-------- Original message --------
Subject:
From: Roy Rogers <roy.skipperroy.rogers@gmail.com>
To: Roy Rogers <roy.skipperroy.rogers@gmail.com>
CC:
About the trip. It was fine. I've posted some of our photos on my FB page. I'm expecting more, hopefully better photos from the friends we traveled with. I'll post some of those when I receive them. We flew into St Martin, which as I expected, was even more commercially developed and crowded than when I last was there about six years ago. I can remember the place very different than what it has become. The harbor where we picked up our Beneteau 43, Oyster Pond, is now filled to capacity with a large marina where both The Moorings and Sunsail operate large fleets of charter boats. I remember first going in there in the late '80's and there was no marina, just an anchorage and a few dinghy docks. We arrived there late in the day on Thursday. Friday noon we sailed off toward St Barts and did not return until the morning of our return flights more than a week later. So much for St Martin.
On the way to St Barts, only about 8 nm from Oyster Pond, there's an island called Ile Forchue. It's semicircular in shape with tall hillsides and dark volcanic columns all around. . It's actually the caldera of an old volcano but makes for an ideal anchorage. The island is I think privately owned but completely undeveloped and open for cruisers to hike on. It's like a sanctuary. There are moorings for transient boats in the anchorage. We picked one up in about 15 feet of water, a hundred yards from the small beach. Most of the rest of the coastline is volcanic rock.. There were only a couple other boats in the anchorage. We had our first swim in the warm clear salt water. Spent our first night away from a marina and any development. Folded the bimini top back so we could see the constellations and planets while lounging in the cockpit. In the morning, following a great breakfast served in the cockpit, we went ashore and hiked. Ed, of Ed and Ginger form Seattle, is a retired scientist and knowledgeable botanist. He and Cathy conducted an informal botanical tour. We hike across where the ridge was lowest for a view of the Atlantic side, which is very rough but spectacular with ocean swells crashing into brimstone and water shooting up high above the surface. St Barts is just a few miles away from there and we could see into a couple of its white bays and houses on green hillsides. After the hike folks wanted to snorkel. I was curious about a sailing catamaran wreck on the far shore just inside the anchorage, so I took the dinghy to check it out.
