109: Is it worth visiting GREEN ISLAND on Antigua?

What an adventure this has been so far. To old and to new friends. She actually thought this was a starter. Let's hope. Bye. You've got all the papers, you've got the passports, you've got some money. Yep. Smiles. We arrived last night and dropped anchor in Freeman's Bay. This morning we headed into English Harbor to clear customs but were told to return to our boat and wait for a visit from a health official. An hour or so later we were completing forms and had our health declarations and COVID test results reviewed. The government official then approved us to proceed with clearing. Because we had a valid COVID test and were coming from a country in the Caribbean bubble, we were welcomed without quarantine or restrictions into Antigua. We were fearing the but it was just that easy. What you doing? I am changing the flag from our queue check-in flag to our Antigua courtesy flag. So we're checking into our first country ever, Antigua, and we're at English Harbor right here and it's just beautiful. We got in here last night probably about 5 30 in the afternoon, barely in time to get the anchor down before the sunset. Look at this pretty homemade flag. Bright, cheerful, and colorful. I guess that's the sun coming up over the ocean. Eileen is practicing for the first time with the dinghy. I think we may need our life jackets on, but I feel safe and secure. Tracy has a lot of confidence in her and off she goes. Look. Who's that loving? My home. Voila. Who's the admiral now? English Harbor is the home of Nelson's Dockyard, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. In the old days, it was hard to find secure ports that were easily defensible with immediate access to the trade winds, yet protected enough to careen a ship and be safe in a hurricane. English and Falmouth Harbors sit side by side and both meet all of the requirements. Their potential was recognized as early as 1745 and the dockyard was completed in 1789. Upon arrival in 1947, Commander Nicholson found the dockyard in ruins. He and his men restored it into a beautiful yet functional monument, giving way to the current yachting industry. All of the historic buildings house modern services, though some do serve as museums. James Little of Norwich, England rode across the Atlantic in this boat when he was 49 years old. He started in January of 2005 and rode almost 3,500 miles, ending in Antigua. He arrived in the middle of May. The journey took 116 days and he expended 8,000 calories per day. Today we planned for an overnight trip to Green Island. The island is about 10 nautical miles from English Harbor. Our plan is to continue our sailing lessons, practicing navigation, trip planning, dropping anchor, and attaching to a mooring ball. Our first stop will be Rickett Harbor, a perfect quiet spot with two lovely sand beaches. We will drop anchor and enjoy the beautiful turquoise water before heading around to the north side of Green Island to our overnight anchorage in Nonsuch Bay. This bay is protected by a barrier reef. Wow sweetie, you pulled it out of the harbor! We pulled it out of the harbor by ourselves. First time off to an exciting anchorage! Life on the high seas! One of the highlights of this trip was our star struck moment getting to meet Yuka and Francesco, the owners of Ouroboro, a leopard catamaran. They are great people and amazing sailors. We have followed their blog for the past few years and it is incredibly insightful. What fun to finally meet them on the water. Anchovy. Sausage. Wow. We are eating well. Mooring ball practice. We are out of Green Island and on our way back to English Harbor. It is Ben's last night with us so we need to drop him off and run around. Are you ready for it honey? Ready as I'll ever be! What an adventure this has been so far bringing the boat while being with Captain Ben and just I mean Tracy thank you for the wonderful and our new friend Lauren. Maybe we'll be a sailing sister. Well she is a sailing sister now anyway. Cheers. What an incredible. Cheers thank you. I'm honored to be here with you guys. Actually I'd just like to say something. I have English I don't normally but I have just spent nearly 14 days with you guys. Almost intense every day. We had phone calls before we met but yeah you rang up with this idea. I was like a bit crazy. I want to do courses. We want to learn to sail. I'm like well we've got to make this work somehow. So we've spent literally seven days chatting every day. These guys didn't really know much in the way of docking boats or the mooring line. This is how we've been for all that. We started off with a few little glitches coming on and off the dock. By the end of working together bringing the boat on and off. That was that. We were sailing then we're putting sails up putting sails down doing man overboard. We've done we've done route planning passage planning. We've traveled 200 miles together up the course of the course of the Caribbean. I think you've done very well actually. It's a huge learning curve. I've seen the stresses you've been through. You've handled them well. You've kept your cool. Some of us. And the apprehension. There's nothing wrong with being apprehensive. We're stupid if you go to sea and disrespect the sea. We're not a little bit scared and a little bit nervous of it. We'd be idiots to think any other way. So I think you've got the right mindset the right approach. I think I wish you all the best. Thank you buddy. Thank you Ben. Thank you. Cheers. We've learned so much through you. You're just a great guy to have around. Well we want to say thank you for uh thank you for all that you've done to invest in us. You're the one who taught us how to sail. Which is all on you. You never get to stop learning. So as we run over reefs we're gonna say cheers. Ben taught us to do this. Thank you for the patience that you had. For really being thorough. For encouraging us. For just being so chill. It's been awesome. To old and to new friends right? Cheers. Papa Ben wants us to email him before we leave and after we get back. Because that's so cute. He feels a little sense of responsibility. He really really loves you. So we just had some uh tapioca with a lime sauce. Whoa look at this line ladies and gentlemen. Adrienne Thompson. This is real skill right here. This is the first time. This is the first time I've ever seen this. Get this video. Ladies and gentlemen world premiere. World premiere Tracy Hemsley. She actually thought this was a start-up. Well said young man. Crazy woman.