Tag: Superyachts

St Kitts and Nevis: Short and hefty

St Kitts and Nevis: Short and hefty

Markus

St Kitts and Nevis is another very small state in the Eastern Caribbean with an estimated(!) population of 55‘000 only. No state so far was too small to give us a nice Welcome. Here, they sent a pretty large whale jumping out of water several times, leaving huge splashes whenever it plunged back. Good he didn’t decide to cuddle with Yuana.

St Kitts is actually also known as St Christopher, the name given by Columbus after his own name. We have met the traces of Columbus many times here in the West Indies. He discovered most of the Easter Caribbean Islands for Spain. Touching history is so much better then just learning it out of school books.

In Columbus’ wake came other Europeans. Too many times, this ended bloody for the Caribs, also in St Kitts. A small number of aboriginal Caribs remains, today living in Dominica. Today, the lands are mainly owned and populated by the descendants of African slaves. Speaking about population of St Kitts, one should not forget to mention the green velvet monkeys. They are up and around until 10a.m., before sun gets too warm.

Arriving at the Southernmost tip of St Kitts, we were astonished to find a high finish mega yacht harbor. It seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. Miss-leaded Investment? Nearby was the Salt Plage, perhaps the coolest beach bar we have ever seen. The palm trees, lounge sofas and high chairs were arranged on three platforms, partially over the water. Super simple and award winning design, someone did a fantastic job!

When we took a stroll to the other side of the narrow island, we came across a small luxury hotel. Another remarkable place in the middle of nowhere? Also special was that all these places were interlinked with perfectly paved roads with park-like gardens aside. On the way back, a six-seated golf cart stopped and offered us a lift back to our anchorage. The driver was a woman, with a man seated next to her.

We asked a bit what kind of development was going on here, and who in that small country could invest in such top class properties. The man in the cart looked back to me and was saying with a wide grin on his face: “I’m the crazy guy doing all that”. It turned out that he was the American businessman Charles P Darby III. Just google him. You will find the former CEO of the company who developed Kiawah-Island in the US and also Irish Doonbeg Golf Resort which was later sold to the Trump Family.

Charles explained that he bought 2500 acres of land to develop it into a huge luxury residential area, encompassing more than 200 buildings.
The most dramatic Tom Fazio golf course is the next thing they will build. Super impressive! Charles was kind enough to shake hands with us again when he showed up at the beach bar on the same evening.

Another helpful person was Elvis. He drove us high up to the Brimstone Hill Fortress, another large defense installation of the British, this time to fight the French. At those times it was of utmost importance to secure an anchorage in the vicinity of a good fresh water river. No trip back to
Europe could start without the barrels filled with drinking water. Elvis also offered us some economical insights:

As everywhere else in the West Indies the sugar cane business lost momentum decades ago and sent Kittian economy into a long sleep. Only 15 years ago when the cruise ship terminal was opened, tourism got significance and quickly became the most important economic sector. In high season, two or three cruise ships visit St Kitts every day. In the off season, its considerably less, depending on latent hurricanes.

Asking about difficulties with quickly growing tourism, Elvis said that everyone is happy with it because it creates lots of jobs. Then he added: “OK, there is one problem. With the tourists coming, many of us now must work on Sundays. Then we can’t go to Church. But the weekly service is very important for us.” More than a dozen of Christian Churches exist in Basseterre only. They compete for members in a saturated market.

Elvis blown the horn every other mile to say hello to someone else on the road. Once it was the hair dresser, then a family member and then a very good friend, the former Prime Minister who is now in the opposition. By the way, there is no Republican Party as we know it, and a Green Party is not required at all. The parties are more in the range of different shades of Labors, which started forming in the late times of slavery.

The country is proud of celebrating its 35 years of independence from UK this year. The Commonwealth improves the access to international financial markets. They however complain that loans for disaster recovery are becoming more expensive after catastrophic incidents such as most recent hurricanes. The county’s stability is questioned. “Why and how should we pay the bill for global warming which was produced elsewhere?”. A thoroughly wide topic…

Last but not least, such small country could not defend itself in case of an attack. We learned that the military interventions of UK in Falkland and the one of US in Grenada are taken as a sign that Kittians would not been left alone in such a case. In return, US Army is allowed to train in the country, and also to use its geographic position strategically. Young Kittians do not need to serve in an army.

That was a lot for little more than one day only, isn’t it? St Kitts was a very quick go for us. After leaving St Kitts and Nevis, we did a short provisioning stop in St Barths. This is the famous French place where Johnny Hallyday was buried recently. As I conclude this article, we are already on the British Virgin Islands. We have decided to meet up here with some friends for Easter. The BVI’s will perhaps be our grande finale in the West Indies, before starting our second Atlantic Crossing with new crew during May.

