Early morning in St Pierre

This is the Mt Pelée volcano which erupted and destroyed the whole city of St Pierre in 1902 and killed almost all of the population of 30.000 people. Before the eruption, the city was called the "Paris of the Caribbean" and was the commercial, cultural and social center of Martinique. 

We had a very brief stay here in St Pierre and are now on our way up towards Guadeloupe. Bad weather and a bit rainy today so we'll pass on the stop in Dominica for this time. Rainforests and waterfalls are best enjoyed when it's sunny. 75 miles to go to Les Saintes today, hoping to have some sun for island exploration tomorrow. I feel like snorkeling! /T

On the sea again

First stop: Anse Mitan some 20 miles away from where we started. We left our berth in Le Marin so late yesterday that we felt like ducking into a convenient anchorage pretty close by for the night. Today was the first time since we arrived to Martinique that we slept to as late as 9 am. Every part of your body and mind gets fatigued by the movements of the boat and the natural exercises one are doing while sailing exhausts many of your muscles. This being the first time we sail and tack this much with our Caos for six weeks and the first time sailing in a long time makes you always very very sleepy. Sailing is a fantastic way of keeping your body in balance and I don't know of any exercise form which allows all of your muscles to work simultaneously in such an efficient way - and for many hours in a row.

We had some company on our way to the anchorage last night. A big pod with adults and small babies. Always a pleasure to get visited by the dancers of the sea. Today we'll be off again and as we've decided to take it easy for the next few days, we will be making a few stop here and there before we arrive to Guadeloupe. Maybe the volcanic city of St Pierre and perhaps we will also pay a visit to the rainforest in Dominica. Let's see.

So now when we're back on the sea again, remember that we won't be able to answer much emails and comments as when we were locked up on land like in the last couple of weeks. We are now back to how we love it - on the sea and closer in touch with the nature, far from Internet and communication with the rest of the world. Our satellite broadband serves us only for important weather reports, a blog post every now and then and also for possible emergencies.

To follow our route when you don't hear from us, you can always check in on this Spotwalla link or on the sidebar here to the right. Take care now all of you and talk to you later. /Taru and Alex

In the mangrove

Mangrove - the constellation of trees and shrubs which grow in many tropical, salty parts of the world are fascinating and beautiful. They are found in coastal environments protected from high energy wave action and what might just look like intimidating bushes and branches in a wild mixture with an inviting wetness calling for mosquitos and creeps to perfectly establish themselves, are in fact more interesting than that when you get into them for real. These botanical amphibians which has one foot in the air, one under water are particularly fascinating for the fact that they can stand the very high level of salt in the water, the choking mud in which they grow along with the tropical heat surrounding them - all features which wouldn't let most other plants to stay alive for too long. Mangrove forests are among the most productive and biologically complex ecosystems on earth as they make an important home to many different bird species, frogs, snakes, shellfish and loads of oysters, shrimps, several type of fish and millions of mangrove crabs. The trees form a beautiful saline woodland, or a swamp if you prefer, and the perfect braiding of branches and trees are spectacular. The trees also have a complex root system which allows them to survive in the intertidal zone and the special ultrafiltration system helps them to keep most of the salt out.

From a sailors perspective, the mangroves in the Caribbean can also be useful and the strength and stability of the woodland habitat is often used to tie up sailing boats to save the boats from hurricanes running through the area and this is how it could look:

You just simply run your boat straight into the swamp and tie it up in different trees and branches. Very convenient.

The first photos are taken close to Petite anse des Salines and the two last ones are from Le Marin Martinique, an anchorage which is said to be a safe place to leave your boat during the hurricane season. It's a hurricane hole, as they call it. /T

Postcard from Carib

Some of you love them, a few of you hate them but either way it was a very long time since there was a bikini pic featured on this blog. Six long days ago, to be perfectly precise.

So with this simple postcard we would like to wish you all a very pleasant weekend, wherever you are in the world.

T&A

More beach life

If you for a single moment doubted on the amazingness we experienced the other days when on beach exploration in Les Salines, here's some more images for you. 

