March 22nd we sailed over to Barbuda from Antigua (3 hours and 45 minutes) on a nice beam reach. We arrived near noon to an expansive landscape of 11 miles of beach. The sand appears pink in certain locations due to broken down pink shells.
There is quite the large surge here so landing the SUP on the beach is a bit of a challenge. Charlie nearly got run over by it on our first landing. We’ve improved since by learning to ride the wave in and then quickly hopping off and grabbing the SUP out of the water before the wave takes it back out.
Charlie loves this beach, but it’s got too much of a surge for him to swim. The undertow would sweep him in to deep water, so he settles for running along the sand. Yesterday he decided to wander into some bushes. This followed with a squeal and he couldn’t move. Paul discovered he’d found a patch of what the locals call ‘prickles’. His fur is like Velcro for these things. Paul couldn’t even pick him up as his belly and legs were completely covered. He sat down on the spot and began to pick them out of Charlie’s fur. I noticed this from shore and opted to swim in to help out. It took both of us about 45 minutes to get the prickles out. Believe me, it’s not fun as you get pricked by every one. Now when we go ashore, we yell ‘prickles’ to Charlie and he happily stays on the sand. No exploring the bushes of Barbuda.
Yesterday, we met a couple from the boat ‘Over Budget’. They sailed in the Salty Dawg Rally with us in November. It was decided that we’d have a happy hour on board Blue Sky in the early evening. They also invited people they knew from Echo. JW & Jenny (Over Budget) and Mary & Jeff (Echo) along with us all enjoyed a delightful evening of salty tales. We feel so lucky to have the opportunity to be a part of this sailing community.