About a year ago I agreed to sail across the Atlantic on a friends boat to help him deliver it to Antigua. It seemed way into the future then but now its here,
The crew were Dave Ross, Dave Tuer, Ken Shepherd and me. We all gathered at Marina Rubicon on Lanzarote together with Carole who flew out to wave us off.
The boat is a Hallberg Rassey 382 called Adagio of Lorne, a boat I've sailed before as I helped Dave Ross deliver it from the Isle of White to Glasgow when he first bought it.
The crew were Dave Ross, Dave Tuer, Ken Shepherd and me. We all gathered at Marina Rubicon on Lanzarote together with Carole who flew out to wave us off.
The boat is a Hallberg Rassey 382 called Adagio of Lorne, a boat I've sailed before as I helped Dave Ross deliver it from the Isle of White to Glasgow when he first bought it.
Morning view of the volcano on Lanzarote
Just some of the food shopping we did for the trip - lots of loo rolls!
Sunset over the marina
Carole stopped on Lanzarote for a few days after we left, strange volcanic landscapes and, weirdly, camels!
Big cave systems as well, some you can visit, this one had a performance stage at one end and also pools with unique blind albino crabs in them.
This is Derek the Duck, the mascot Jen gave me to cross the Atlantic with, he spent all of the trip in the cockpit and did more hours on watch than any of us.
My bunk - the lee cloths are supposed to keep you in when it gets rough, they didn't, I got thrown out of bed several times, luckily we kept the spare loo rolls on the floor here so at least I had a soft landing.
The intrepid crew!
Bye Love.
On our way out of the harbour.
And we're off!
This was our first sighting of dolphins, we saw large pods most days, along with flying fish.
Dave R's first cake!
Gentle sailing
But then absolutely no wind, we had 4 days of this and a few half days scattered through the trip as well. As a contrast we also had about 6 days of very strong winds and fairly big seas. It's very difficult to get an accurate idea of wave sizes whilst sailing, we had a forecast of 4-5m waves but we had some much bigger.
No wind, flat sea, so we went for a swim. 5000m of water and about 1000 miles from anywhere! totally surreal.
After we got out of the water this shoal of yellow fin Tuna came for a look at us, beautiful fish.
Great image as they swam just under the surface, the water was almost oily, it was so smooth.
The same day two whales breached a little way from the boat, as you can see it was a tricky photo, but they are there I promise!
Halfway celebration with a wee dram!
Adagio Hot dogs on fresh bread - we took some part baked rolls but when they ran out we baked our own bread most days. DT became a dab hand at it. Food was very important, fortunately we could all cook and ate really well. We'd bought hard frozen meat and managed to keep it was almost 2 weeks before we succumbed to tins and chorizo. Veggies lasted well too, the root veg kept for the full 3 weeks.
Average sailing conditions - I didn't get any photos of rough weather - too busy hanging on!
First sight of Antigua on the horizon.
Prepping the courtesy and customs flags for Antigua
Entering Jolly Harbour - and it rained!
On the Customs quay at Jolly Harbour, Antigua
Carole and Marie sourced the shirts and Lei. As well as the welcome bottle of champagne. When we arrived the customs office was shut, so we were officially not allowed off the boat until we'd cleared customs and immigration, but the girls chatted up the customs staff and they allowed us to nip off the boat to the restaurant next door for a celebration but then had to get back on the boat to sleep overnight and be ready for the Customs opening in the morning
Last page of the log - 2963 miles sailed at an average of 5knots.
This is the beach 2 minutes from Dave and Marie's place - one of the best beaches on the island. We walked here most mornings for a pre-breakfast swim - just stunning.
Derek came for a swim too.
The colours really are just as shown on the photo, simply beautiful.
Sundowners
Our favourite beach bar, Sandra's. Lots of reggae music playing, some great, Asha Otto singing Home, some decidedly dubious - House of the Rising Sun (reggae version) or one of the best/worst - Neil Diamond's Sweet Caroline (reggae version)
St John's is Antigua capital and centre of its cruise tourism, three or four of these leviathans docked each morning, bussed the inmates to various tourist sites and beaches and then back, setting off again that evening.
