Story - St Lucia
Kalandia Web Diary
Bill Peach
Fri 11 Dec 2009 21:21
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We have now been here for 4 days. The two
Dicks have moved into a hotel and Leila and Tom have moved in.
Unfortunately they flew in about 6 hours after we arrived so didn't catch our
arrival which was on Tuesday 8 December at 16:39.50 GMT 16 days and 3
hours after departure from Las Palmas.
The reception party included a steel drummer and
glasses of rum punch plus a basket of fruit plus shouts and clapping from some
of the other boats in front of us. We came in 64th out of the fleet of 210
boats including racers. Not bad eh?
We haven't done much apart from boat
cleaning. Haven't left the marina really apart from going to the Royal
Hotel for a welcome party on the beach courtesy of St Lucia Tourist Board.
It was very well done with a fanatstic steel band, fire eaters, dancers and
another band plus complimentaryf ood and drink. There is a raft of
activities but we haven't psyched ourselves up yet.
One great experience for us was meeting Christian
and three of his carers from Koblenz who are on holiday here. Thanks to
Richard who will chat to a lamp post if it stood still for long enough, we were
privileged to be able to invite Christian on board for a quick trip round Rodney
Bay (see pic), He is next off to New York with another of his bank of 10
carers. Please take note services in UK. This man is the employer
and gets to interview his staff who are a great bunch. Perhaps
'Personalisation' which is coming to the English Health & Social Care system
will change things for the better.
Some of the stories from other participants have
made us wonder if we have been on the same journey. There are stories of
rig failures more serious than ours, furling jammed, generator and engine
failures, collision with whales (we didn't even get a sighting) and large
squalls. All these put a greater strain on the sailors as they have to be in
constant action - unlike us who had relatively plain sailing.
The marina has everything you need includiing two
banks, supermarket, bread shop, restaurants and bars and loads of enterprising
people offering to do your washing, clean your boat etc.
We have just noticed that some of our blogs did not
upload so you will have missed some of our experiences. One you may find
interesting is a late posted story for 25th November. We will try and make up
for any others by publishing all our photos in the Photogallery with captions -
but not just now - must go and relax. Tomorrow we will definately get
going, maybe.
Liz
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