Actually it’s St Barthelemy, and either St Barths or St Barts is acceptable, although only English speaking people use St Barts. Given that this is a French island, we decide from now on we’ll call it St Barths. While different than the typical “cruising” islands we’ve been to, St Barths definitely has its own charm and manages to win us over in the end.
A pleasant passage
St Martin to St Barths is a short 20 mile journey – although heading east is rarely a “pleasant” journey. We are fortunate to have calm seas today, though, as the trade winds are just beginning to pick back up after a north swell/front passed through. We put out our jib and turn off one engine, taking advantage of the nice breeze.
A couple miles before St Barths is a small, uninhabited island, Ile Fourchue. It provides a dramatic setting among sharp cliffs and bright blue water. I circle the boat around the anchorage, avoiding the half dozen charter boats with swimmers in the water, looking for a nice place to drop our hook. Unfortunately, we cannot get cell service to connect anywhere in the anchorage. Since it is still the afternoon of a work day for Matt, that means we have to move on. We snap a few photos and remind ourselves we can’t visit every pretty anchorage in the Caribbean.
It’s a short couple miles to the western tip of mainland St Barths, where we find a mooring field off of the well known Colombier Beach. After confirming some amount of cell service, we tie up to one of the mooring balls. Technically we should heading into the main (and only) port of entry, Gustavia, to clear in with customs and immigration – but, it’s already late in the afternoon and a long dinghy ride, so we’re going to wait until morning. We’re living like pirates.
The local wildlife
Monster and I decide to relax for a bit on the trampoline up front while Matt works. I see several sea turtles popping up around the anchorage – which is always fun! Once Matt finishes work for the day, we decide to dinghy ashore to walk the beach and check out a hiking trail. After a couple attempts and a “sporty” landing, we have the dinghy secured up on the beach. Monster races off, excited to be on land and smell all the smells.
Tangent: The topography of the Bahamas is very flat and shallow. This means when coming up on a beach, there is typically a very gradual slope in the sandy bottom (and depth of water). Assuming you are approaching into the wind (and thus there are no large waves slamming onto the beach), this makes it very simple to land the dinghy up on the beach. This was our experience last season while cruising. This season we are in the Eastern Caribbean where the topography of islands is mostly volcanic. This results in mountains, cliffs, and deep water right up to much of the land/beaches. The very steep grade of the beach makes for sharp little waves to crash, even if the wind is blowing away from the beach. It also means the front of the dinghy will often be dug into sand (i.e. the beach), while the stern (and engine) are in a few feet of water. This is a challenging combination and can be very difficult to actually get the dinghy fully onshore. Often we’ve found those small waves breaking over and into the back of our dinghy making for a wet and sandy trip.
It’s getting close to dusk, so we decide to head straight for the stone steps that mark the path up towards the hiking trail. Once up on the path, we are able to see across to the ocean on the other side of the island – making for a pretty view. We can, of course, also see out over the bay where Sea Monster floats tied up to a mooring ball. A nice gentleman passes near us, clearly having just finished hiking himself. He shares with us a couple different trails and what you can expect to see. Technically, there are no trespassing signs around, but no one lives/frequents the area anymore – it’s local knowledge that hiking is generally considered okay. He even points out one trail that requires passing through a gate. Seems strange, but he says the gate is only for the goats – as long as you’re not afraid of goats (which we’re not).
We just walk the main trail for a bit since we’re racing against the sun at this point. We do indeed spot (and hear!) some goats along the way. We also spot numerous turtles – not sea turtles, but land turtles. Actually, according to Google these are red-footed tortoise. They are quite fun, and do indeed have spots of red and orange coloring on their feet, necks, and shells. Monster is a bit curious of the first tortoise we see, but ultimately decides they move too slow to chase and ignores future ones. Once the trail reaches another gate, we climb back down and finish our walk along the beach.
Hello Gustavia
The next morning we motor over to Gustavia where we plan to clear in with customs and immigration, plus spend a night or two exploring the town. Gustavia is the only official (sea) port of entry into St Barths and also where the infamous super high-end shopping stores are located. According to Active Captain, there is a small mooring field located all the way inside the Gustavia harbor. We decide to head in and see if we can snag a ball there, as that will put us in the heart of the action – plus completely protected from waves. The mooring field is TIGHT. There are so many boats inside and just outside the harbor, it’s insane. Matt carefully navigates us through and we do spot an open mooring – nice! These particular moorings are stern-to-bow, which means you actually have to tie up to two mooring balls, instead of just one. This will be our first time attempting such a tie-up.
Matt carefully backs us over the first mooring ball, snug tightly between other boats. As we approach the second mooring, I tie up our stern lines. So far – so good. Next, I need to get our bow lines on the first mooring ball that we passed over which now lies in front of us. I have to keep loosening our stern lines until we have the right distance between and I can snag the front mooring ball to get a bow line on. I’m almost done – 3 of our 4 lines are on, when a guy pulls up next to us in a dinghy. He’s talking to Matt about some reason why we can’t be on this mooring. I can’t really hear everything as I’m still messing with our lines trying to make sure we don’t float into a boat next to us.
