St Anne and the Cul-de-Sac du Marin
Friday 23rd and Saturday 24th February
St Anne and the adjacent town of Marin are the focal point of sailing in Martinique. It’s an area that has almost legendary status. I have never been anywhere in the world where there were more boats, and to be honest I don’t see what all the fuss is about.
There is large anchorage off St Anne that is well protected from the trade winds, and as you enter the lagoon to the north, the Cul-de-sac du Marin, there is another enormous anchorage with protection all round. So there is no doubt that this is one of the best locations in the Caribbean to head to in bad weather. There is also access to a fully operational boat yard and all the marine shops and services that you can imagine. It’s only fair to add that beaches off St Anne and to the south are gorgeous. However, we counted over 200 boats at anchor off St Anne, and during our dinghy ride up into the lagoon we saw hundreds more. Our guidebook says that the marina has the capacity to berth 800 boats. If that includes slips and moorings then we believe that is probably accurate. To me this begs the question: with so many boats, why do people want to come here? It is as far removed from a quiet, romantic Caribbean getaway as I can imagine. It seems more like taking a camping trip to Alaska, then pitching your tent in the WallMart parking lot, because that’s where everyone else is. Don’t misunderstand me; we are having a pleasant time here and I’m glad we are visiting, but the very presence of nearly 1000 other boats does tend to color the experience. At least if all these vessels are here then they aren’t elsewhere …we are already shocked by how busy the Caribbean sailing scene has become and it’s already hard enough to find anywhere that is quiet and isolated
Yesterday we took the dinghy into the dock at St Anne. It’s a small, pleasant town with a bakery, a couple of decent supermarkets and quite a few restaurants. We hiked part way along the Trace de Caps trail. This is a linear National Park that follows the south east coast of Martinique for about 34 km, and it is beautiful. We only walked about 5 km out (and then back) but we passed some amazing beaches. One of these is a “clothing optional” beach, and on our return, when we were hot and tired, we took advantage of this and went skinny dipping. Marvelous! Just as an observation, this nudist beach did not appear to be full of young people with movie-star-like bodies, but a bunch of old wrinkled people - so we fit right in!
Today we took the “Dainty Dog” up into the aforementioned Cul-de-sac du Marin, a ride of about 3 miles, and tied up at the marina. We wandered around town and checked out a few marine stores. We were impressed that we could have bought a new Yanmar diesel for the boat, but managed to keep ourselves in check! After a good lunch out (Caesar salad for Gloria, Entrecôte steak and chips for me) we headed home and got caught in a squall. Not too much wind but we did get rather wet! It’s always a relief to find the boat where we left her. Now we are back on board relaxing. We’ll stay here until at least Monday and then start making our way northwards back up the coast
Postscript … This evening I went back into St Anne to take some low light photos and I came away with a much more favorable impression of the town. As the sun went down and daylight faded it seemed to come alive with a really vibrant and fun atmosphere. Maybe our previous trips in the hottest part of the day didn’t do it justice. Maybe the area will grow on me and we won’t be able to leave …!
Gloria is feeling a bit better, somewhat up and down, and still coughing up a storm.
Mike
P.s. Yesterday I discovered an unusual and perplexing camera problem … I have an ant inside my camera body! I could see it crawling around through the viewfinder, but it wasn't visible when I looked inside. The only way in (and out) would be through the lens attachment whilst I was changing lens. I have no idea how to extract the little bugger, so if you have any suggestions I’d love to hear them!
A Lesser Antillean Bullfinch. We were sitting at a picnic table and it would land to pick up crumbs. I set the camera up with wide angle lens and flash (with rear curtain sync). As I press the trigger the prism flips up, the shutter opens, the bird startles and the flash goes off. In truth I got two shots of the same bird, and cut and pasted the head off the first shot onto this one because it was better focussed. A bit of a cheat really !
Where's the skinny dipping picture?
ReplyDeleteLaura
I was so distracted ... !
Delete