We are in the Windard Islands

Dominica was the last of the Leeward Islands and on Tuesday morning at 0430 we left Prince Rupert Bay and headed to Martinique, the largest of the Windwards. The Windwards are the southern most chain of the Eastern Caribbean Islands - the last before you get to Trinidad and South America. The British named them the "Windward Islands" because to get to these islands from their other island possessions - you had to sail to windward. Martinique, our first stop in this part of the chain, is part of France.

The sail to Martinique was like "Mr. Toad's Wild Ride" (from Wind in the Willows - a favorite book of the Astarte crew). In the lee of the island of Dominica, the seas were benign and the winds light. Once we got to the end of the island and had open sea between the two islands - it was a wild sail. The seas picked up to 6 feet and the wind hooted in the low to mid 20's. We had reefed main and genoa and hit speeds in excess of 7 knots. Overpowered as we came close to Martinique we had to reef in the heady even more.

On Tuesday night we anchored off St, Pierre. This town was originally supposed to be the capital o Martinique and was known as "Paris of the East" and was the social, cultural and economic center of the island. That was until 1902. That's when Mt. Pelee, a volcano erupted and wiped out the entire city and surrounding plantations. St. Pierre was also not far from where the Europeans wiped out the last of the Carib Indians in 1658. It is said, that before the last ones died, they uttered horrible curses and asked the mountain to take its revenge. It ultimately did, over 29 thousand people died.

As we came in to anchor, we were met by a French customs dinghy with three agents on - board. They didn't board us - but obviously called in our boat name and probably realized they already checked us out in "The Saints." The anchorage is just off the town and not in a protected bay. So it was impacted by the surge - and caused a very uncomfortable night. As soon as the wind died, the surge rolled the boat throughout the night. We were happy to leave early on Wednesday morning. We left to head to Fort de France, the actual capital of Martinique and a huge shipping port. It was only about 15 miles away. We arrived and anchored off the city near the fort. The flags in the country are all flying at half staff - we're thinking it's to remember those lost on the recent Air France plane crash.

This Fort de France anchorage was also very rolly - so we decided to go into town, clear into the country. Clearing into Martinique was very easy. In fact, we did it by computer. One of which just happened to be located at a nicely stocked chandlery(boat parts store). We needed some things, most importantly a new pump for the forward head. We are already planning for our next guest. After spending some boat units we headed across the very large bay to an area called Trois Ilets. It does have "three islands" and after three tries to get the anchor to hold, we settled into a very nice, calm, flat anchorage. The anchorage we ended up in is right off a big golf course. Supposedly one of the only ones in the Caribbean where you can play golf and watch your boat. Michael spent a long time looking for the catering tent! We went into the town and roamed around.had an ice cream, picked up a baguette and came back to the boat. We were going to do cook's night off (still haven't gotten it from the Dominica leaky dinghy night) - but we were both too tired to come back after 1930 when the restaurants open.

We're leaving tomorrow morning bright and early to head to the next island - St. Lucia to get the dinghy worked on. It'll take us about 8 - 10 hours to sail there.