Martinique
We left St Lucia with a beautiful sunrise silhouetting the mountains behind Rodney bay as we set sail for Martinique. The crew was in good spirits, if a little hung over – blue skies and a minor swell. As we passed the Northern tip of St Lucia, the swell began to build and we (the new crew members) began to wish for sea legs. The sail was supposed to take 6 or 7 hours but with the swell came stronger winds and we arrived in under 4, in time for lunch at Les Anses-d'Arlet.
After a quick check of the mooring and a snorkel with some Turtles it was time to check out Les Anses-d'Arlet. The crew were excited for cheap wine, fresh baguettes, croissants and high quality cheese from the French island. While Peter went off to deal with immigration, the rest of us went to a nearby beach bar for an Orangina. It was soon apparent that we were on a French island... a very French Island... in fact we could have been in the south of France. Extortionate prices, speedos and a certain arrogance that anyone who has visited France would be sure to recognize.
Pretty Les Anses-d'Arlet
There is an obvious reason for this: Martinique is French colony – you can fly direct from France (without a passport) and spend your Euros like you’re in Paris. As you can imagine, it was not for us. We returned to Rafiki to eat French bread, drink a few pitons and discuss our plans; it was a unanimous decision to head up the coast in the morning to Fort de France.
After an early start we made the short sail up to Fort de France, with Ayla at the helm we made good progress and arrived midmorning. The boys went to sort out immigration and attempt to get an alternator serviced while the girls went shopping... Fort de France is the capital city of Martinique and as such was bustling with activity and full of shops that apparently had the best clothes in Martinique. The clothes were great if you were either a prostitute or a stripper but the girls were not impressed and didn’t get too many new outfits... There was a huge market in Fort De France which was full of local fruits, vegetables and tourist tat, Peter was in hell, Ayla was in heaven. Clodagh managed to score a big bag of tomatoes for 4 euro which apparently was the deal of the century. The highlight of Fort de France was an old library, so we took our tomatoes and headed North to St Pierre.
St Pierre and the devastating Mount Pelée in the background
St Pierre is an interesting place; it was mostly destroyed in a volcanic eruption on 1902; there were only 3 survivors. We figured that this would be an interesting place to visit as there was some history and was also the drop off point for Fitzy (aww). We arrived in the late afternoon and spent some time choosing a spot to drop anchor (there were no mooring buoys) this is less than preferable – more about this later... We quickly went to town as we wanted to eat at restaurant that apparently was the best in Martinique. On arrival it turned out that we were there on the only night that it was closed, so we headed to the nearest bar!
We had a couple of drinks while watching gangs of kids on motorbikes wheelie down the street, a local suggested that we eat across the road at a beach front restaurant. This place was busy, but seemed to only have one waiter for 10+ tables – turns out he was the owner and his wife was in the back cooking the food. We had the set menu to keep things simple; the food was good (apart from Damians) and the service was excellent. We headed back to the bar and got into a conversation with some interesting (!) locals. Unfortunately for Pete, as he had the best French, had to bear the brunt of this and was continually harassed by a guy who wanted to come and see his boat and maybe was secretly in love with Fitzy.
Clodagh and Fitzy making friends with the locals...
The next day was spent sightseeing, eating baked goods from the boulangerie and drinking orangina; it was Fitzys last night so we stocked up on supplies to see her off in style. With Adam and Damian manning the BBQ and Clodagh in the galley, the cooks produced an amazing farewell meal for Fitzy. Of course any good farewell party has disco lights, singalongs and a couple of drinks; any great farewell party has drinking games and water fights. Later that night there may or may not have been a confrontation with a charter boat that arrived late and moored too close to Rafiki. Their very early departure the next morning may or may not have been related to a halfnaked boarding party knocking on windows and taking photos of the offending charter.
A sad day for the Rafiki crew; it was time to say farewell to crew member Fitzy as she was off continuing her adventures in Cuba. An advance party went to find her a taxi while the rest helped her pack and bring her bags to shore. With raging hangovers and a poor grasp of French we eventually managed to find Fitzy a bus to the airport. Everyone was sad to see Fitzy leave (especially Clodagh), she was a great addition to the crew; always happy, full of craic and one of the friendliest people you could meet. <3 Fitzy <3. With Fitzy gone we decided we were over the frenchies so we should go to the nature island; Dominica, in the morning.
We awoke early to get a start up to Dominica which was anticipated to be an 8-10 hour sail North, the crew was excited to get to the next island. We prepared the boat and called for the anchor to be pulled up, the motor pulled the chain tight, and stopped. We made several attempts to free ourselves but quickly realized it was really stuck; after several attempts to free dive down, we realized 26m was too deep for breath hold and we would likely need a diver. Being a crew of engineers, several alternative plans were formulated and attempted; from anchor fishing to manual winching nothing was working.
The dive shop was less than helpful, refusing to help that day or even to rent dive gear to our qualified divers.
After resigning ourselves to another night in St Pierre our saviour appeared in the form of Andy from our neighbour yacht Four Winds. He and his French wife Val knew a local diver who may be able to help!! Val put in the call and not long after a small dinghy was approaching with the unmistakeable shape of dive gear on board!! After some confusing English/French exchanges he agreed to check our anchor for 50EUR and disappeared in a cloud of bubbles. After several trips up and down and some communication difficulties we were finally free; he described the anchor situation as shitty... We paid the man and gifted a fine bottle of rum to Andy and Val and we were finally on our way to Dominica.
Pics of the rescue dive taken from Four Winds
With love; A&A
