3rd to 7th March 2019
The highlight of our stay here was, without doubt, the turtles. We saw one on the way over from St. Anne while we were sailing, and thought that was cool enough. Little did we know that we would see the turtles surfacing several times a day close to the boat. The kids got to the point that they only ran on deck when a turtle was close by (rather than just-in-sight), and Charlotte managed to video one for a little while when she had the snorkel out! Great fun. We swam lots – not just because of the turtles, though they were a factor.
Carnival was on in town, which we watched from the boat. Arthur despises loud environments, and while Theo is happy enough with the noise, he doesn’t enjoy it enough for one of us to take just-him. So, we watched the parade and had a dance along to some of the music from the boat 150m or so offshore – about the right distance for the kids, especially as the music quietened down at a reasonable hour. God, I feel old typing that. Be aware that, during one day of carnival, the local police were preventing boats from anchoring close to shore, and from using the dinghy dock.
Another large dinghy dock here, with direct access to the town and beach, and directly in front of the beautiful church. We didn’t need to shop here, and only located a couple of bakeries during a brief explore. The beach became very busy towards the afternoon onwards, the place has a real holiday feel to it- a ittle touristy for us to be honest. There are lots of beachside bars and grill-restaurants, but we didn’t try any as they felt a tad expensive. One of the best locations we have been for snorkelling- the beach shelves quite suddenly close to shore, providing a perfect habitat for many types of fish, but even better is the designated snorkelling area a short swim from the beach. The buoys that mark the area are covered with labelled pictures of creatures you might see, and in about 20 minutes I spotted squid, a pufferfish, as well as numerous starfish, reef fish, coral and sponges. Try to get snorkelling before the tour boats moor right next to you and the area is filled with day trippers!
I neglected my blog keeping while I was here. I don’t want to spend too long on the computer, and spent a while changing my LinkedIN and setting up a profile as a freelance academic. Nobody in the family is keen on me returning to full-time work, so over the next couple of months we’ll find out if I need to for the money. Our expenses as nomads-on-yacht are much lower than they would be as people-in-house, but we still need some income, obviously! Anyway, we’ll see how this goes. And yes, I wish we’d thought seriously, rather than wistfully, about this earlier, not least because I’ll feel guilty as hell if I end up resigning in May (when it will be more difficult for my Department to recruit a replacement).
