Mom having fun behind the dingy!

How nostalgic to sail into Scarborough, the capital and main port of Tobago, after 15 years.  The same, but different. This time we held off till daybreak and then motored in at first light, our Open CPN software/nav system accurate to a tee, both motors responsive and purring.  Last time not so much fun…we were on Finesse, with 2 smallish children, and were hit by a violent squall as we approached. Viz was nonexistent, and of course Murphy chose to pop his head out of the bilge on that occasion too, as no amount of coaxing would get life to splutter into the 60 Perkins. Kids were ordered below as Doug and I tried to orientate ourselves and locate nonexistent buoys and markers which are supposed to indicate the reef and approach, all through the driving rain and gale force wind. Same in that still virtually none of the channel markers or cardinal buoys exist or work.  Same in that the enormous Trinidad/Tobago ferry was moored on the quayside of the terminal building but this time a glossy white super smart express turbo had replaced the rather dowdy heavy set ‘Panarama’ ferry, and the turbo was roaring and the mooring ropes being untied, but we thankfully had learnt from last time that you need to tuck right in to the anchorage for fear of having your stern shortened, or a quick conversion to two monohulls.

The ferry traveling at 33 knots passed us… Yikes!

The ferry’s AIS details.

We were amazed that not another single yacht was there, but surmised it was probably due to the filthy water which we had not had in Scarborough last time.  Bleary eyed from lack of sleep and a surprisingly tough passage from Iles du Salut, we donned our step outs, inflated and launched the dinghy and got our documents together for the obligatory visit to the immigration and customs. It was a sweltering day and once we had dripped ashore we were thrust into the hustle and bustle of the day, and of Scarborough, bursting at its seams with people going about their business, and being school break, throngs of local holiday makers. After a pretty long and sweltering walk through the town and up the hill to the immigration offices, we were told that no, we needed to book in at the ferry terminal, all the way back at the docks! When we got there, queues of people, or rather crowds of people not in queues were pushing against all the entrance doors and angrily waving papers and complaining, while expressionless security officials refused access to most. We joined in trying to get heard, and eventually were escorted upstairs to the air-conditioned, relative comfort of the immigration office where we filled in copious quantities of forms with good old fashioned carbon paper, got our stamp and cruising permit and escaped the hordes of angry people still trying for a seat on the ferry.  Being holiday time, we discovered that although several huge ferries ply back and forth between Trinidad and Tobago, they are all fully booked several weeks in advance and so last minute traveling is very difficult with desperate people trying every trick to get wait listed.

We upped anchor and headed off to Store Bay, one of our favourite spots on Finesse, and were joined by a school of dolphins, mothers and calves in abundance. Still the water was dirty though, and this was a letdown after the crystal waters we remembered.  Even Store Bay, whilst better, was a disappointment.  We are in the rainy season, last time the dry season, (no summer and winter here), and so the rivers constantly purge themselves into the ocean, the worst culprit being the Orinoco whose mouth is just south of Trinidad.

Otherwise good ol’ Store Bay has not changed, the craft stalls and beach, the colourful glass bottom boats and the big spreading tree where we enjoyed so many sundowners with yachtie mates. When we enquired about the whereabouts of Jerome (the chair hire guy who we worked with to do clandestine day charters on Finesse), the new chair guy, aptly named Sugarlips, was quick to fill us in that he had taken over from Jerome who had moved to Germany with his German wife, and did his utmost best to sell us a boat trip! We went upstairs to the rustic bar that afternoon and sipped on some ice cold Caribs, the local beer, and discovered that Carib make an ‘oh so refreshing’ ginger shandy, the closest we have found to “Fresh” which is a similar low alcohol beverage made in Madagascar which we thrived on back in 1995!

A Fresh on Gambit back in August 1995.

Getting ashore this time was a far cry from back then, we simply rode the little swell onto the beach and pulled the dinghy above the high water mark – Elementary stuff.  But for some reason, back then there was a huge shore break; maybe the moon or the Orinoco, or even Neptune had a hand to play, but yachties dinghying ashore was a favourite entertainment for the tourists sunning themselves on the beach.

