the river and the Carib Indians that used to live along the river banks. Pirates of the Caribbean ll was also filmed in the river.
It was now time to get to Antigua as the weather window was shortening up every day and we wanted to arrive with sometime to get the lay of the land before our guests arrive.