2nd Bloomfield Crew<\/p>\n
On Monday, after Leon and Ricky left, Shirley, Brock and Cathy
\nhelped us provision. Union is kind of a tough island to
\nprovision at despite a plethora of fruit stalls and small and
\nmedium size food stores. It involves going from store to store,
\nfiguring what they have, and then figuring out the best plan to
\ngather all the stuff and get it back out to the dinghy and the
\nboat before the frozen foods defrost or the fruit gets mashed
\naround too much. Some of the stores even have their own dinghy
\ndock so you can pull up and put the heavy cans and bottles in,
\nbut they are not that easy to tie up to. We ended up buying
\nfruit from three different fruit vendors in the market –
\nskipping Jenny- our favorite from last time because we were a
\nlittle miffed at her having charged Brock about 3 times the
\ngoing price for a pineapple that was the size of an orange.
\nBetween the fancy French boat provisioner, the big “Lambi”
\nsupermarket, and a couple of smaller stores we were able to get
\na nice selection of cheese, chicken, fruits, vegies, and drinks.
\n We ended up walking up and down the streets, from store to
\nstore for quite a while, and mom was getting heat stroke so she
\nwent back to the hotel to wait while we finished up. It’s not
\nquite the same type of shopping as driving over to Lunds in St.
\nPaul for a 10 minute shop.<\/p>\n
They got a water taxi driver – who Mom nicknamed Chicago for his
\nshirt – to drive them and their luggage over to the boat while
\nMark and I brought the groceries back to the boat in our dinghy.
\n It was pretty hot – so we were all glad to weigh anchor about
\n3:30 and start sailing over to Tobago Cays. It is so much more
\npleasant out on the open water. It is a short hop from Union to
\nTobago so we only had the sails up for a half an hour and then
\nhad to motor the final half hour through the openings in the
\nreefs to beautiful Tobago Cays. We picked an anchoring spot
\nvery close to where we were just a few days earlier with Leon
\nand Ricky. Still gorgeaus. Lots and lots of boats in the
\nharbour. We had a quick swim around the boat, before starting
\ndinner..and then sat on deck to watch the moon and stars.<\/p>\n
Next day, Tuesday was spent doing lots of water activities.
\nStarted out dinghying over to one of the tiny islands behind the
\nCays where we could go for a short walk. There is a path that
\ngoes to the other side of the island – which is facing leeward-
\nand is very quiet and calm. Lots of other people were there –
\nmostly day-trippers on charter boats. It was a great place for
\nan introductory snorkel with Mom. She put on the snorkel mask
\nand hopped right in – very fun to find such a nice beach. Not
\ntoo many fish, but the water was great. After that we dropped
\nMom back at the boat while the rest of us went out to the big
\nreef for another snorkel. The current was very strong and it
\nwas pretty hard to swim towards the reef – but quite a thrill to
\nturn around and go the other way where the water was pushing us
\nquickly along. Getting back onto the dinghy from the water is
\ntricky and we had some good laughs as we all pulled ourselves up
\nvia the dinghy strap – each of us doing a great impersonation of
\na beached whale, or more like a hippo.<\/p>\n
We had a rest on the boat for a while and then headed out to yet
\nanother small island – in search of a good snorkel and possibly
\nsome turtle sightings. The beach ended up to be “the place” to
\nbe- as it had at least a dozen people on it, several of whom
\nwere doing kite surfing. It was really beautiful to watch these
\nincredibly strong young people flying back and forth through the
\nwater and then gently landing back at the beach..
\nJust as we were dinghying back to the boat, someone snorkeling
\nin the water called out to us that there were at least 10
\nturtles right near us in the water. We rushed back to shore to
\ndock the dinghy – knocking Mom off the dinghy, and creaming
\nBrock with the bow of the boat as we reached shore. We jumped
\nback in with our snorkel gear and headed out again over some
\ndisgustingly gooshy looking green grass in search of turtles.
\nApparently the turtles like that green grass and tend to hang
\nout there. Although we saw only one turtle and one huge
\nstarfish it was a great swim.<\/p>\n
Sun was setting as we dinghied back to the boat for dinner.
\nNext day, Wednesday, the crew was anxious to go see some other
\nislands, so we set sail for wherever the winds would take us.
\nGorgeaus sail – past Mayreau and Canouan. The winds were quite
\nhigh and we decided that we would try out Canouan as an
\nanchorage. It doesn’t have much of a reputation as a “gorgeaus”
\nisland, but it does have restaurants and a protected anchorage,
\nso it seemed worth trying. When we pulled into the harbour it
\nwas suddenly amazingly calm. We decided to go to shore to have
\nlunch at the Tamarind Beach Hotel and were immediately charmed.
\n It is a lovely hotel with a gorgeaus white sand beach, palm
\ntrees and comfy beach chairs. We had a delicious lunch and then
\nspent the rest of the afternoon just lazing around on the beach
\n– swimming, snorkeling and napping. Great Pina Coladas at
\nsunset topped off the day. We met a couple of great women on
\nthe beach – Cheryl and Petra – and ended up inviting them to the
\nboat for a little visit. It was fun – we showed them the boat
\nand sat on deck for a while chatting under the full moon.<\/p>\n
After dinghying them back to shore, we all decided to have
\ndinner on shore again – and returned to the Tamarind Beach Hotel
\nRestaurant for dinner. We had a very charming waiter, great
\nservice, and a totally enjoyable meal. Very nice day in
\nCanouan. Back to the boat for a final “full moon watch” before
\ncrashing.<\/p>\n
L.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
2nd Bloomfield Crew On Monday, after Leon and Ricky left, Shirley, Brock and Cathy helped us provision. Union is kind of a tough island to provision at despite a plethora of fruit stalls and small and medium size food stores. It involves going from store to store, figuring what they have, and then figuring out … <\/p>\n