Yes, I know this is hard to imagine from this pic…

We would motor in to the back set of waves and then crisscross back and forth waiting for a lull.  Once committed, there was no pulling out, and the outboard would be gunned, riding in on the back of a wave, and in a well-executed manoeuvre of timing and expertise (Doug of course), we would beach ourselves, leap out and drag the rubber duck up clear of the next crashing wave hell bent on embarrassing the occupants. Once we had just done a perfect instruction manual beach landing when we looked up and saw a large dinghy motoring towards the shore from a bareboat Moorings charter yacht anchored close to us. Then, with a mixture of horror and amusement we watched as it became evident that the poor skipper had no idea what awaited him.  With his oblivious wife perched on the seat in a pretty frock, handbag and sandals in one hand and the other hand holding on a wide brimmed straw hat, (silly girl, basic rule is one hand for yourself, one for the boat at all times), they didn’t even  hesitate, just rode straight in ending up side on to the huge breaking swell which picked them up and hurled her overboard in a very undignified fashion, before crashing onto the shore full of water, crunching motor and boat into the sand.  We all hurtled down and grabbed the boat handles to haul it up but of course the weight of water in the boat rendered it almost impossible to budge and Doug succeeded in ripping the handle off the boat instead.  All in all a fabulous distraction to all the bored burnt tourists still sunning themselves on Jerome’s deckchairs.  

Anyway, back to the here and now, several caribs later and we went back to Katlyn in that semi-comatose state induced by too little sleep, too much beer and the euphoria of having ‘arrived’ after the final leg of an Atlantic crossing, had a simple supper and slept. That final leg had been longer and tougher than the mere 4 days it took to do indicated.  Once one leaves French Guyane, for about a day or more, the water is shallow, perhaps between 15 and 30 metres or so, and therefore littered with masses of fishing boats who stay out at night, often unlit, without AIS, (Automatic Identification System which is an integrated transmit and receive software system which identifies vessels and relays the information onto our Open CPN Nav system), and too small to pick up on the radar with the general sea clutter. This makes watches long and laborious and tiring; add to this the lack of wind and the constant and repetitive sail changes trying to coax speed out of the boat for a few days, and it doesn’t take long for the lethargy to set in, and general boat and galley chores to become unpleasant challenges.

On day three our woes were heard, and wind was sent, plenty of it, but from a direction we were unaccustomed to (I think you made a mistake wind god, we ordered a downwind sail, not from all over, not with intermittent squalls and rain, not varying from 15knots to 35knots; just nice and constant, like we’ve had for nearly two months), and the sea got lumpier and choppier, and swells seemed to come from any direction they chose, making the ride jerky and sporadic and the crew grumpy, hot and sweaty.  And so it happened that one night I was off watch trying to fall asleep while Doug tried to improve the motion of the boat by tweaking the course and the sails, and my hatch was cracked open to provide just a smidgen of ventilation, when some rogue wave swamped the boat, the pressure of it lifting the hatch further and dumping gallons of water into our cabin, swamping the entire bed and mattress, it gurgled over the edges of the mattress and into the storage beneath, wetting all the spares , flags, charts, etc seeping into all the protective plastic covers.  I was drenched, truly and utterly drenched, like as if I was standing under a waterfall, and truly and utterly unimpressed, as the mop up operation under the circumstances was more than I felt capable of doing… I would rather have flying fish in my bed again, like on the last passage when I woke up with a foot long slimy flying fish nestled into my duvet cover next to me. Imagine how advanced his nav system must be to have negotiated the small ‘post box like slot’ in the hatch above our bunk and come to rest with his head just close enough not to be too intimate. He was a bit inconsiderate though, because he touched down midway up the bed and left a long, bluish green skid mark of fish dye and scales before coming to his final resting place. I seem to remember that fish scales were once used as dye, so it took a fair amount of effort to get the mark out of the duvet cover. Back to Doug tweaking sails and course, he was also avoiding getting run down by ships, now in deep water and in the shipping lanes.  Here’s a snapshot of the AIS picture one night.  You know the basic navigation rule that vessels under sail have right of way over those under power… forget it, might is right and you get out of their way as you can see we did (we are the red boat, the arrows are ships traveling on various courses at varying speeds.