Whilst were were on Antigua England were playing three Test Matches against the West Indies, they were soundly beat at the first Test. Then they came to Antigua and the Windies demolished them - England were dismal, just dismal!
The shirts got another outing - we blended in well with the Barmy Army supporters.
The local fans took great delight in the Windies slaughtering England.
We took local buses to Nelson's Dockyard, stopping at a local shack restaurant for lunch. Good food, most have a similar menus of chicken, pork or goat, usually curried. There are lots of these small local restaurants around the island
Nelson's Dockyard, from where Nelson controlled the Caribbean, now home to super yachts. Many of the buildings contracted around Nelson's time are still there, restored and turned into shops and restaurants.
A few of the super yachts.
This is the remains of the original sail loft
Time for a beer.
A pretty random photo of canned cheese and butter for sale in the local supermarket
A few days later Carole, Marie and I, together with a friend Geraint, went on a sponsored walk, called the HASH in aid of the oncology department at the local hospital. It ended up going around the super yachts blagging cash from the crews - the one boat that had an owner on didn't give any money - must be how the rich stay rich! The HASH House Harriers is an organisation of mainly ex-pats around the world who organise local charity (and beer drinking) walks.
Views from the walk
At the end of the walk we retired to a bar where the more adventurous (fe)male walkers held a beauty pageant, the locals were bemused!
Montserrat
We managed to fit in a trip to the neighbouring island of Montserrat, only 30miles away by ferry. We went for the day but spent a large part of it going through immigration in and out of each island!
The blue tin roof is Antigua's, international ferry terminal
Montserrat's main quayside after the volcano destroyed the capital's.
Montserrat was devastated by a series of volcanic eruptions in the late 90's, what you can see here is the capital, Plymouth, after it's inundation by pyroclastic flow. Nineteen people were killed. The island's population fell from 12,000 to 2,500 after the eruption, most of the people left this British dependancies to go to Britain, many remain there. The population is now about 5,000.
The volcano is still smoking,
Back on Antigua.
When we got back to Antigua we decided to have a little road trip around the island, little, as the island is only the size of the Isle of White. There is an area called Shirley's Heights named after an English clerk who worked in the Dockyard and bought the land above the harbour. It has a big reggae party each Sunday with lots of local food on sale but we were too early and had to settle for just the stunning views.
Looking down on Indian Creek
The view looking down onto Nelson's Dockyard.
This chap was sat making hats at the top of the hill, what a charmer, with a great sense of humour, he loved to chat. He made Carole a rose from palm leaves and then made her a made to measure palm leaf hat, It took him about 15 minutes, he said he'd been making them since he was a boy and now he was "sexty" years old.
Great hat. Complete with fish flag!
That night we stopped at a B&B above Half-Moon Bay, lovely peaceful place set on a hillside with a great view of the ocean.
Our room, and it had a kettle and tea bags!
Found this monster, about 4inches long, in the pool in the morning, Carole declined the usual morning swim.
Half Moon Bay, almost undeveloped. Had to go here as its the same name as our boat.
Devils Bridge where folklore has it slaves threw themselves off into the cauldron below rather than return to the sugar cane estates. Slaves brought in by the English made some people very wealthy on the backs of the slaves and the Rum and sugar trade. When the English banned slavery in 1833 the slaves were given land, almost all Antiguans can trace their ancestry back to these times. We were told that Antiguans to this day don't like to work in agriculture due to the connotations with slavery, and despite the island being fertile there is not a huge amount grown there. The original Indian inhabitants were wiped out and left very little trace.
Just time for one last goat curry and a Carib beer
And a chill out on a beach before we head home on an 8 1/2 hour overnight flight to Gatwick.
The hat travelled well and surprisingly drew no comments when we stopped overnight in Birmingham on the drive back from Gatwick. Had a great night out there with Jen on cocktails and curry!
Our neighbour Diane, left us welcome home balloons and Prossecco!
Quite an adventure!
And I think I'd do a Trans-Atlantic again, possibly!
