St. VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES .........

When we first sailed into WALLILABOU BAY on St. VINCENT, we met this gentleman in his rowboat called Bagga (We know it's hard to pronounce properly) ....... He even has his photo in Chris Doyle's 'Windward Islands Cruising Guide' so we arranged to have him take us to a waterfall up in the mountains, and promptly the next morning he was there on the dock..... What a pleasure to have such an informative guide to tell us so much about the island, the vegetation and who is buried where in 'them thar hills' ....... We left " ARITA " secured to a mooring ball and a stern line to the remains of the dock that once held the English ships, the HMS DAUNTLESS and the HMS INTERCEPTOR that Captain Jack Sparrow and 'Bootstrap' Bill Turner's son, Will stole so handsomely .......



About a mile inland past various holdings and houses, the spectacular volcanic cliffs are partly covered by vegetation and show patches of grass where once crops had been grown and on the more level areas there were fruit trees like this one laden with unripe baby avocadoes .... And see the huge mangoes in the foreground in the other photo (left) .... Do a double-click on it .....



Our guide picked some nutmeg fruit off the trees and opened them up to shed the outer skin, show us the 'red mace' and then ground the inner nut to let us smell the rich aroma of nutmeg ............ Even the red mace is used for flavouring .....



But it was the waterfall and the abundance of cold clear mountain water that really took our breath away ....... When you have spent months being so careful with water so as not to waste any, what a heaven-sent to be able to stand under a shower storm and love every moment of sheer EXHILERATION and INVIGORATION ......



There are no words to describe it ........ What a bugger that Bagga was there .....



Still we needed somebody to take this photo .................



In the former colonial days they had put a dam across the river to capture the water and relics of the wall remain ....... A few hundred yards downstream were the remains of a waterwheel that had powered a mill for crushing arrow-root, but in more modern times too many people had lost their arms in the water-powered machinery and it was finally abandoned ...... When a waterwheel gets going you cannot turn it off until you have diverted the stream .....



Look at the tree with its root system all over the stone wall and everywhere there were wild ginger flowers in various colours like small 'Picasso' paintings ......



And in the misty afternoon we took off to move another 18 miles south, to the island of BEQUIA with the wonderful anchorage of ADMIRALTY BAY ...... Protected from the swell and the winds from the east and the south ....



And straight to the fresh fruit market, where they had mangoes the size of bullock's hearts and cucumbers, christophene, eggplant and tomatoes ........ All good stuff, and lots of sweet bananas, pineapples and passionfruit ....



There is an an Anglican Church in town and right next to it is a magnificent frangipani tree with these pastel-coloured flowers ....... How could we not take photos of them .....



And elsewhere we found another frangipani with even more vibrant colours ....... There is obviously colour vibrancy in Bequia ..... Even at the 'Rush Hour Bar' you'll find some severe colours and some 'pointed' signage on its corner ....



Amazing how many commercial vessels operate out of the harbour to service all the small islands like Carriacou, Canouan, Mustique, Petit Vincent and the Tobago Cays ...... We even saw this barge which has 'turned turtle' and is slowly being refloated ...... The red part of the hull is the bottom of the barge............



But BEQUIA and the nearby island of CARRIACOU are famous for the building of wooden boats in the traditional method ..... Like this local cruise vessel the " Friendship Rose " undergoing some repairs ....... The timber is locally grown though not necessarily on the transom of a boat ...... The people on BEQUIA still periodically hunt whales with traditional open boats and hand-held harpoons ............ No evidence of that in town ......



But here are two rare items found locally ....... A half litre glass bottle of Coca-Cola and a very rare ST. VINCENT IGUANA ........