Freedom

A life without a Blackberry or an iPhone is such a wonderfully relieving and fulfilling life and I'm glad they're all finally gone from our surroundings. Hello privacy! Do you have any idea of how many hours per day you gain by not being in constant touch with other people/your email/facebook accounts/twitter updates/blogs/news all.the.time? I'm thinking it must be something like 4-5 extra hours given to you each and every day when getting rid of the phone. The unconscious stress which evolves within us when constantly being reachable is one of all of those evil little things most of us just accept and keep living with in the modern (destructive) society - but let me tell you that nothing feels better than to cut old habits like those. I have thrown out so many bad old habits from my life lately and I feel so light. I feel free, you know what I'm saying? This above pictured moment shows the only type of phone communication we're having nowadays, along with some occasional Skype sessions with dear family members and friends of course, and the best thing is that it's completely up to us when we feel like being in touch and not. No beeping or ringing every minute from every corner, just a visit to the good old booth every once in a while. This is one of those things that we've discovered gives a new peaceful dimension to our lives. It's simple but oh so rewarding. Much more time for real life. /Taru

Boat of the day - Drumbeat

This is one impressive yacht we ran across the other day in Le Marin, Martinique. S/Y Drumbeat, a luxurious superyacht produced by Alloy Yachts. The 174 ft ketch was constructed and launched in New Zeeland in 2002, according to the constructor's website, and has a total sail-area of 1139 m2/12.220 sq ft. Beautiful, isn't she? /T

In paradise

Hello!

We took a little vacation from the blog and our emails for some days as we found a little piece of heaven on this island. Clear turquoise water and powdery white sand. How cold is it where you're at, you said? The water is 29°C (85°F) over here. Did I say heaven! /T

Sunny days

It's seriously hot here today. Luckily I have my Spanish flamenco fan comfortably on hand. And let us not discuss my hair further. I'm undergoing a several steps decolorization/bleaching process and will soon be back to my original roots. It is about time to get back to some type of ash brown/copper blonde or whatever my natural Scandinavian hair color might be called. Just bare with me for a couple of more weeks and let's ignore the disaster until then, OK.

I hope you all had a good weekend. /T

Hello gorgeous

Alex have caught so much fish during our life aboard that tuna, barracuda, dolphin fish (Mahi Mahi) and amberjack starts to feel a bit boring. More interesting it is when he pulls up random fishes with a new type of look, like this little bastard. But what is this? I know we have quite a few bird experts reading our blog who've helped us identify a couple of flying creatures in the past, might be we have some fish specialists here as well. So. What do we got here today? /T

Plans and wonderings

We are based in Martinique for a while longer. As this is France and EU, it makes it easy for us to sort out administrative tasks, get shipments to arrive safely and other things are easy to sort out here and has to get done before we’re ready to move on again. Might be we'll have the time to revisit St Lucia once again before we head up North, would be wonderful as we haven't had the chance to visit the Pitons and Soufrière as yet. Our plan thereafter is to set sail towards Dominica and Goudaloupe in the end of this month and perhaps spend some days/weeks in Antigua and St Barths in April/May before we return back down South where we'll most probably spend the hurricane season. Or maybe we skip the most Northern parts of the windward/leeward islands and sail on straight towards South and spend a longer time in St Vincent and the Grenadines, Mustique, Bequia, Grenada, Tobago and thereafter the ABC's for some weeks? We can't really make up our mind.

Caribbean, as far as we have understood, is beautiful and colorful, a bit inspiring, and the light here is more than spectacular. The Caribbean islands we've seen so far might not be as secluded and private and not totally as paradisish and lush as some parts of Asia or the Indian Ocean as we know it, or might be we haven’t found those hidden gems as yet? Search continues. One question for you who've been around the world: What are your absolute most favorite, dreamlike, unexploited paradise in the Caribbean sea? And we're not looking for places where you'll find 250 charter boats anchored on the same spot and beaches overcrowded with tourists, no it is the quietness and privacy combined with a dreamlike atmosphere and a breathtaking nature and sea life we're after. Or do we really have to get out in the Pacific to find that?

And then another question: since we've already decided to stay around here in Central/South America for the rest of the year before we head out in the Pacific, we're also keen of finding the perfect place for putting the boat, and ourselves, for the hurricane season. So far we have these options on our list: Grenada, Trinidad and Brazil. Have any of you spent the hurricane season in any of these places and what are your experiences with them? Is Grenada really a safe place for the boat during the tropical storms and what about the ABC islands?

Thankful for your thoughts.

/Taru and Alex

Last night of the carnival

We kind of ignored the carnival this week which has been going on for five days or such and we decided to go out only on the last night. Too bad for us that the final nights celebration ended already around 10pm as people finally* would get back to work on the morning of today. That didn't stop us (me) from dancing to the last zouk beats playing on the beach last night though. Here's some retro zouk love music for you all, straight from Martinique.