Wishing everyone a nice Easter Weekend
Markus and family

PS: There are some great photos from St Kitts on http://www.yuana.life . As always, Klick on our logo to randomly see the next picture.

Antigua – The upper class holiday place

Antigua – The upper class holiday place

Markus

Antigua welcomed us with its English Harbor, a paramount anchorage which can perhaps not be found many times in the world. Very well protected and hardly visible from the sea, it was the perfect place to protect a naval fleet. The whole area around that most beautiful bay is today listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site. What is called The Nelson’s Dockyards are the docks where ships tie up for unloading and loading.

This all started 235 years ago, when Piracy was still a big issue in the Caribbean. Admiral Horatio Nelson developed the English Harbour area for the British Navy to support their claims in the West Indies. The place grew strong enough to stop the piracy of those days. Earlier, the British, French, Spanish and other Admiralties teamed up with the Pirates very opportunistically, just to win (or loose) the next battle.

The Nelson’s Dockyards were beautifully restored and are today used as a marina. Also thanks to its nice surrounding, it became a preferred docking place for super yachts. Steering my own ship into English Harbour and tying her up at the great old Nelson’s Dockyards became one of my personal maritime highlights. I realized this only in hindsight. And this was the perfect start for our encounter with Antigua.

The following days brought us back some dear friends from the yachts Krabat, A Capella of Belfast, Dream Catcher and Kisu. All of us were then anchored in Falmouth Bay, just next to English Harbour. We enjoyed sundowners in one or the other cockpit and made sure to party at the local Yacht Club.

Then came the birthday of our son. He turned eleven and was a bit disappointed that he didn’t get an invitation for Hogwarts, the School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. This was at least what happened to Harry Potter at his own eleventh birthday (we are working ourselves through that book, English edition, every evening bit by bit). All of us enjoyed the day with a bit of sailing, swimming, beach games and an e-reader as top birthday present. It was very important for him to get into a marina with internet connection. Sure we did, and we closed this great day with an appropriate dinner at a great Greek restaurant.

Because we liked Antigua and wanted to get more of it, we decided to explore the Northwestern part of the country. We found dozens of quiet islands, reefs, almost white beaches and turquoise waters. We spotted breeding Pelicans and pure nature. On Long Island, one-story luxury hotels lined up along the beach, offering peace and privacy for several thousand dollars per night – the place to be.

Antigua actually has a little neighbor, with is the island called Barbuda. Barbuda is said to top the beauty of Antigua. We didn’t go there. Sadly, Barbuda got totally destructed by storm Irma, and other sailors who tried to visit the place confirmed this. So we decided not to go there.

Antigua is something special, not only for its natural beauty, but also for rules and regulations. They are so good that they need their own electronic pre-arrival notification system for sailors, whereas the other East Caribbean States teamed up for one common solution. Moreover, one has to throw the hook and dinghy in for the customs and immigration, before the boat can be tied up on a dock. ‘Work your way in if you want to be part of our place!’

The hight was when we had to register our kids as passengers rather than crew, which cost a lot of money. Dear Antiguan authorities, the sailing community just laughs about such advanced level of ridiculousness.

Other strange things? Yes, when we were on the beautiful uninhabited islands with no supermarket around the corner, we tested some canned meals which we bought earlier in Martinique. We assumed that we can find the same cans again further up North in Saint Martin, as stock for our second Atlantic crossing. Guess what? Those canned meals must have been produced in the same factory which produces the food for our cats. So: No canned meals for the long way back to Europe ;-)!

By the way: Nelson’s Dockyards called up some nice memories from the great old harbors we’d visited in England. That made me starting to like the idea to pay some more visits there on our way back 🙂

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Picture: Copper and Lumber Store, now a hotel inside Nelson’s Dockyards

Being (very) rich and in the Caribbean

Being (very) rich and in the Caribbean

Markus

Imagine you manage a big business and earn millions of Euros or US Dollars a year. Your family owns one of the larger properties in the area with every amenity one can think of. You have seen all fancy holiday places in the world and the options for enjoying the few days off get thinner. Now you are planning the next holidays:

Your youngsters shall top any holiday experiences when being back at boarding school. Your wife is sure that she deserves top notch. You may have to welcome partners but need no spotters. So you should go super-yachting the West Indies for a week or two!

Charter a motor yacht to get started on the water. The even longer sailing yacht will top the experience in the following season. There is no reason to worry about the handling of all the equipment there anyway. The ship will come with a well experienced team of six who takes care of all vessel operations and also the toys on board.

