HEADING FURTHER SOUTH AT LAST ...........

Having dealt with the farewell emotions of "AMOEBA's" departure, that beautiful ferro-cement schooner with a great bunch of people on board, that's now on its way to Nova Scotia, CANADA, we were able to leave ANTIGUA and set the sails for GUADELOUPE, a passage of forty-six miles with a steady wind from the east, making it a close reach ...............



Rainy and misty when we finally arrived at Des Hayes, GUADELOUPE where we had anchored previously ........... A sleepy little town that has a very loud church bell to keep everybody awake during the day ....... A great place to restock on French bread and other delicasies ............ The bay is surrounded by steep volcanic hills covered in vegetation right to the water's edge .............



Early morning departure while the good weather lasts, and we motor-sail all the way past GUADELOUPE and ILES DES SAINTES and onto DOMINICA ..... Nowhere near as many yachts in Prince Rupert's Bay at PORTSMOUTH as the last time we were here, in late March ........It is hard not to miss this vessel that looks like a Turkish charter-cruise ship from somewhere near the Adriatic Sea........ No one on board ....Ah, well, another mystery ship? ....



The tradewinds blow so consistantly around the lee of these islands that they give the bushes a neat little 'comb-over' where the wind accelerates along the water's edge ............ The cliffs drop off to hundreds of feet deep and we can sail very close to the edge of land ..... By close, we mean 30 feet or less ....... Definitely nowhere to anchor .........



Magnificent green hills and mountains ...... This is the island of 365 streams ... The garden island ....... Despite some houses that might be better built a little further inland ... Do a double-click on this photo and you'll see why ....



Even these houses close to shore have a substantial seawall around them ...... We only stopped overnight in PORTSMOUTH to get some wonderful fresh vegies for which this garden island is so famous ........



Other than fresh vegetables there is not a lot for DOMINICA to export, except maybe rock ....... Volcanic crushed rock, that is....... Do a double click on these photos to see the process ...... Slide the hillside down, then put it through a crusher and onto a conveyor belt, then load it onto barges towed by a tugboat and 'Bob's your Uncle" ..... Money in the bank .......



By the time we reached the end of DOMINICA at Scott's Head, the wind had died altogether so we again motored across the next inter-island passage to MARTINIQUE .... About 30 miles ...... it is getting to be steamy hot and the haze hides the islands until you are quite close ..............



Modern medicine is such a wonderful thing ........ Laurie put some 'EFUDEX', a cancer cream, on a sore spot on her chest ....... Sort of rubbed it in, and a week or so later found out that there was a little more than one spot ....... Now this is all good, for each red spot is cancer cells being destroyed and replaced with new baby skin cells .... You'd freak out if we showed you what I look like after treatment each year ....... Anyway as soon as we anchored in Fort-de-France, MARTINIQUE we went ashore to do clearance, some shopping and internet in McDonalds ........ You should try one of these delicious French Bread rolls ...... They are McNIFIC ......



Everybody is always asking us " Have you seen the Green flash, yet?" and at least until recently we never had ....... Well, now we can finally say " YES, we have " ....... We even know where it is, but we are not telling anyone ........

THE " AMOEBA " FAREWELL

It is done ............ They are finally free ........... THE SCHOONER " AMOEBA "HAS A NEW WORKING ENGINE ALL CONNECTED .......They motored round the corner of Five Islands, away from Jolly Harbour and finally put their own anchor down once more in blue water, amidst screams of excitement and John can give you twenty thousand reasons why he was the first to dive overboard ............ What a feeling to feel and finally hear, the purring of a new sweet motor that will carry them all the way back to NOVA SCOTIA in Canada .......... And moments later everyone else dived overboard to share in the joy ........



And all we could do was share in the joy and take their pictures ..........



And that evening as the sun set, we all once more celebrated and toasted to our good fortunes ... To 'fellowship' and 'hardship' and to just plain 'ship' ...... And we wished each other well and safe journeys in opposite directions ....... And emotions and spirits flowed well into the evening and again over breakfast.......... Surely by now, you know how it goes ...........



Like so many of the wonderful people we have met on this journey ............ How do you say 'Good-bye' without not wanting to say it at all ........... And how you send that last wave and that last wish of 'good luck' over the stern rail ...........