So our first day in Store Bay involved fetching water and washing linen and mattress covers, wiping down the cabin and storage and drying out the spares and generally tidying up. We also met Dimitri and Michelle with their two boys on ‘Wind Chasers’, those who have been involved in kite surfing might know them, they have the kite school and guest house of the same name up in Langebaan, right on the lagoon, and have spent their cruising time searching for an appropriate location for opening another school in the Caribbean. While you do see the occasional kite out and about on windy days, they say that good spots are few and far between.

Tobago is understated and underrated; it just has a lovely rhythm to it where life is simple and relaxed. Villages are shabby chic, with tumble down houses interspersed with neat little houses, colourful manicured gardens competing with rampant vines, lantana and litter, pavement bars and airtime kiosks.  Grocery shopping is at local road side stalls or shops comprising a maze of inter – leading rooms stocking everything from kitchen ware to car spares to veet and bikinis, fresh bread and freshly caught fish.  Mostly anything you need you can find, maybe not Woolies muffins, or Checkers matured steaks, but I said ‘need’, not ‘want’. But how I wish I could just find a shop that sells the luxury of an indulgent magazine, though!  Prices vary, mostly just a little more than home prices on most things, but here’s the winner, R2.25 a litre for diesel! I repeat, R2.25 for diesel.  Unbelievable.

So we have settled into a mixture of yachtie and village life, meeting other boats and moving up and down the leeward coast of Tobago between the anchorages and bays, discovering the unique something that sets each apart from the other; surfing and boogie boarding and snorkeling at Mt. Irvine Bay; horses and fire flies, steel drums and yoga at Buccoo Bay, (pronounced Book – Koo), and the steel drum orchestra is called the Buccooneers! Then Plymouth, better known to us as Internet Bay as we have through Wind Chasers discovered that if you anchor in nice and close, and have in some manner procured the password for Rex Resorts wireless connection, you have unlimited internet access, especially valuable for blog updates and gmail.

Buccoo Bay

All the while the water is cleaning up by the day, we are swimming to keep clean and cool, and intermingling relaxed boat life with the constant need to finish all things started before we left, biminis, cockpit cushions, etc… and of course attending to the unrelenting list of things to be fixed or serviced.

Tonight we are anchored again at Internet Bay, and have taken the opportunity to research and book Dylan’s ticket to join us for a few weeks at the end of the year. A flutter of excitement, can’t wait!

– Val

Dad milking a small 2ft wave at Mt. Irvine.

A real sense of nostalgia was felt as we sailed into Mt Irvine Bay. Found memories flooding back from our last visit way back in 1998. What is so great about this little anchorage is that there is a cool surfing spot in the corner of the bay. The natural coral reef serves as a platform for a perfect right hand break and when the swell is running, it is a lot of fun! This must rate as one of the prettiest surf spots in the world. During our stay here we have been unlucky with the amount of swell we have had, but I have still been fortunate enough to surf in two foot waves on numerous occasions. When the surf is flat there is the added bonus of having really good snorkeling on the coral reef, so it’s a winner either way. Let’s hope the swell picks up. The location itself consists of a small village dotted with quaint little cottages, guest houses, the inevitable bar and eating place.

– Doug

Mom trying to drop in on another one of Dad’s waves… tisk tisk

Internet Bay

Internet while sitting in the comfort of your yacht is an immensely luxury, but after updating the blog, answering emails and trying to work out the difficulties of getting the particular reef fish identification book I wanted (from Canada), I was over being cooped up. Earlier in the week we had gone for a Roti roll at one of the local spots in Store Bay, before heading to the info centre. The lady there operates out of a tiny Wendy house structure and is considered the best Roti (a pancake/tortilla with curry, pumpkin and chickpeas inside) in the area. She has a tiny verandah with two tables where we sat and watched as the locals arrived for lunch, drive through style. They pull over to the wrong side of the road, so that all the oncoming traffic must negotiate their way around them, the lady comes out and catches up on news and takes their order. When it’s ready they move on, this is probably the only part of the world where road – ragers wouldn’t attempted to kill you, everything is a bit slower – iz da Caribbean mon!