The kids will love the 30 meter slide from the top deck into the sea. Give them the seabob, then the waverunner and finally the jetovator, just to raise the fun over the days. The cinema’s sound will beat all expectations anyway.

Your wife will be happy with the first class spa and gym, and she will definitely be proud when showing the inescapable evening guests around the upper deck lounge, the dining room, and finally their bedrooms with own bubble pool. For yourself and to make it short, there will be no gourmet issue this time and the box of properly sorted cigars will be appreciated.

So why is Yuana.life writing about this? Because those guys are our neighbors every here and there. They pay perhaps half a million in hard currency per week, but they can’t book the nicest sandy snorkeling bays for themselves. So comes we meet with them when arriving same time on Sandy Island (Carriacou, Grenada), as it happened just two days ago.

Whereas we beach our dinghy with 4 horsepower outboard engine, their shore landing vessel comes with 3 outboard engines of 350 horsepower each, so 1.050 horsepower in total, just to enjoy the number. Sure two of their crew would have prepared the beach chairs, umbrellas and drink coolers under the palms, before Gentlemen, Madam and kids are safely brought to the island. When the sun isn’t too far from going down, the society changes to the fatboy lamzac’s which now form a lounge on the white sands, and the little shore party would go on. Comfort and Style.

When we bump into each other on our stroll along the lonely beach, everyone is perfectly sure that the other ones are just here to enjoy the their life. Some have an eye on the toys of the other ones, and the other ones would love to be back at work only after another couple of weeks or even month in Paradise. So we just nod heads and take a glimpse of each other, and everyone goes his way. When we sit in our slow-motion dinghy for motoring back to Yuana, we can be sure we would arrive there with salty wet buttocks, from the waves spilling over the pontoons of our little rubber boat.

Yuana’s Mr. Rope Cutter vs. Somebody’s Mrs. Super Yacht

Yuana’s Mr. Rope Cutter vs. Somebody’s Mrs. Super Yacht

Markus

We are exploring the southern part of ‘Saint Vincent and the Grenadines’. The distances from one sandy turtle bay to the next sandy coconut bay are very short. So we tow our dingy Dorie from one place to the next one, instead of taking it on deck. This isn’t an issue at all until the anchor is dropped in the next bay. But then one thing requires special care, and the captain didn’t care enough this time:

Once the anchor is dropped and the anchor chain lies on the ground, then the propeller must be engaged in reverse direction to make sure that the anchor is nicely digged into the ground. Before reversing, the dinghy towing line must be taken very shortly, otherwise it goes into the propeller and jams it.

One of the kids had the task to hold the line of the dingy today. The captain however didn’t check for a second time whether the kid was still doing its job. Sure the kid wasn’t there anymore and the dinghy line went into the propeller. I realized it when Dorie was quickly pulled towards Yuana. I disengaged the propeller, cut Dories line and checked the situation. Worse, the anchor didn’t hold at the first try.

Now the casino starts: we were drifting with the wind, right towards the bow of another yacht. The distance until collision was perhaps 150 meters and that yacht was one of the biggest Super Sailing Yachts I’ve ever seen. The width of her hull impressed me quite a bit.

Options:
– Hope that the anchor still grips somewhere. It didn’t look like that.
– Boat boy next to us could have towed us away, but he wanted to agree on a price only later. Sure he would have made his bill according to the prevented damage. Last option, under „Lloyd‘s open!“
– Pull out the genoa to get away from the other vessel: Possible, if we got the anchor in quick enough. „Anchor up!“
– Engage the propeller again an see if the rope cutter would do its job: first choice.

A rope cutter is a da.n sharp disc knife which we mounted on the propeller shaft. It’s task is to cut a rope or netting which is jamming around the propeller shaft.

So we had two options how not to kiss the superyacht. In the first attempt I engaged the prop again and increased the revolution immediately. There was an uncommon rattle from underneath the boat and now, also the rudder was going freely again. „Adrenalin off!“

So we dropped the anchor and Manuela The Mast Climber dived to take the last bits of rope off the propeller.

Now let’s talk about our neighbor, the Super Sailing Yacht which definitely deserves some capital letters. Her name is ‚Mondango 3’ and you can easily google it. The hull is 185 feet (56 meters) long. The 499 tons weight require some proper sails or a couple of thousand horsepower. 100 liters of fuel will only last for 10 nautical miles, according to the charter brochure. And this is the good news, my friends: You can charter it! The cost per high season WEEK starts at 224‘000 Euro, plus ‘a typical 25-50% on top’ of this for the operation expenses.

I‘m sure that some well known faces would have looked over Mondango’s reiling, would we have kissed her. But Yuana’s Mr. Rope Cutter was quicker, this time.