*I'm saying finally not for the fact that the carnival is over, but because we're waiting for shipments and packages to arrive and finally the postal service is working again. /T

In love with a fruit

I announce the pamplemousse to be the best fruit on this island. It is so sweet and juicy that you simply wanna die when you eat it. No I'm serious! I have never tasted anything sweeter and more fresh under this sun. The pulp is so so tender, the juice so rich and scrumptious, the fruit is simply perfect with just the right amount of acidity. And do not get frighten by the ugly brown speckled peel - these fruits are in fact better the uglier they are on the outside and more delicious than any grapefruit I've ever tasted. /T

Love Peace and Happiness

Sorry to sound like a fucking cliché or a complete hippie all the time but when I see these pictures we took the other day I, again, get reminded of the point in what we've chosen to do with our lives. For are there anything greater, stronger than the happiness and contentment you can feel from only being close to another human being? The one you love most. Just like that alone could be enough to feed ones soul. We're now gone from all the stress, gone from a destructive world and instead we're spending more time with each other, enjoying what mother nature have given us. In peace. On our conditions. In our speed. Someone once said "the hard thing is to find a person you stand for a longer period and in more than ten minutes at a time" and I can definitely relate to it from an earlier life but this time it is all so different. So simple. So real. So... right. 

I vote for love to be the new universal religion. That's at least what gives us strength, hope and a peace of mind. /T

One refreshing starter

I'm really into the Martiniquian way of cooking at the moment. The mix of traditional French cuisine and the refreshing tropical creole (a mélange of French, Spanish and African) style of preparing food makes for a perfect mix and the fresh ingredients makes the food light to savour in during hot days. Coco, rum, bananas of all different types, lime and other fruits are often a part of the cuisine here and this is a little something I threw together with inspiration from the local kitchen.

Lime and coco chicken with ecological quinoa

Boil quinoa according to package instructions. I use the ecological version found at Carrefour. 

Pan fry very finely chopped spring onion in tiny bit of butter and when crispy - throw in some chicken and fry until golden, pour in a tiny bit of dark rum (rum goes with most things I've recently discovered, especially fish and most definitely in desserts.) add salt, pepper, a squeeze of lime-juice. When quinoa's done, mix it all into the pan. Serve with or without coco flakes and enjoy as a starter or main course. 

Enjoy!

Just some snorkeling

Por fin! One short video up at least. We found one shitty underwater camera here and that one will have to serve us until we get a hold on something more proper. Very low quality here now guys so unfortunately it is not obvious on the video how clear and beautiful the water is IRL. Also I had to cut out fishes and other nice stuff so that I could get up something at least as of the slow connection. Or maybe you'd rather see fishes than us. Ha! Next time. /T

Anse d'arlet

We went to petite Anse d'arlet for the weekend, snorkeling, chilling out and enjoying a picturesque view.

Clear water and (almost) white sand.

Alex fishing in the morning. We both lost by the way around 4 kilos (9 pounds) on the Atlantic crossing though Alex is slowly getting back to his normal shape as you can see. Myself have also gained back my lost kilos, not in muscles though like this bodybuilder, but in extra fat from all the chocolate and tasty food I enjoyed in Finland and elsewhere. I'd definitely need to get swimming some more now.

He didn't get any (eatable) fishes this time so we went to the beach for lunch.

Was nice too.

My hair pretty much sums up how much I'm into superficialities nowadays. It's a long messy hippie hair you'll find me in today and also I didn't dye my hair for... what is it now? Three, four months? Looks catastrophic with dark on the lengths and blond/light brown by the roots and a reddish kind of shimmer on top of it all. Sorry for that, will take care of it one day when I'm more into hair and not enjoying life? Or maybe I should just continue with style naturel and bring back the color I'm born with to reduce hassle? Talking of my hair btw - here, on a car forum of all, you can find some guys discussing just my hair. It's an Audi forum, guys! Jeezus. 

I did some drink experiments in the evening. Will show you a homemade video later on about how to mix my new favorite tropical rum drink. It's so good that not even my non-alcohol-drinking man can resist it. It is impossible for me to upload videos now though. Slow internet must be one of the top ten most frustrating things in life. So many videos, so little time (to wait for fucked up connections).

We sailed from Anse d'arlet in the night and arrived safely in Marin just in time for dinner. The rock to the left is by the way the diamond rock, that rock had an important role with its strategic position in the fights between Napoleon and the British for some two hundred years ago or so.

/Taru