Capt Greg's downtime: St Pierre, Martinique

Hey Y'all,

Sorry for the long delay in posts. The French are so laid back on this island and just really don't put a high priority on internet or being connected. The cafe's (the two that are here) don't have internet connection and the one restaurant in town that does opens at 930am and closes at 3pm....sometimes, if they don't close sooner. I have heard rumor that French law requires that no one works more than 35 hours a week??? Whether it's true or not, I don't know but, it sure seems like it.

30 Jan 2001 - The weather finally seems to have broken. I have been here since the 17^th and every day it has been blowing 25 to 30 knots and rains at least 8 times and as many as 12 times a day. Even though the rain showers don’t last more than 10 minutes at the most, it makes you put your plans, dinner, sleeping, whatever on hold for that period of time. We don’t have a generator so that means no air conditioning. Although you don’t really need it because it’s mid 80’s during the day and mid 70’s at night. However, that means you sleep with your hatch open and two to three times a night you have to wake up and both close the hatch because of the rain and then open the hatch because it has gotten stuffy in the cabin. So anyway, we haven’t had that in two days and the weather has been PERFECT!!

The local sailing team...cool huh?!

My current home.

We ended our stay in Fort de France today and sailed to the northern jumping off point of Sainte Pierre on Martinique. I don’t think I would ever go back to Fort de France unless I had to. Even though it is more civilized than other small Caribbean towns I've been on so far, it just isn’t focused on the yachties, restaurants or other things I enjoy. Like I said in my other blog it’s a little too much downtown Detroit for me.

One of the reef inhabitants.

coral in St Pierre.

The colors of the reef are amazing.

So, as I am reading about our next stop of St Pierre I am seeing….rum distilleries within walking distance, waterfalls with a short car ride, two dive shops with TWELVE local dive sites, two laundry mats and lots of restaurants. Sounds like heaven and we are planning on staying here a few days for sure. St Pierre is located at the base of Mount Pelle’ which is a local volcano. In 1902 a newly elected governor of the then capitol city ignored the volcano’s warning signs for more than a week and never evacuated the town of 30,000 people. Well, long story short only two, yes that’s right, two people survived the blast. It wiped the entire town out except for a cobbler who hid in his cellar and a prisoner who was in a stone dungeon. It also sunk twelve ships in the harbor that I am now sitting and writing this blog from. They are all sprinkled around the harbor. The water is crystal clear and the wrecks are supposed to be in 30-100 ft of water….perfect for diving. So again, we may stay here quite a while.

The skipper and the Russian have found some peace today. Michael was much less disagreeable today for some reason. It made the whole trip to Martinique more enjoyable and things seemed like they were the first few days I was on the boat.

3 Feb 2011 - Been here at St. Pierre for a few days now. We have gotten tired of moving so fast and want to stay here a bit. Looks like we may move again tomorrow and jump islands to Dominica. 5 days here has given us a little time to rest and just get used to an area. When you only stay for two days you can't really get your bearings on a place because so much of your time is spent finding necessities and then preparing to move again. So far we have found our laundry spot, grocery, tourist office, the museum and have done three dives since we have been here. Planning on doing a big dive today, 50 meters deep, which is about 165 ft. That's very, very deep for those who don't know. Most of the diving we do in the states is about 100 - 110 ft. We are gonna do almost half again that distance. Don't worry mom, obviously we are taking lots of precautions. :) The skipper is a dive master and has done lots of dives this deep before. We have been talking about it a preparing for it for days now. We are diving on one of the biggest wrecks that sunk in the harbor during the volcano eruption.

St Pierre with Mount Pelee that erupted in 1902.

Part of the remaining ruins from the eruptoin.

The sole survivor. Convicted of murder, put in jail and one of the only two survivors from the blast. The stone cell he was in saved him from the lava. However, he was severally burned from the gases and steam. Later in life he worked for the Barnum Circus (I think sold) to display his burns.

The skipper and I walked the 2 miles up hill to the local Depaz Rum Distillery. In the heat of the day it seemed longer than two miles. Of course, no one spoke english so out tour was self guided. haha. They had a tasting at the end which was nice but, the cut the Americans off after just a couple of samplings. We couldn't figure out whether they didn't want to serve us or if it was quiting time. Maybe a little of both. The skipper bought a bottle. I voted not to buy since we once again recieved the Le France' attitude. On the way home we tried to hitch a ride with no luck but, it was all down hill. The skipper has very bad ankles and was practically crippled by the time we got back to the boat. It was said that the reason Mt Pelee erupted on the island in 1902 was because this is the spot that the last of the Carib indians we captured and before they were all gone they cast curses on anyone who inhabits the island there after. So, skipper was trying his hand at curse casting as each frenchman past us in his car and didn't stop. "May your brakes not work going down hill"...."may your wife have a headache for three weeks!"....ha ha. It kept us laughing on the walk back.

I took the boys out for a nice dinner last night. We had anticipated that being on a French island the level of food would be much higher that the others. Good cuisine has been hard to find. Once again, most everything shuts down about 4pm, even the restaurants. We did find one however, and what a treat it was. It turned out to be that gourmet French we were looking for. I had a filet mignon with foie gras on top of it.....it was to die for. The Capt had the fatty duck and the Michael had the mahi mahi....all three meals with made to order and made the whole stop here worth it! It was so good that it made the crew nervous because they asked several times during the meal what I expected from them when we got back to the boat. Lol.