Thursday 23rd January 2025
We woke up full of hope and expectation of a nice day for our sailing only to have them dashed when the rains started again. Next we got a message from our skipper offering us the opportunity to postpone our charter until Saturday when hopefully the weather would be better. This was very kind of him but unfortunately Martin leaves on Saturday so no. We eventually settled on a delayed start time and therefore finish an hour later as the “forecast” suggests things will improve this afternoon; we just hope Antiguan Forecasts are accurate!!
Eventually we headed off to Jolly Harbour, and arriving early, stuck our heads into the tour office as we passed and a few moments later she came running out saying we were late. I explained we had re-scheduled and she was happy but insisted she would “escort” us to the boat.
We were looking forward to today, apart from being on the water, we had not experienced sailing on a Catamaran, quite exciting. Very soon after we got to the pontoon our charter arrived with Captain Simon at the helm and “Tafari” his deck hand ready to help us aboard, but only after we had placed our shoes into a basket; no shoes on board.
After introductions and a discussion as to where to go followed by some refreshments, we headed down the channel to the open sea.
This man wants to buy a boat, I don’t think so!
There was quite a lot of wind today so out went the main and once we cleared the headland and headed north west, out went the jib, cut the engines and we were sailing. It felt very strange being in a Cat, no sensation yet we were doing 8-knots! The real point of difference was the slapping of the water against the underside of the boat between the hulls.
Our first stop was Pinching Bay where we dropped the anchor and immediately jumped into the water. Because of the rain and wind we have been enduring these past few days, snorkelling wasn’t going to be very good so we swam about, we also had fun on the “Lilly Pad” floating off the stern. I wish these things had been around when we had Anam Cara here in the Caribbean, they are fun.
After a time we weighed anchor and headed to Deep Bay and moored off the beach looking at the “Royalton Antigua Resort” a five* fully inclusive destination. In fact around early 2007 I was due to fly out but the ‘plane broke down so they had to put us all up somewhere to wait for the parts to arrive the following day. I was lucky as I was sent to this hotel where upon arrival they gave me a wrist band and it wasn’t until the following morning I released this band meant I was “fully inclusive”; what a missed opportunity!!! The skipper also pointed out this “mansion” of “Georgio Armani” high on the hill top overlooking the Caribbean Sea; how the other half live. Apparently if you have sufficient funds you can buy “Citizenship” for $500,000 and the government will sell you any piece of land that takes your fancy, for a price naturally: of course that’s just the start as these plots of land are on the side of a mountain and there is several months work just cutting out the mountain before a brick is laid!!!!!
Once settled in this bay, Christine and Martin jumped into the dingy to be taken back out to sea to snorkel over a wreck, I elected to stay and keep the skipper company, or annoy him!! As they left the rains came down by the bucket, apparently with the rain at an angle and the speed of the dingy, it felt like hailstones and it was so hard it was like sailing in fog. It wasn’t too long before they were on the way back due to poor visibility, naturally the Skipper was disappointed for them but pointed out he had no control over “God”.
Whilst they were away the Skipper fired up the bar-b-q and cooked chicken, again and as soon as they were back we sat down to eat. As many readers will remember from our last charter, we weren’t particularly impressed with the food and we mentioned this to our favourite lady in the tour office and when we were with her booking up she rang Captain Simon “telling him” in no uncertain way to improve his food offer, well this time the chicken wasn’t tough and overcooked, it was nice and we had a green salad, no beans, a great improvement and a potato salad but unfortunately for Christine it had “muck” on it; Martin and I liked it though!! So overall a great improvement but still not the spread one would expect when only 3-of us charter a boat at vast expense; at least on his other boat they also gave us fresh fruit, not today. I will be having another word with our lady!!!
After lunch we headed back towards Jolly Harbour but pulled into another bay where there is a small reef close to the beach and the snorkelling is good, well on a clear day!!! Here there is a rock formation that looks like a lady lying down, locally it’s known as the “Sleeping Mama” Martin swam back to the boat whilst Tafari took Christine in the Dingy for a personal tour jof Hermitage Bay, just around the corner; apparently Tafari hadn’t been there and was happy for the experience.
Back on board we motored round to Jolly Harbour, said our goodbyes, left the catamaran and headed to the bar overlooking the marina before heading home.
Our day on the water was great but thanks to “God” visibility for snorkelling was virtually non-existent, but this didn’t spoil any bodies enjoyment and by the time we got back home we were all knackered and didn’t want to eat anything. Our reflections of a cat verses a mono hull were similar; for a days enjoyment dropping the anchor etc., the extra space was great but for sailing, a mono hull every time.
(Christine’s highlight). was having several rides in the dinghy and being shown several bays close up, my snorkeling was ok, we saw a wreck from 1906, I also learnt how to get back on a dinghy properly, and I loved sitting in the bow’s on beanbags. Both days were enjoyable but we did more on the catamaran which made it my favourite.
After a nightcap and nibbles we headed to bed, tomorrow is Martin’s last day so a visit to Papa Zouk’s is arranged 🦞🦀🦐
