Nevis

April 24, 2011

Happy Easter. We did not find services so we stayed on the boat and ate a more fancy

breakfast...sausage, hash browns,

egg casserole. Later we motored 30 minutes further up the coast of Nevis to North Pinney Beach to two restaurants: Yachtman's Grill and Coconut Grove. After taking the dinghy to shore, pulling it up and putting an anchor high up on shore, we ate lunch at the Yachtman's Grill sitting out under their blue umbrellas

sipping cocktails and working on their free wifi. It was a beautiful sunny day and the food was good. Their in ground pool had an infiinity side. The owners were working this day giving many of their staff time off. Tthey are a delightful couple: Evelyn and Greg Slogan. When Charlie told Greg about losing our bar-B-Q grill's regulator, Greg thought that he might have some extra parts which might work and would bring them the next day. Greg had spent some years cruising himself.

Next door at the Nevis Coconut Grove there were many children and they were having

an Easter egg hunt. The wife of the owner is from Germany and she started the egg hunt tradition several years ago. It was totally unknown on Nevis. They had many families at their restaurant with its lower deck with above ground swimming pool. We went over to this restaurant for dinner. We had a delicious lobster bisque. The restaurant is in a thatched roof building the owner had built by Cost Ricans ( I think) several years ago. They brought their own materials and tools. It is quite impressive and has withstood minor hurricanes. We had neglected to bring the dinghy lights but we were very close to the boat.

April 25, 2011

In Nevis the day after Easter is "Easter Monday" and many do not work and stores are closed. The Coconut Grove was closed but the Yachtman's Grill was open. We had lunch and then it looked like it was going to start raining which it did off and on, though it was usually light sprinkles. Later in the afternoon. we rushed out to the boat just in time to close the hatches before a really hard rain came. We had to go back to the shore because Greg was on his way with the grill part. Due to the rainy evening, we went back to the boat for dinner. It rained off and on most of the evening and night so we did not try out the grill.

April 26, 2011

Alas the grill part did not work on our grill so we returned it to Greg. Greg has many fingers in many businesses, including rental of small car/jeeps to tour the island. We reserved one and picked it up about 9:30 just as the rain started again down the mountain. During what we thought was a break in the rain we drove to Evelyn and Greg's house to see the baby lamb she rescued. Unfortunately we were drenched while driving over there. We dried out while waiting for it to stop raining...about 45min-1 hour. Greg had built a nice pen for the lamb who was sharing it with a rescued puppy.

We finally felt safe enough to proceed with our tour of the island. First we had to go to

customs and check out so we could leave the next morning. Completing that we drove to "The Hermitage"an old plantation built before 1670. It reminded me a bit of High Hampton Inn in NC. The public rooms in the old house were gentile with many antiques.

Extensive gardens outside included many vegetable gardens so I guess they grow much of what they serve. There were separate "cabins" and a lovely swimming pool. The dining room was added to the back of the house as a porch and was a lovely place to dine.

We proceeded to the Botanical Gardens which were very lush

with blooming plants...orchids growing everywhere. Statuary was spread throughout the gardens, some native and much was Asian or Indonesian. There were dolphin fountains and cascading pools filled with lilly pads. A greenhouse containing plants from the rainforest

and a huge statue with waterfalls cascading off it. There were two cages with parrots. A big house in the garden was used as a shop to sell local and other products off island. The restaurant must also be in the house, perhaps on the upper floor. We felt lucky that it was open today because they usually only open it when a cruise ship is in at St. Kitts.

Our next stop was the Montpelier which

is an Inn at an old plantation site. It has this huge tree at the entrance. It also has a huge sugar windmill close to the house and this is used as part of the restaurants there. They have several buildings to house guests and a big living room with well-stocked bar, tennis courts and a lovely pool. Lunch and dinner are served out on the patio and on its porches overlooking the Caribbean Sea from the hills. special dinners can be served inside the sugar mill.

A taxi driver helped lead us to the next stop: Gold Rock Inn up in the hills close to the rainforest. The clouds on the mountain were again threatening rain. We only stayed

a short time there, but it is very impressive. A hotel has been made out

of another sugar mill and its buildings. The sugar Mill Plantation buildings were built in early 1800's. The reception is in part of the original kitchen and storage area. Gold Rock Inn is made up of numerous garden rooms with tables for intimate dining scattered sparsely. The stone is a grey and the umbrellas and chairs are red. They have added huge stone terraces with reflection pools and a pagoda. Due to the threat of rain we did not linger. There are trails from here up into the rainforest. Due to our short stay, we did not see the hotel rooms or cabins which I think are spread up into the hills.

After returning the vehicle, we stopped in at the yachtsman's Grill for a drink. We met some students from the nursing school and Medical University who had come to Nevis for a short

holiday. We made a quick trip to the boat to drop our cameras off and to pick up our computers to use at the restaurant. Then we took the dinghy back to the restaurant for their Grilled Lobster special before returning to the boat and bed. There was so much lobster that we took half of it back to the boat.

April 27, 2011

The next day we left Nevis heading for Montserrat. We were about two hours out when the bridle on our dinghy snapped. We had just put in a third reef in the main when it happened. The winds were 25-30 knots instead of the 20 we expected. We dropped the sails and headed back to try to retrieve the dinghy which by now had flipped over. By the time we retrieved it successfully, it had flipped back upright. We had to use the lines we put on it to haul it up beside the boat to prevent theft to retrieve it. We slowly towed it back stern front to Charlestown, Nevis. Then we had to bail out all the water which had splashed into it. Our new rule will be to put the dinghy up on the bow deck when traveling between islands. We stayed on the boat and had left over lobster in garlic cream sauce over rice for dinner.