South!

We’ve made it to Tobago Cays, which at 12° 37’ North Latitude is as far south as we plan to venture this winter. We arrived yesterday afternoon after a short but fun day-sail from Bequia. The 15 – 20 knots on the beam with moderate seas made for a fun sail at 7.5 to 8.5 knots the whole way. When we arrived at the Cays, it was like being back in the Exumas with the beautiful turquoise waters. We are joined here in the Tobago Cays by Susan and Randy Williamson on Windward Passage who have been down here in the area for over a month now. Quinn is quite excited to have Miss Susan around to play with!

The Tobago Cays are now a designated marine park in the Grenadines, which is a group of islands south of of St. Vincent and Bequia. The anchorage we’re in is sheltered by a huge horseshoe coral reef and has good soft sand perfect for anchoring. The marine life is abundant, as the “no take” policy is strictly enforced. After squaring away the boat after the sail, Jen and Quinn joined me for a swim to cool off and we saw many reef fish, several puffer fish and a couple of large stingrays in the first few minutes of the swim. We also found a Heineken can which I dove down to retrieve and toss in the trash. Happily, we almost never see garbage of any sort during our snorkeling and diving.

I am really enjoying this anchorage. The big horseshoe reef protects the anchorage while leaving the view of the open Atlantic and the cooling trade winds unobstructed. The view out our front windows starts with the turquoise waters of the anchorage, then breakers on the reef, then Petit Tabac and open Atlantic. Petit Tabac is the small Cay which starred in the movie “Pirates of the Caribbean, The Curse of the Black Pearl” as the tiny island where Captain Jack Sparrow was marooned. Given the many sea turtles we’ve been seeing here, Jack’s tail of escape using sea turtles seems almost plausible.

This morning we breakfasted on plain and chocolate-filled croissants which were delivered by one of the boat boys that do a good business here. After breakfast we picked up Susan and took the dinghy across the anchorage to the beach that is popular with the turtles. Quinn practiced with his new fins, mask and snorkel (is taking to it like a fish), played with his new boogie board, and of course, played in the sand. It is a very nice beach. There are large iguanas hanging out by the beach, and a lot of turtles just out past the surf. I was able to swim right up to them without them being bothered. They put up with it for a minute or so and then swam slowly but deliberately away to munch on some more sea grass. We’ll have some photos posted soon. On the way back to the beach I swam up on a small (3’) reef shark. I didn’t have the opportunity to take pictures as we surprised each other and he made a quick exit.

As this anchorage is quite remote, we have no WIFI. Pictures will have to wait until we can get access to it. I’m posting this update via the satellite phone, which has a built in modem that transfers data almost as fast as I can type it! So updates need to be limited to text and xml files for the web site’s blog and “Current Position” sections. We hope the updates work correctly as Jen has no way to test the updates. If you encounter a problem, we’ll get it fixed when we are next in civilization of some sort. If you wonder what it looks like here and can’t wait for our pictures, watch the Pirates movie and you’ll see for yourself. (The palm trees seem to have recovered nicely from the rum bonfire, by the way.)

We plan to stay here a good while as there are many beaches and lots of coral reef to explore! Time to wrap this up as I need to flag down the boat boy to order tomorrow’s croissants and baguettes. Yum.