Sunday 11th March

Pigeon Island
Guadeloupe

16.10.00 N
61 47.00 W

As many of you know daylight saving came into effect sometime during the night, dutifully Gerry and I changed our clocks over and we were up and ready to leave when our clocks said 09.00hrs. As we hauled up our anchor, dale called us to say that they were right behind us. We motored out of the harbour and were pleased to note that the exhaust smoke seemed to have vanished, maybe we had cured our problem after all. Once clear of the harbour we hoisted the main sail with the first reef in it and unfurled the jib, turned towards our destination and turned off the motor. We had a very pleasant sail for the next couple of hours reaching our destination without having to motor until we needed to anchor. We chose to anchor near the beach and were a bit concerned to find that the anchoring gremlins were still with us – our anchor didn’t set on the first attempt. Dale and Lorie anchored just to the left of where we had chosen and had no problem so we tried again, it seemed to set but we weren’t sure so Gerry jumped in the water to dive the anchor, it was almost set – a short burst of reverse thrust and we were anchored. A quick radio call had us agreeing to go straight over to the nearby Pigeon Island for a snorkel. The area where we were staying was right next to the Cousteau national (marine) park and the Pigeon Island was one of the dive sites in the park so we expected it to be good. We loaded all the snorkeling gear into the dinks and took off to the island which was just a short distance away, once there we tied onto a mooring buoy and donned all the gear. This was our chance to try out our new underwater camera case, Gerry took control of the camera whilst I followed on behind him. We snorkeled all around one side of the island, and I have to say it was one of the best places we have seen this trip. The coral was still alive and there were all sorts of fish. We were lucky as there were very few other people in the water whilst we were there – we are sure that it is a very popular spot for both snorkeling and diving. Gerry took a few pictures, it obviously needs some practice but he did manage a couple of decent ones. In this final picture see if you can spot the flounder hidding against the rock - it is there! We would have liked to have done the rest of the island but we were getting chilled and it was starting to rain so we decide to get out of the water – itself a spectator sport! We have a small ladder which we use for climbing back into the dink from the water but even with the ladder it is often a difficult job. Gerry climbed in first, getting the giggles half way in which usually has disastrous effects, often ending with him falling back into the water. As I was behind him I pushed him into the dink and then took off my fins to follow him up the ladder, I managed to get onto the first step and then got stuck, Gerry had to give me a hand to haul me into the dink – I shot out of the water like a cork exploding from a bottle, both Dale and Lorie along with Gerry and myself found this incredibly funny and sat laughing at what must have been an horrendous sight. At least we were back in the dink and able to cast off and return to our boats for a hot shower and something to eat. Everyone had a short siesta and then it was time for sundowner drinks and dinner. I had been marinating some meat and invited Dale and Lorie to join us for dinner at 18.00hrs. It got to 18.50hrs and there was no sign of them so we radioed them to ask when they were coming as they were almost an hour late, we threw them into total confusion when we asked about daylight saving – they then told us that there is no daylight saving in the Caribbean. When we asked why they left Deshaies at 08.00hrs instead of 09.00hrs they said they thought we just wanted to get going earlier than we had planned – it was a misunderstanding and I could have stayed in bed for another hour! Anyway they came across to our boat, Lorie bought salad with her and we had an enjoyable meal together discussing our separate trips to here and our plans for the morning. We finally went to bed having turned the clocks back an hour again!