Roti Heaven!

In the info centre I found out that there are two operations that offer beach horse rides. So when we were up in Plymouth I headed to the closer of the two. On the way there I hitched a ride with ‘Lennox’, a health and safety inspector for TT (Trinidad and Tobago), who proceeded to take me the long way around via the coast, into each of the villages, including Black Bay near Mt Irvine Bay. Later on in the week I met an American boat with a SA girl onboard, and we all headed to one of the local Reggae bars here – an experience. Lennox dropped me off on the edge of Buccoo Bay and I walked up to the ‘Healing with Horses’ stables. Admittedly I went for a bit of a wild goose chase as locals directed me onto cliffs, to ramshackle houses and places where dogs chased me. As I was retracing my steps I bumped into two guys fixing a car, and woe and behold, I meet Lennon.

Me on my wild goose chase.. 🙂

Lennon and Veronika started the foundation ‘Healing with Horses’ to aid disabled children and help them to connect and learn with horses. Their 6 extraordinary horses each have their own unique backgrounds, some found on Tobago in need of a home, other sent over on the ferry from Trinidad.  Check out their website www.healing-with-horses.com.

Lennon helping a child during this years camp.

They are impeccably looked after, fit, shiny and happy. They work as a herd and one is never separated. Each and every day they ride through the town of Buccoo, in the mangroves and along the beach at a leisurely walk, before swimming (trotting and cantering with only their heads or top of their backs out the water) a good 1.5 km in the waves and giving tourists one hell of an experience. They are rated the top activity in Tobago on Trip advisor. Veronika and Lennon have equally come from unique backgrounds. Veronika is from Germany and spent many years riding horses in a well-known European traveling circus and Lennon is from South Trinidad and grew up on a 250 acre stud farm. And so I have joined in their day to day activities, taking the guests along the beach since it is school holidays and the children are taking a break from riding lessons. Swimming horses in the sea is an entirely different kettle of fish to swimming in dams and rivers back home – and tremendous fun! After a few days of long walking in the heat to get there and some interesting hitched rides, we moved the boat around to Buccoo Bay. This turned out to be a beautifully protected spot where we were the only yachties. So the ultimate goal of finding a new activity has been accomplished, with the added bonus of meeting some truly remarkable people and learning some local inside information.

The only photo we have of the horses, courtesy of mom and dad on the dingy.

Sunday School is a weekly market and barbecue, that was particularly big this week with the added hype from the Great Carib Race, a 84 mile speed boat race from Trinidad to Tobago with a huge beach party. The steel drums were fantastic! Unfortunately my little camera recording feature couldn’t capture it in all its glory. Hilariously an old man was having a seriously good time dancing with his Caribbean ‘lady’ (a slim cross dresser in the tiniest of shorts and high heeled tackies) taking grinding to a new level and providing shocked entertainment for all the unwilling crowds. Dad taunted me with ideas to go and start dancing on the dance floor, which I told him I would easily have the balls to do – he retorted that so did she!

Mom and Dad were treated to stunning snorkel (now that the water has cleared) on the Buccoo reef that is about 6NM². Tobago is the number 1 eco-tourism destination and boasted the largest brain coral mountains in the world. Bitterly disappointing, I have an ear infection and was left behind!

Nope, not one of us in this pic 😦

Buccoo bay is the same as most of the quaint villages but is proud to host the Goat racing stadium, a true TT sport that is taken very seriously. There is also a beautiful 18 hole golf course at the edge on the town. Dad played with the children on the docks and took them for rides in the rubber duck, pulling the rest of them on their old broken windsurfer – ever since we can barely get ashore without being inundated with requests. On our last night, I joined Veronika and some friends for meditation, (Yes, contrary to what some of you may think I am capable of sitting still and keeping quite) a bonfire and a picnic on the cliff where the horses graze. Lennon has promised to show me the fireflies next time we are in Buccoo, and we will be back in a week or two since I forgot to take any photos of the horses! We were headed back to Plymouth this morning in the clearest water, only to be hit by a huge rain storm which has made all the rivers flow and turn the water brown again.

