The Social Pause

The weeks-long social events that we participated in, organized by the Salty Dawgs, came to an end after Thanksgiving. Dinners, games, gatherings and fun were all good. Cruising is definitely a social occupation. It was great to catch up with old friends and meet new ones, but it is also good to take a pause and not be so socially organized! With that in mind, we moved from Falmouth Harbor to Deep Bay to do so. Before we left Falmouth, the Charter Boat Show began. This is the place to be if you wish to charter one of these mega yachts for a week or so. Now that would be a social event! I can just imagine a bunch of these mega yachts getting together and having a dinghy drift with their tenders like we had! All this may set you back an inheritance or two but it would definitely impress your friends when posting photos on Facebook.

We haven’t been to Deep Bay for a few years. This little bay, on the west coast of Antigua, featured a good beach, protected anchorage, a sunken ship to snorkel and nothing ashore. But developments progress and the resort

ashore, The Royalton, that started to expand when last we were here, has become very popular. Actually, when we were here, jet ski mosquitoes were also a bother. Well, the good features still exist, despite the expanded resort, and the mosquitoes are fewer.

The daily Wadali “cattelmarans” of tourists still arrive for a few hours a day and there is a new very informal beach side restaurant, “Jus Grillin’ Seafood”. Otherwise, it still is a great little bay to chill out and not be socially organized.

We did, however, meet one other Salty Dawg boat here (of the 2-3 other cruiser boats here) and had sundowners and lunch (lobster) at Jus Grillin.  Diane and Carl (s/v SONAS). This is also the beach we can do a brie – a South African beach BBQ – but don’t think we will do it this time around.  

So, in a day or so, we will be moving over to Jolly Harbor and then flying to New York next week to start the Christmas Holidays Social Schedule!  We are looking forward to being with family and friends but hope the weather cooperates. Coming from air temperatures in the mid 80’s, with the water temps also in the mid 80s, it is going to be a bit of a shock walking around with temps in the 30’s. That is not something we look forward to. A White Christmas looks great in photos but the Deep Bay colors are more to our style. And yes, there are Christmas trees around, despite the lack of snow.

Have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!