Martinique

Sailing past HMS Diamond Rock off Martinique

Our anchorage at Grand Anse D'Arlett, Martinique

A boat, a beach, French food and warm weather - it doesn't get much better than this!

A nice rocky hike on Martinique!

 A big dinghy dock but there are tides to deal with!

S/Y Aspen – February 10, 2014 – Log #115
Aspen Position: 14 degrees 30’ N  061 degrees 06’ W
Martinique

Ahhh the Caribbean!  Martinique, very French with sparkling clear water and oui the food!

Sailing from St. Lucia to Martinique was a 4 hour sail; just 4 hours?  That's right, no overnight passage but just a rocking and rolling time in the winter trade winds in these little latitudes.

Yesterday we did a 4 mile hike from Grand Anse D'Arlett to Anse D'Arlett and back, where we are anchored.  Going there was easy because it was on the road.  Then Captain Steve decided to take the trail back to Aspen and it turned into one of those rocky, scrambling, hot and not so pleasant trails.  Luckily Maria had proper sandals on while Steve, well, bare feet would have been the same as his sandals.  Yet we survived and had a nice lunch on the beach to make up for all our activity!

We found out the there is a strike going on here.  The strike means that there is no gasoline being delivered and the cars are starting to sit idly on the streets.  Of course our dinghy needs gasoline so pretty soon we may find ourselves swimming ashore if nothing returns to normal.  Normal is not in their vocabulary here so we will probably have to just go to another island and country to find gasoline! Geeze.

We plan to slowly head further north when the winds and seas tell us to leave.  But for now we will enjoy the pate, baguettes, and French beaches all around us.  What fun!

Sail on, sail on Aspen...