SAILOR VEE .......

The winds have suddenly changed to the south-east and brought with them lots of rain ....... Rain, rain and more rain, so much so, that you can forget what we said about ANTIGUA being a dry island ............ The only bit of real sunshine of late has been the return of the " QUEEN OF FLORIDA AND THE BAHAMAS ", who has had three wonderful weeks with her expectant daughter and seeing some of her friends in Jacksonville, Florida ............ That same south-east wind has brought lots of French yachts to Antigua from Guadeloupe and Martinique to the south of us, most of whom call out to us in fluent French that always ends with "Sailor Vee" ....... I wish them well from "Sailor Vee", to which they again reply with " Sailor vee, Qui, qui " ...............

I did ask Laurie to bring back some additional navigation charts and she has dutifully complied .......... She says they are " colourful, stretchy, flexi and waterproof " .............. Arriving at the airport the 'Queen' certainly was hungry and we drove straight to St. Johns to get a 'king roti' ...... This a mixture of chicken and potato in curried sauce, wrapped in an envelope ............ Delicious ...... They no longer serve food on the flights but they do manage to loose your luggage ....... Retrieved two days later, all intact, but thoroughly inspected by the TSA ........ Wonder what they thought of our stretchy, flexi 'charts' ........



She was also able to catch up with Esther Robinson, the Secretary of Lauren's former Division in the School Board, that dealt with Exceptional Student Education ..... They have been friends and colleagues for more than twenty years ............ Two exceptional people ...



But here are three really exceptional people ........... The Queen's daughter, Lauren Anne Shiver, that little baby girl that's definitely on the way, and hubby Tony Shiver, listening to that brand new heart-beat ........



And driving back from the airport we finally caught a glimpse of one of those huge cast-iron cauldrons used during the colonial sugar plantation days, for boiling the cane syrup to make sugar .............. And to make delicious rum ........... Amazing what happens when someone clears the undergrowth ...........



The French are masters at making aluminum yachts (that's Aluminium if you're from down-under) .................... This one has no visible keel but probably has folding keels tucked away inside and rounded edges and some clever solar panels that act as sunshades and window protection at the same time .............



Boatyards, like this one at Jolly Harbour in Antigua, have a number of contractors that specialize in most marine fields ........ Everything from woodwork to machine engineering, and John Bryson of the schooner " AMOEBA " has visited them all ..... John and family have now spent two months tied to a dock while coming to terms with replacing their engine ............ An ordeal that no-one would want to do ...... Their engine, a new Perkins 85 HP motor, was finally shipped from Virginia, USA, and sent to Antigua .........



You might say there were boatloads of 'spectators' ..............



We mean, how beautiful is that ................ Straight out of the box .....



A forklift to drop it inside the hull after John had first cut out a sizeable part of the cabin-top ............ And every day there are meals to be cooked for the crew and other jobs to be done, as we lend moral support in small doses ........ Stretching it out for this incredible ordeal .....



First a whole new mounting frame has to be built to allow for the different heights of the new engine mounting brackets ............ It all looks so easy, but then .... It isn't ............ Back and forth to the workshop for re-welding .....



And every evening calls for some sort of celebration, because bit by bit, they are making progress ........



The crew of "ARITA" presented those wonderful people on "AMOEBA" with a set of hand-painted wine glasses to commemorate " THE AGONY AND THE ECSTASY " of the new engine installation .......



The engine in, the cut-out now back in it's place and caulked shut and waterproof, and a new coat of paint over the cabin-top ......... Just in time for the two ladies to go shopping for tonight's celebratory meal ........... Tomorrow will be time to connect the propellor shaft and think about exhaust pipes and water connection lines .... Hey, they just keep plugging away at the problem, day by day ..........



Despite the fact that ANTIGUA is only a small island in the Caribbean, it is still possible to get an awful lot of technical things done ............ Provided you work in "Island time" ....... The rules are different ......... And the largest structure downtown and on the island is .......... A cruise ship ....... You can even park on the wrong side of the road, blatantly, and get away with it ....... Or as the French would no doubt say ..... " C'est la vie ...." ........There you have it " Sailor Vee " .............