– Kate

On the cliff at sunset.

>>>>> Check out the rest of the pics <<<<<

The 7 day sail was our last long leg and yet entirely different from crossing the Atlantic. We had to be on ‘active’ watch at all times, as we negotiated the shipping channels and played chess with unregistered, illegal fishing vessels that only turned on their lights at the last moment.  Dad and I had picked up some or other flu virus that made the unbearably hot days even worst, and made me want to sleep for days. At least we had great sailing and averaged 8.5 knots on Day 2, doing 203 miles in 24 hours, with the help of 1.5 knots of current. The temperature was at 29˚C at 08:00pm at the end of the day, having crossed the equator earlier with all our traditional ridiculousness and we had made the monumental sacrifice of one beer to Poseidon (or Neptune) to keep him in his good natured and jolly mood! We had some strange warm gusts of wind which would come through at complete random and heat up the already stifling days. We were particularly lucky to be joined by dolphins, with 6 or 7 pairs of mother and calf. We put on the deck light and lit up the water in front of us, with them putting on a show of jumps and splashes! Every now and then they would come directly underneath us and turn sideways to get a better look.

Games of Rummikub, baking bread and reading any book that had not yet reached its 3^rd cycle kept us occupied. The large amount of river water entering the Atlantic in this rainy season meant that we lost our turquoise water, as well as our fish.

We had some hassles with our wind instruments, which we picked up when it started acting like a Stellenbosch first year after a particularly good night at the pub. Hilariously so, we reverted to tying red wool on our shrouds to see the wind direction. This was a particular favorite of the Heinz, the 72 year old previous owner who had an enjoyed using the notorious red wool to earmark every process and piece of equipment – Not a favorite of Dads and yet here it was coming into use again! We had a good chuckle at the irony and remembered the quirks that made Papagena uniquely theirs. We also got a few tears in our Genoa from the hank ons on our No.3, which required a ‘en route’ fix to ensure that they did not tear further.

We arrived at Iles du Salut in the dark on the 4^th August, in time for Dad’s Birthday on the 7^th. It is made up of 3 islands not 200m from one another, Ile Royale, Ile Saint – Joseph and Ile du Diable (no translation required). Devil’s Island is the smallest of the three, and the group lies about 9 NM (14 km) off French Guyane (Guiana to the French). This island rises about 40 metres out of the sea and is only 14ha, made up mainly of over populated coconut palms, vicious rocks and an undergrowth of re-sprouting coconuts and dead leaves. It was part of the French penal colony for 101 years, till 1953, and favoured by the government of Emperor Napoleon 3^rd and so earned its name for being the infamous exile of political prisoners.

Devil’s Island was originally used to house the leper colony of the prison and since no understanding of the cause of Hansen’s existed, victims were quarantined there until 1895 when they were replaced with France’s political prisoners, and the most hardened of thieves and murderers. Back then Ile du Diable was so perilous that prisoners of Ile Royale constructed a cable car system for officers to reach the island that is surrounded by rocky outcrops, hidden reefs, vicious cross currents and shark-infested waters. Needless to say that the islands were naturally walled in, and those imprisoned for less severe crimes on Ile Royale would be allowed relative freedom. The small prison facility on Ile du Diable did not hold more than 12 convicts. Ile Saint-Joseph held the solitary confinement cells.

