We made an adventurous night sail on the 21st Feb to St.Lucia to pick up our next visitors. Stevens family
had arrived on the beautiful island of St.Lucia to join us for a week of sailing, sun and sea. They made themselves at home Rose-Marie and spent their first day on St.Lucia day eating Roti and chilling on the beach at Rodney Bay. After a couple of days sight seeing we headed south to the beautiful Marigot bay and caught a lovely tuna en route Barry bravely reeled in and Steven sent to the big aquarium in the sky in as humane a way as possible with the hammer he had to hand. We enjoyed Marigot thoroughly and vowed to return to the lovely surroundings and friendly people. The next day we crossed the waters between St.Lucia and St.Vincent in fairly rough seas resulting in a lot of puking into buckets as our new guests tried desperately to find their sea legs, to varying degrees of success. After arriving safely in Wallibalou however, this was soon forgotten and we spent the evening exploring the set of the Pirates of the Caribbean. The next day we sailed to the Blue Lagoon Marina before sailing on to Bequai. Where we were forced to take a buoy as our windless had broken down meaning we were without anchor for a few days. We delivered our damaged sails to the local sailmaker and had a nice dinner at Jacks Bar. The following day Steven and his family toured the island and spent the rest of the day sunning themselves on St.Maragret beach. In the evening we enjoyed some wonderful violin music at the Sailors cafe. The next day we picked up our repaired sails and spent a couple of hours refitting them, everyone pitching in bravely in high winds and a loose grub screw resulting in Barry being hoisted up the mast to save the day(again). We sailed back to Marigot and had a great evening there before sailing
on to St.Lucia the next morning to Laborie where we went exploring and visited the local church. However on our return we found our dinghy had worked itself free from the jetty and was being rescued by some (mostly) friendly locals. After the drama was resolved we waved a fond goodbye to Stevens mother, Daniel, Markus and Ina and continued north to Marigot. It was great having Margaret and the kids aboard and despite their rough sail at the start of the adventure felt sure that the experience was one they would not soon forget! (More photos to come!)

On the 15th February we sailed into Tyrell bay, tacking feverishly to avoid many a near collision as we were (again) without engine. We dropped the hook and decided to drown our sorrows with a night in town. We met some old friends and enjoyed some live music and a bite to eat at the Lazy Turtle. The next morning we were rudely awakened by excited voices off our stern as we had slipped our anchor and drifted into a belgium boat anchored behind us. After much running about deck with fenders and braced bodies pushing against hulls we managed to pull up our anchor and drift passed the Belgium’s who were rather miffed by the early morning excitement. Captain Ismail later resolved this with a couple of bottles of wine by way of compensation. We then spent the entire day fixing the engine discovering a fuel blockage had been the source of our woes. Spirits lifted we attended a wonderful concert that evening and hooked up with Ragga man and co. and a local artist who couldn’t paint ears. We cadged a lift in the back of a pickup thanks to Barry and got a good night’s rest before moving around to Paradise Beach the next morning where we enjoyed an afternoon barbecue with ‘American Sam’ and co. As the day wore on into evening we were joined by some local kids who were keen to join in with Barry and yours truly in an impromptu Jam session. On the 18th we sailed to the stunning Sandy Island and enjoyed some rum punch and a treasure hunt! We left the same day for Union Island and a welcome return to Happy Island pub where we were lucky enough to catch a wonderful kite surfing display by Butter and Casper. Barry also practiced his stage diving to the wonder and bemusement of the crowds. The next day we sailed to Tobago Quays and enjoyed a day of Snorkelling and a lobster feast prepared by Allan. We then journeyed forth to Bequai once more to enjoy the sights and sounds of one of our favourite Islands. I visited the wonderful Sunshine School for kids and that evening we listened to some lovely live music and enjoyed Allans farewell dinner in Mac’s. Then it was onward to St.vincent to say a very sad goodbye to Allan who, we all agreed had been a fantastic addition to Rose-Marie’s crew and who we wished could have stayed longer. We had no time to hang about as we had a long sail ahead North to St.Lucia to Collect some new visitors. Never a dull moment!