St Kitts

17 15.0 N 62 39.0 W

The island of St Christopher (St Kitts) is green with a has a steep mountain range rising 3750 ft high most of which is covered in rain forest. The Caribs (original inhabitants) called St Kitts “Liamuiga” meaning “fertile isle”. Columbus renamed the island after his patron saint. British landed on St Kitts in 1623 making it the first British Caribbean colony. They were joined by a French group and the two nations teamed up to massacre the 2000 Carib inhabitants before they fell out between themselves. After 150 years of fighting St Kitts came under British rule. Today they are fully independent.

Our plan was to sail to St Eustatuis, spend the night then onto St Christopher (St Kitts) – with the weather deteriorating in the next few days we bypassed St Eustatuis and headed directly to St Kitts and anchored in White House bay. We flew our yellow flag (which means we are under quarantine ie have not checked into the country as yet). It is generally considered ok to fly this flag when stopping overnight in an anchorage without checking into the country but you must not go ashore, it is used by boats who have made an unscheduled stop due to engine problems or similar. We spent the next day in the anchorage doing washing and cooking then left very early the next morning to sail to Antigua – the closest secure harbour to wait out the nor-easter. We motored for 11 hours that day – absolutely no wind but no big seas either – this island is usually a hard beat to windward so a day without wind or seas was a nice surprise.