Saba Island. Never hang your hat higher than you can reach.

Blogger: Gill

Never heard of Saba? Neither had we. It is a former Dutch island, small, 5 miles by 3 miles precipitous volcanic island some 90 miles south east of Virgin Gorda and lies due south of St Martin. We arrived there just as dawn broke after a 19 hour motor sail from the BVIs and tied onto a mooring buoy before anyone else was awake in the anchorage.

Dawn, approaching Saba

When we looked around we were stunned.  It was breath taking. The anchorage is on the west coast of the island and the authorities have very kindly put 8 mooring buoys along the shore as it is too deep to anchor in most of the bay. We were tied up under vertical cliffs of volcanic rock with frigate birds, an eagle and white tropic birds wheeling above us, and waves crashing on a stony beach.  Wild. Remote. Beautiful. More like the Antarctic than the tropics, except that it was nearly 30 degrees C.

Petronella, Saba island

Petronella off Saba

The one drawback is that to check in there is a 2 mile dinghy ride round the southern end of the island to the customs. Clever people would note the winds and set off when they blow from the north in the morning and come back as they turn to the south in the afternoon. We didn’t know that and got soaked both ways in a pretty substantial swell. However the checking in was a delightful process with friendly customs and police sitting next to each other and costing nothing. Then it was beer for John, fizzy water for me then back to Petronella, who was happily rolling on the swell. Tried to land on the way back to look at the former customs post which is a small hut at the top of 800 steps. Not a chance, the swell was far too violent, we would have smashed the outboard to pieces on the rocks.

Next day we dinghied back round again, earlier with the swell behind us – we learn – and started to walk up the steep hill out of the harbour towards the first small town known as The Bottom, even though it is high above the harbour. The second car to pass stopped and offered us a ride, which was great. He turned out to be the one and only tour guide on the island and took us all the way up to the main town known as Windwardside, clinging to the side of the mountain above the eastern coast, then introduced us to all his friends in the tourist office and told us about the sign posted walks on the island. We bought a map and then headed up the hill to buy an internet SIM card and find a patisserie. It turned out that it was election day so the whole town was out in force, dressed in brightly coloured T shirts, canvassing the voters and drinking coffees in the cake shop. Friendly, friendly people. Mainly descended from original settlers, seven or eight generations ago, a mix of Dutch, English and coloured.

Looking down into The Bottom

Looking at the map we could see a trail leading down to the harbour. Even though I had only flip flops on my feet we decided to try it as we could always turn round and come back if it was too rough. Brilliant trail winding down through tropical rain forest with swiss cheese plants with leaves over a metre across, trailing lianas, dense vegetation, a black snake that might just have been a feu de lance, lizards, exotic birds. Wow.

Bananas

Mega Cheeseplant!

Half way down we came upon a man sitting outside a small house in the jungle, surrounded by banana plants and lush vegetation. Half an hour later we had learned a great deal about Reed Barnes’s family history and his politics.  He was a descendent of the original settlers and very proud of his island. “My father always told me never to spend more than I earn and never to hang my hat higher than I could reach and I didn’t and I am a happy man” And to our amazement, as we left he said that when we come back to visit Saba again we must stay in his house for free.  How good is that. We will be back. It’s a great place, some tourism mainly for the excellent diving, better seen from the land than from a rolling boat I think.

John with Reed Barnes

The next morning we were up at 5.30, off at 6am just as it got light and tried to sail the 45 miles to Nevis. Bad tactics on our part, we allowed ourselves to get pushed too far to the east so had to motor up into the wind for two hours in lumpy seas. Horrible wet and unpleasant. In the end we abandoned the attempt to get to Nevis and stopped at St Kitts, 10 miles up the island chain. We didn’t check in so flew the yellow Q flag, and anchored in White House Bay in the south of the island and had two days of chilling but not going ashore.