Ultimately, it comes down to – he’s on another mooring nearby, and he takes his boat out every day to go fishing. When he comes back, he needs to drive over our mooring spot in order to park his boat. He’s alone and unable to approach from the correct angle that doesn’t require driving over someone else’s spot. He’s been living on his boat on the same mooring ball for 10 years and has always done this. So apparently, he pays for one mooring spot but actually gets use of two because i) he hasn’t figured out how to navigate his vessel properly into his mooring spot after 10 years, and ii) he is unwilling to simply take a different mooring spot that is easier to get into. At some point we admit that we haven’t paid for the spot yet, we just picked up the mooring as we were told first come, first serve. We plan to pay when we check in. He then proceeds to tell us we’re going to be in BIG TROUBLE, that these are private moorings and you can’t just pick one up. I point out that they are clearly identified as for rent at 10 EURO per night – thus not private. He has no response to that, and just goes back to saying how much trouble we’re going to be in.
We go ahead and call someone at the location that manages the moorings prior to leaving the boat after his little explosion. Unfortunately, he gets through to them first (we see and hear him on his cell before we’re able to call in). Short story – they claim no moorings are open even though we’re on an open one. Whatever, we don’t want to stay overnight this close to such a jerk anyways. At least we were successful on our first attempt tying up bow-to-stern mooring style.
We motor back out to the anchorage on the outside of the harbor, where – I kid you not – over a hundred boats are anchored. It’s also not really what we normally consider an anchorage. It is so exposed to wind and waves – it’s a disaster. There is so much roll and so little space. Unimpressed, we pick out a spot as close to a large rock and the edge of the channel as we can, so that we won’t have boats around two sides of us at least. After getting the hook set, we launch the dinghy and head back into the harbor to check in. Unknowingly, we tie up the dinghy at the furthest dinghy dock from the check in location. Oh well, at least we get to walk around the town.
The town is VERY HIGH-END. The stores here are just silly. I mean Gucci looks cheap compared to many of the stores here. I’m scared to even walk in some of the stores wearing my sweaty Nike shorts and tank. There’s one store that only sells clothing and hats in white – yes, only white. Not exactly our scene, but everything sure is pretty.
Catching shrimp
Back on-board, Matt sets to work on real work stuff, while I decide to start the dreaded task of cleaning the bottom of our boat. The growth down there is just disgusting – definitely the worst we’ve ever let it get. There is green algae three inches long hanging off the hull looking like gross mermaid hair. The water is pretty rough, and being alone I decide to just use my snorkel (rather than pulling out the hookah dive system). The plan is to just get some of the worst of it off the scum line and then in a few more days we’ll do a full cleaning together.
The growth is so bad, it’s just not coming off. I’m trying to use the same sponge-like pads we used all last year to clean the bottom and it’s not doing much. We try to preserve the bottom paint as much as we can and not use scrapers or harsh devices we hear others use. It’s at that point though. Matt hands me a couple different scraping options and I go back to work. The scrapers I’m not using are left on the back steps – bad idea. There is enough movement here that small waves actually come over the steps and wash away the scrapers. A plastic one is long gone, but a metal one I spot sitting on the sandy bottom. It’s only 25 feet deep, so I’m able to dive down and grab it. Not loving this day. Luckily, a turtle swims by a few minutes later brightening my mood just a little.
Once I’m focused on something, I have a hard time stopping. This is one of those things. I know that I’m not stopping until the whole stupid bottom is cleaned. Thank goodness Matt also recognizes this and jumps in to help after an hour or so. With both of us working hard, we finish a complete bottom cleaning 3 hours after I first jumped in. What the heck. Last year it only took us an hour together. A couple lessons learned: i) just pull out the hookah, ii) never, never, never let it get that bad, iii) our bottom paint is fading so it’s going to be harder than last season.
Absolutely exhausted, we sit on the deck and start peeling off our dive hoods and rash guards. I head inside to grab a towel and some water, but am quickly back in the ocean when I realize there are dozens of tiny shrimp covering my swim suit top! I’m absolutely freaking out. Matt realizes he is also covered in these tiny shrimp as are our dive hoods and socks. Yuck. We strip out of our shrimp infested clothing and work on removing all that we can. The few that remain we figure can jump off or die while hanging outside in the sun.
Now I’m really not loving this day.
Living the good life
It’s funny how quickly things can change when living on a boat. There are a lot of highs and lows – yin and yang. So far, today has had more lows for sure. Given how rolly the anchorage is, we know that we are going to be taking out tomorrow. So even though we are beyond exhausted, we clean up and head back into town for the evening. St Barths is known for having amazing (albeit expensive) restaurants, and we want to splurge on a nice dinner. After a bit of research and reviewing a few menus, we settle on Bagatelle. It is a chic restaurant on the water, serving French and Mediterranean cuisine. It is also a classic within the Gustavia restaurant scene.
As soon as we sit down, I let out a sharp breath I didn’t realize I was holding and finally feel myself relax. It’s been a tough day, but moments like this make it seem worth it. We’re sitting at a table just a couple feet from the water, with a super cute sailboat docked in front of us, the last of sunset off on the horizon. The servers are incredibly pleasant and have shortly brought us glasses of red wine plus a dog bowl for Monster. Life is good again.
After much deliberation from Matt, we both end up ordering a type of pasta dish plus a large salad to share. My pasta dish is homemade cheese ravioli in a truffle cream sauce. It’s not what you would expect, though. The ravioli are each about the size of dime and there’s so many flavors taking place (not the normal red sauce, Italian cheese ravioli). Matt’s dish is tiny elbow pasta, ham, truffles, and some other stuff. It’s also delicious, but not as incredible as mine (he disagrees). Top it off with some homemade bread and a second glass of wine – perfect. We leave feeling full, refreshed, and with a complete 180 degree opinion of Gustavia after such a wonderful dinner experience.
Now I’m extra annoyed we’re not on that mooring ball (literally a hundred feet from this restaurant) staying for a couple nights. Oh well, such is boating life – yin and yang.
