Rodney Bay,
St. Lucia
14.04.473N
60.56.990W


We scheduled an island tour today, so I got up early and finished the recovering of the dinghy seat project that I had started yesterday. Dale sent an e-mail message to Orpailleur regarding the fire last night and discovered that they had not seen it.

When it came time to dinghy in, we swung wide and got a better look at what was left. It had been a trimaran and even the little houseboat that was anchored behind it had damage to its roof.

Gerry & Nicky picked us up at our boat and we dinghied in and met Mike & Terri at the docks. When Chris, our guide, picked us up, he already had the local scoop on the fire. Arson basically. The trimaran was used as a lunch and dinner cruise operation; successful from what I could tell. Someone had approached the owner of the trimaran asking to purchase the establishment but they had been refused. Next thing you know, the boat is destroyed. Chris called it jealousy. Dale figured it was a propane leak considering how quickly it engulfed the entire boat and how hot it appeared to be burning. At least no one was on it at the time.

We began our tour to Castries, the capital of St. Lucia. We continued our southern trek with stops at banana plantations, a casava bread operation, a waterfall (and small botanical garden), a sunken volcano that spews sulfuric steam, a fishing village, a restaurant at the top of the mountains with a view between the Pitons, but we actually ate lunch at a local establishment which was tasty and cheap, then the rest of the island that we simply circumnavigated.

We learned that the old prime minister is out and a new one is in and at this point, doing a much better job of managing the island’s budget so that the people are seeing some benefit from their tax dollars. Most of the roads we traveled on were recently repaved, the people have work if they want it, the farmers have been encouraged to return to their farms to provide a more diverse economic base, and the island just seemed to be growing and improving.

One item of concern though, we were told the last prime minister encouraged everyone to buy, build and basically go into incredible amounts of debt based on the tourist dollar expected to come with the World Cup matches in cricket being played here. However, now that the matches are being played, hotels are not completely booked, bed & breakfast rooms that were built onto people’s homes are not booked, and the extra taxi cabs that were purchased are not being fully utilized to pay the debt. I fear that once the games are over, the islanders will quickly fall into economic ruin and the huge changes that we’ve seen in one year will backslide over the next.

Cricket, naturally, was our lunchtime conversation. Gerry & Nicky tried to teach the Yanks the basics of cricket. Since its about the 3rd time that Dale has listened and asked questions, he seems to be grasping more of the game. Listening to the conversation reminded me of an old Andy Griffith skit I saw a long time ago about a country bumpkin describing the first time he ever saw a football game.

It was pretty late when we got back and even though Terri had offered to cook lasagna for everyone, we didn’t want her to go to all of the trouble after such a long day, so we dropped by Scuttlebutts and picked up a couple of salads or burgers. We told them about Google Earth and they were fascinated. There was an internet connection in the restaurant but a couple of guys were using it to surf for the latest female crew photos (we hope), so I suggested that everyone return with us to our boat and we’d pull it up for them.

Unfortunately, until quite late at night, our WiFi is usually slower than molasses in January but they at least got the idea. If you haven’t seen it, go to http://www.googleearth.com/, download the software, and then travel the world. It’s best to start out with a state or country, then start narrowing it down to city, before you go for the street and house number. It’s not real time, but it’s pretty cool to see where we are. Of course, you can just enter our coordinates as another type of address.

Tomorrow, we’ll point our bows south again and make our way to Dale’s favorite anchorage between the two Pitons. Hopefully, Mike & Terri will be able to go with us but if not, they’ll catch up to us on down the road. At some point, we need to touch base with Scott & Heather on Scott Free who are in a slip right in front of us. They are on the same time table as Orpailleur as far as making Panama by May, so maybe they can buddy boat part of the way.

In any event, I need to get these posts uploaded while I still have an internet connection. Even if it takes me all night.