A limited number of convicted women were also sent to French Guiana, with the intent that they marry freed male inmates to aid in settlement and development of the colony. As the results were poor, the government discontinued the practice in 1907. Life in this penal colony gained a reputation for ruthlessness and cruelty, inter – prisoner violence was common, and tropical diseases were widespread. The sanitary systems were limited and the region was mosquito-infested. Only a small minority of broken survivors would return to France to tell how horrible it was and terrify other potential criminals. This system was gradually phased out and has been completely shut down since 1953. The majority of the 80,000 prisoners sent to this penitentiary never made it back to France. The only exit from the island prisons was by water, and few convicts escaped.

However Clément Duval, a revolutionary, was sent to Devil’s Island in 1886. Having initially been sentenced to death, he received a commuted sentence of hard labour for life on the island where he contracted smallpox, but escaped in April 1901. Duval fled to New York City, where he remained for the rest of his life, eventually recording his imprisonment in a book called Revolte.

Three Frenchmen by the names of Francois Frean, 37, Paul Renuci, 32, Raymond Vaude, 35, and an Italian, Giovanni Batistoti, 35, managed to escape and arrived in the Virgin Islands on 18 October 1936. Their hand made boat was in bad shape and was nearly wrecked on the reef when the convicts were found.

Henri Charrière’s describes his successful escape from Devil’s Island, with fellow inmate, Sylvain in his bestselling book Papillon in 1968. According to his book, the two men threw themselves into a raging sea, using only two sacks filled with coconuts to float and drifted to the mainland over three days.  Sylvain periled in quicksand once on shore. This book caused significant controversy, enraging the French authorities with its public descriptions of the extreme brutality and inhumane treatment of the prisoners of Ile du Diable. The Authorities disputed it entirely and eventually released penal colony records that contradicted his account. He had never been imprisoned on Devil’s Island, but apparently escaped from a mainland prison. French journalists and prison authorities found other dubious foundations of his book, believing that he had invented many incidents or adopted experiences of other prisoners. Critics said he should have confessed to fiction.

The nightmare of the penal colony was publicized during Captain Alfred Dreyfus case, where the French army captain was unjustly imprisoned for treason in January 1895.  (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Dreyfus). This lead to public outrage in 1938 when Rene Belbenoit published his book, Dry Guillotine, denigrating the penal system. The French government’s plans to close the colony down were delayed during World War 2, but from 1946 until 1953, one by one the prisons were closed. The Devil’s Island facility was the last to be closed. The cable car system deteriorated and the island is closed to public access.

During 1965, the French government passed on the responsibility of the islands to its newly built Guiana Space Centre. The Islands have to be evacuated during rocket launches as they are under its trajectory. We were bitterly disappointed to have missed a launch not 5 days before we arrived. The islands have all sorts of weird and wonderful apparatus to measure and record the space launches. Now Iles du Salut is a very popular tourist destination, with hordes of charter cats arriving each morning and thankfully returning to the mainland in the afternoon. Facilities have been added, and the old prison buildings restored to receive the 50,000 tourists each year, however only the two larger islands are open to the public. Devil’s Island and the surrounding prisons eventually became one of the most infamous prison systems in history.

Some of the ruins that we had previously been allowed to explore had been closed off to the public and the daily tourists gave the islands a less ominous feel from last time. Dad spent an afternoon collecting and husking coconut to store on the boat from making cream for curries and to just to chow – we had forgotten how rich they were. I collected shells and whiled away time reading the prisoner tombstones and wandering if their crimes were merely being of a different opinion or something more threatening. The water was never perfectly clear, but still warm and inviting. We went trawling in the mornings on the dingy and consistently caught a variation of Spanish Mackerel, as well as a particularly stupid, rather ugly and impossible enormous Tarpon, which took us some time to get off our line, without it ripping a hole in our pontoons.

We could hear the monkeys screaming and chattering in the trees from our boat and got some pictures of them on one of our walks. Surprisingly they were not spoilt by the amount of visitors and were neither afraid of us nor aggressive and begging. We got used to the afternoon electrical storms, but our hatches’ seals were seriously put to the test and we had to keep the yacht power off the whole time for fear of shorting out the system. So here I am trying to cook dinner with a hatch dripping water on me, a headlamp on my head and swell knocking us about – naturally it was a culinary masterpiece. Hey, at least we caught a lot of rain water.

