April 29 – May 06 2021; 6875 nm and 777 days after departure from La Rochelle.

…and live slow, that’s what we were doing the last passing weeks. Eaaaaasy living.
End of April we lifted the anchor in Tyrrel bay and sailed a few miles up the west coast of Carriacou, not yet exactly knowing where we were going to stay. In the mood of sailing just a little more than the few miles up the coast, we tacked into deeper water to give the fish a better chance to nibble and finally enjoy our lure. Or in other words, to hopefully get us a nice dinner at the new anchorage. Again just wishful thinking. Our yield was, like almost always, none. We definitely still need to improve our fishing skills! Fortunately our finding-beautiful-anchorages skills are much better. Our poor fishing, though beautiful sailing day ended in Anse La Roche, a paradise like, wild beach in the northwest of the island. With its turquoise water, the sand glittering in the sun AND a perfect beach bar/restaurant hut run by Tim a local chef, we immediately fell in love with this hidden gem and stayed for some very relaaaxing days.

Already thrilled by just the beach and lots of iguanas welcoming us, we were flashed by it’s absolutely stunning under water world. The snorkelling was so delightful. At least for our, so far little snorkelling experience. We were lucky to swim with so many fishes and species. We’ve seen puffer fish, eels, which look like snakes, moraines and lots of other fishes with names we don’t know yet. Though the highlight was definitely an octopus which caught our attention for quite a snorkelling while. Amazing animals! We knew that they can change colour, but what we didn’t know was that they are able to match their surroundings. Imagine that?! One minute it looked like a stone and the next like sea gras and then it was just sand. We were very impressed! Little Octopus was watching us and trying to escape our observing eyes. That was great as it changed its colour and body structure very often. We just couldn’t get enough of it. But of course we couldn’t take it aboard or follow it forever (even with a water temperature of 25 degrees celsius you get cold eventually) so we finally needed to say goodbye.
Very annoying for us is the fact that our stupid GoPro died after only 3 years, hardly ever used. Our old underwater camera kind of still works but the outcome of the pics is just grey and blurry. Same result, not suitable to make (nice) pics 😩. Well, I guess sh.. happens! As soon as we come to areas were we can just purchase whatever we like we’ll have a loooong list of items we need. OMG that just gets me! Imagine to go to supermarkets, shops, hardware stores, clothes shop… and buy what you need or just want or like! And then maybe you can even decide between different colours or sizes or shapes or,or,or. Hahaha, I guess I have to wait until x-mas 😁. Happy dreaming me. Oops, this shopping subject let my mind wander… now back to Anse La Roche!

Also very impressive were the numerous big lizards bathing in the sand ashore. As long as there was no human being ashore there were hundreds of iguanas strolling at the beach, enjoying the sun or digging themselves in the sand. But as soon as we came a little closer they immediately disappeared in the woods behind the beach and hid until the beach was human free again. Very cautious creatures and hence difficult to take pics of. Though they didn’t seem to mind the laughing seagulls having fun at the beach. Those birds were excessively and very noisily living out their love life. All the time! They were always in the right mood, like little rabbits.
Meanwhile we’re used to see turtles floating at the surface of the water to get some breathing air and I am not getting overexcited anymore. Still excited of course but not like shouting and pointing in the direction of the turtle and almost not able to express what I meant to show to my poor startled El Capitano because I’m so thrilled to see a turtle. No, it is better now! A little. We heard from another boat in the bay that the turtle nesting season had started and that they saw a turtle laying eggs at the beach. Unfortunately we weren’t as lucky as those guys but at least we saw the huge track the turtle left in the sand after laying its eggs. Even that was exciting for us.

The next following days boats left, new boats came, sometimes the bay was crowded and sometimes we were alone. The days went bye with snorkelling, swimming, reading, going ashore to have some chats with the locals or a sundowner at Tims hut. One day we thought we could get rid of some garbage and decided to take this as a reason to walk to Hillsborough. Our idea was to walk up the trail to Bogles through the bushes, then follow the street to Hillsborough and take the bus back to Bogles. After walking for half an hour we found a garbage bin, it was in the little village Bogles (I’m not sure if it actually is a village or if the area is just called Bogles?). I’m happy to announce that it is usually not as far to find a proper place for dumping garbage. Anyhow we continued our walk to Hillsborough and had a lunch break at our favourite cafe kayak. A pretty cafe on a diminutive deck overlooking the water near the dock in town. We already realised that the streets were very quiet and that no busses had passed us, but we didn’t pay much attention yet. Until we talked to the nice owner, she reminded us that it was Sunday and that there was no bus service in Carriacou, unless we took part in a worship at church. We decided against going to church and instead headed back to Anse La Roche. Without using the bus which would have covered roughly half of the way, we arrived at Altimate sometime later than expected. A bit heated up but happily exhausted and absolutely ready for a nice cooling swim.