Falmouth - St Barts

Our last few days in Antigua were spent revisiting the places we had come to really appreciate and enjoy. We went to a little local church and enjoyed some good old fashioned gospel music, later we provisioned for a few days ( back home, I suppose I will go grocery shopping, not provisioning!), then enjoyed Jolly Harbour Beach for the last time. Later that afternoon, we went into Falmouth in order to clear customs. I decided that we would try to contact Clive, a mutual friend from Baddeck. I had tried unsuccessfully the last time we were in Falmouth. This time, Bingo. We arranged to meet at the Mongoose, a local watering hole. We had a great evening with Clive and met up with some of his friends. We ended up closing the place!!!

     Laura Clive & Kristy. Clive says hello to Zion

We spent a very enjoyable morning at Nelsons Dockyard, where we cleared out with customs. We wandered around, took more photos, had lunch, and generally acted like tourists!

Around 6PM we raised the anchor and headed out for an overnight passage to St Barts, a distance of about 90 miles. We began the two hour watch system. The night was very clear, calm seas and easy breezes, in fact we motorsailed most of the way. The sky was incredible, its awesome, in the truest sense of the word, to be able to gaze at a star -filled sky. We are so small by comparison.

We arrived at Gustavia, St Bartsâ main town, at around 8AM. We were all starving after traveling all night, so we enjoyed a hot breakfast, cleaned up a bit, then headed to shore to shower and explore.

Gustavia is a very busy little town. With its rocky hills, picturesque port, gorgeous beaches, and exclusive boutiques, art galleries and night life, it has become a world famous "chic" destination for the well to do "In-Crowd" The Riviera of the Carribean! Gold, silver, fine jewels, expensive art, leather goods, designers such as , Louis Vuitton, Ralph Lauren, Versace, Dior, Georgio Armarni and Cartier have stores along the waterfront. Gustavia is a major duty free shopping center. Over 200 little shops pack the crowded small streets. Naturally our exploration of this island included venturing into these stores. There was no way we stood out in our "boatie" attire as we browsed these exotic, vastly expensive and totally unpractical fashionable stores. Yeah we looked like the "poor relations" but, we had fun.

Yachts like ours are anchored outside the harbour and also tied up at the slips inside the port. A steady stream of dinghies go in and out of the port. The waterfront has been expanded and has pleasant walkways, bountiful flowers and trees, benches to sit and watch the rich go by, and life on the water. You can climb the hills surrounding the port for great views and panoramic pictures of the island.

We spent a morning at Shell Beach, very aptly named beach with seashells piled on the sand. The kids buried each other in the shells. As I mentioned it is very expensive everywhere, 4 cans of coke at a little beach bar (sorry Jerry, Pepsi was not available!) Set me back a mere $16 US.

Later that evening the girls and I went window shopping and took some great photos of the girls mimiking the models in the windows. The louis Vuitton store really caught their attention! The price of just a very small wallet was over 1200 Euros.

We said goodbye to St Barts on Thursday morning, we hoisted the anchor and motorsailed to St Martin, back to Simpson Bay Lagoon. We have come back to where we started 5 months ago. Its incredible just how fast these months have gone by. Right now, I/we are trying to get our fill of all that is Carribean, so that images will be etched in our minds forever. We know that our days are numbered here, so beaches, nights spent on deck looking at stars, wandering around local markets, interacting with local people, the music.... all these things that have been a part of our lives are coming to a close. Soon we will be back home.

We are preparing ourselves and the boat for the trip home. Frequently now we discuss our homecoming plans and the upcoming summer. People we are looking forward to seeing again, the girls are anxious to go back to school ( yes, its true) and seeing their friends, Kyle, his family and friends,( He has a big party planned) and Melvin, he just wants to go to Canada. We are preparing him already for the question " Hows she goinâ Boy?" He knows the answer... "Good, Dear, Good"

Anyway, hope you enjoy the photos of St Barts, I will add another article next week about St Martin.

View of St Barts

Overlooking the Shell Beach