Dad’s birthday was simplistic and relaxing, with a new homemade leather helm cover and beautiful one for the helmsman’s chair. The celebrations were nearly interrupted when a large navy ship pulled in and we were mildly concerned they might come over, considering we had decided not to check into Kourou – Eish!

We took a trip in on one of the days to refill our gas and buy supplies. Our first problem was that the river up to Kourou was pretty hectic and when we weren’t dragging anchor, we were sailing on it; riding over our chain and at times 90˚ to the other boats and dangerously close to shore. Mom volunteered to be on anchor watch and so Dad and I headed into town. It is an arb, dusty patch of earth with foul smelling mud and vultures on the shore – a far cry from the islands lying just off their coast. We were met with the same problem we had had in Brazil of an incompatible gas canister. Have you ever tried to understand a Chinese man that looks about 200 years old, explain to you that they don’t fill American canisters, in French with a Chinese accent? It goes like this ‘Non, non, non, non’! We got the gist… So we got hold of a ludicrously heavy French canister, some fresh veg, beers and a jerry can of petrol only to be told that taxis cannot transport flammables. Y’ell! Thankfully some local guys were filling up and were kind enough to give us a ride in exchange for two cokes. We were in and out in 3 hours in time for the tide to change, and high tailed it back to Iles du Salut and its relative comforts. The next day we started on our final 4 day leg to Tobago, which we were itching to complete as it was the last bit before the Caribbean where island hopping would never be more than a day sail and well… it’s the Caribbean!

>>>>> Check out the rest of the pictures <<<<<

– Kate

Iles du Salut, French Guyane
(Coconuts, Sundowners, Tourists)
Bargain: The cheap imported french wine and unexpected fresh produce available.
Irritation/Quirk: The main ruins being closed to the public and the ‘no entry’, ‘restricted access’ and ‘no swimming’ signs around every corner.
Cost of a coke: €1.30

The church lit up at night, it changed from blue to red, green, orange etc…

During our last few days at Fortaleza we met Rob, the South African skipper on the neighbouring Italian yacht.  It was fantastic to have a conversation that was closer to home and hear about his adventures and travels, with Kilimanjaro planned for September. Having spent time in Fortaleza before, Rob introduced us to Gheller Churrascaria, a restaurant about a 4km walk from where we were moored. This gem of a place offers a buffet of salads, fresh produce, warm side dishes and unlimited sushi. You are given a cardboard disk on arrival, that you turn over to the ‘Sim, Por Favor’ side. This little green circle has every passing server offer you your choice cuts from their rotisserie selection… steak, rump, chicken, lamb, sausage, chops, quail… You name it, they got it. When you simply cannot fit in anything more, you turn your disk over to the red ‘Não, Obrigado’. This ‘all you can eat’ experience costs a mere R$20.00 (R100.00) per person – on reflection, maybe it was actually goat and roadrunner? Either way this was a particular treat, not only as South Africans, but ones who had subsisted off fish for far too long! We have come up with a number of ingenious ways to eat fish; sure there is the usual like baked, fried, battered and braaied… the exotic, such as steamed, curried, pickled or sashimi… and then just the plain weird – fish surprise a la macaroni and cheese.

Gheller Churrascaria

We also got to see the delivery crew of the Mooring’s yacht that had been stuck in Ascension for weeks on end with engine trouble, who arrived the day before we left. Checking out at customs involves the usual – a perfectly competent, yet entirely unmotivated, snotty customs official, who of course is the only one manning the desk. However unlike South Africa, he only has two people in the queue to deal with, and still manages to make a blind, 3 legged cow look more active. Waiting in the queue behind us were two Canadian brothers who have embarked on an epic kayak adventure, where they are traveling from Belem, Brazil to Florida, a total of 6500km which they aim to do in 7 months. Pity we met them so late as they had been arguing with customs for weeks to get hold of their kayaks, but it was time to press on to Guyane, taking along the hotel’s ice bucket as a souvenir.

>>>>> Check out added pics <<<<<

– Kate