Port Elizabeth, Bequia with J&J
03 May 2019 | Port Elizabeth, Bequia
Philip Greetham
Once again we had ideal weather for the passage from St Vincent to Bequia, Jack steering a perfect course. After anchoring in Port Elizabeth, we went ashore and did our customs and immigration check-in and wandered around the streets checking out the building. Well we were, Jude was checking out the men's rear ends.
Next day we wanted to do some serious sight-seeing ashore, so after a disappointing breakfast of croissants, we set off to walk to the Hope Estate, which had been a banana plantation on the windward side of the island. Nowadays it serves as a resort, with about half a dozen rooms, a nice restaurant, ruins of the sugar cane production days, and gardens of local plants where once the sugar cane grew. We were treated to coconut milk, sugar cane juice, mango, banana, and stuff I can't remember. (Pix) We met a British couple who were having their wedding there the next day - we had to drag Jude away who swore she had a bridesmaid dress and kept inviting herself to their celebration! The poor couple were too embarrassed to say "no" to her.
Unfortunately, I had been developing a bad back pain for a couple of weeks and it became so bad, that I couldn't face the several Km walk back to town, so we called a taxi and I decided to visit a doctor.
Next day following my blood test in the doctor's room, which must have been about 2m by 2m, breakfast ashore again, and some basic shopping, such as drugs for my back, and men for Jude, Jack and I decided to have a hair cut. Island time extends to everything here, and two hair cuts for Jack and I ended up lasting several hours. The small hair dressing "salon" on the water front had crates of empty, and half--drunk beer bottles. Jude was so bored she decided to grab the broom clean up the place. (Pic)
We caught one of the local buses and rode it to the other side of the island to Friendship Bay. A nice beach for a walk with mixture of nice resort buildings along the beach and local buildings a bit further inland. (Music trivia question - music playing on the bus was "Forever Young" - great song from the 80's - I bet you cannot remember who had the original hit; I couldn't.) Of course the local bus trips are always a great experience to see the local people travelling with their chickens or car wheels. Geri's great chicken curry aboard for dinner.