A Small Island in the Sun

Wednesday, December 13, 2017
Grenadines
Another nice meal last night, the food has been really quite good, plenty of choice and you can eat virtually 24 hours of the day if you have the inclination to. It looks like some of our fellow passengers have been doing just that. Before the meal we went up to the top deck for the sail away party, the Union Jack bunting was out, we all had Union Jack flags and the DJ was playing what he though were appropriate songs such as Sailing, Rocking All Over the World and of course Rule Brittania. Azura left before we did as she was facing the right way and I think she was heading to Antigua, we followed quite quickly but had to do a 180 degree turn in the harbour to face the right way, by this time it was gone 18.00 and the sun had just gone down, quite lovely. As we were turning a plane came into land at the airport to our right in the gloom, it was quite low as it crossed the water, avoiding ships can't be that common a hazard for pilots.
This morning we cruised into Admiralty Harbour at Bequia, only a small island  of 7 square miles south of St Vincent. There is nowhere for ships to berth and only the smaller ships like Adonia that can stop here due to the shallower waters. The tenders started running about 08.15 with priority for people booked on excursions. We decided to wait until later on until the queue subsided, each tender carries about 80-90 people and the journey only takes about 5 minutes but the time is taken up by getting people on and off. They do carry out a mobility test before hand as you have to be able to step into and out of the tender unaided and there are a fair number of people on board who wouldn't manage that.
We went down at 10.00 but had to wait about 15 minutes. Once on the island we walked through some stalls set up by the locals selling trinkets and the like. We had decided to walk to Princess Margaret beach, it wasn't far, probably 1km or so. The walkway was along the waterside, in parts a concrete path, then through a small wood on a hill and then along a boardwalk. Because we had waited there were no sun beds available to hire but we had brought our towels so lay on the sand avoiding a tree which had a sign on it saying all parts of it were posionous! There were a couple of small stalls selling cold beers or rum punches or shopping bags made from old plastic flour bags - the lady selling beers said her 74 year old mum made them.
We stayed on the beach for a about 90 minutes, that was enough for both of us, we packed up and walked back and stopped in a small cafe called Gingerbread. Fiona had a rum punch and I some beers and we used the wifi. After that we walked back to the tender but had to wait about 10 minutes whilst they refuelled, luckily we were able to find some shade. We got back on board about 15.00 and went straight to the restaurant, lunch stops at 15.00 and afternoon tea starts then so it was the crossover period. I managed to get a salad which will tide me over until dinner tonight.
Bequia is a lovely place, quite laid back and small but a good selection of small bars and restaurants. The usual people touting taxis and water taxis and trips but more easy going than on some of the other islands, just what I though a Caribbean island would or should be like.
When we got back from our lunch there was an envelope waiting for us with our boarding cards for our flight home and luggage labels and immigration forms for Barbados. Our luggage will be picked up tomorrow night and the next time we will see it will be in Manchester (hopefully). The immigration forms are needed as when we arrived in Barbados we didn't go through customs or anything, it was straight in a bus on the runway and to the ship. But now we have to go through immigration so we can go out for the day. When we go to the airport on Friday afternoon we get taken to security. I skipped the gym in favour of watching the football and when that finished it was time to get ready for another formal night

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George
2017-12-14

Your life is soooo tough

2025-02-08

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