41 years of fishing tournaments in Antigua

OK so I bashed the hell out of the 40th Antigua Sailing Week and now all kinds of people have taken it the wrong way and are upset with me. AS IF I AM THE ONLY ONE FEELING THIS WAY!!!!!!! Anyhows, I am gonna keep on a bloggin’

Today let’s talk about an event that has been going on even longer than Antigua Sailing Week which has never gotten as big but still manages to keep going and going. This year will be the 41st time The Antigua Sport Fishing Association is holding their annual big fishing tournament. 41 years!!!!

Not bad when u consider that unlike sailing week this even has always been a small association event. There are few comparisons to make but as many criticisms as there are for sailing week. The purpose of this blog isn’t to rant about it though as I don’t feel the same problems exist or even come close to those of ASW.

The pic above is of my boat coming in to the weigh in station after a days fishing many many years ago. I think I have competed in about 6 or 7 of them while skippering boats ranging from a 23 foot open pirogue style boat seen above to my 52 foot power catamaran where i am releasing a blue marlin below.

The fun seems always to be the same and I haven’t lost the excitement that the fishing tournament brings along with it. The first time registered a boat for the event the organizers thought that my boat was a little too small and after the winds picked up to 25 knots on the morning of the first day…I had to agree with them, and looking at the pic now i shake my head.

We were soaked from start to finish and beaten around quite a bit too. I think I was 18 years old and my crew including my brother Ali and former co-worker Adam felt quite a bit older after it was all finished up. We caught some good fish and ended up with several prizes. In fact, we have been quite lucky in almost all the tournaments that we have entered and the last few years we have done extremely well. Xtreme was the boat we were on last year and after catching the biggest marling seen in these waters in years the week before, we were being taken seriously. My crew including Big John and Tony had been out with me several weekends in a row before training for the tournament which sounded funny to many, but at the end of the weekend being prepared helped considerably. You see, we fish primarily for the massive Blue Marlin in this tournament hoping along with many other crews to be the first boat in Antigua to catch the elusive GRANDER. A grander is a Marlin over 1000 lbs and although they have been seen and hooked here, no boat has ever been able to bring one back to the scales. UNTIL NOW!!!!!
Xtreme is out to change those stats this year. Tony has been in the gym for 3 months preparing himself for a fight that could last 4 hours or longer. When he got his 590 lb one last year he didn’t skip a beat with that beast fighting him and trying to break him and his line for over two hours. As you can see here it was a pretty good size. I am 6'3'' to give you an idea of the length of the marlin.

I think I sweat more than any boat skipper had done before as the marlin made me fight to keep the boat up with it. We traveled over 2.5 miles according to our GPS and did many circles while we fought it. Anyway, I could go on and on about that fight, but at no time did we feel that we were going to be beaten by the fish. I am sure that with our gear and preparation that veterans Tony, Big John, Chopper, me and the other crew…we will be ready for that grander this year. We finished 2nd behind Derrick Biel’s Obsession last year as he managed to catch one small white marlin more than we did. In fact of all the marlin that we both brought to the side of the boat, none were killed. All we had to do was bring them to the side of the boat, take photos of the fish and then carefully release them to fight another day. You are only allowed to bring one back to the scales if you want to and if it’s over 300 lbs. There is quite a bit of controversy about this and I won’t go into it here, but thanks to the pull out of the Japanese fishing boats last year from the area, we have more marlin than we have had in years. This year’s tournament will prove to be a contest like none seen here before. The largest marlin brought to the scale in this tournament over the past 41 years was a 772 lb Blue that was caught by some years ago by a foreign boat. I think this is a pic of that marlin.

We want bigger this year!!!
Anyway to get people even more excited about this event they are having an opening party next Saturday night (the 19th) at Club Havana in English Harbour from 8pm. Things have gotten very quiet out there as is usually the case after sailing week and this party is usually the biggest thing going on. Come by if you are looking for something to do. There are prize giveaways and plenty of big fish stories and strategies. It’s always a good drinkup and party.
This year TEAM XTREME will be sponsored by Adventure Antigua as usual, but we are looking for another sponsor who can help us cover this costs. The thing about big game sport fishing is that it is extremely expensive. The entrance fees alone are about $500 us and then there is a hell of a lot more in fuel and gear. I will be blogging about our pre-fishing days as well as proper reports of the day by day action. This was a training day last year when we ended up releasing a fish of about 350 lbs.

If you can think of a possible sponsor that would like to get some mileage out of this then please let me know J My poor uncle Jim is also determined to catch a grander and has spent considerable time and money trying to train and prepare his boat and crew for that event, but last week they hit a stumbling block after fighting a small fish for over two hours. Three of his (geriatric) crew had to take turns fighting the Blue Marlin which eventually freed itself close to the boat after several futile hours of punishment. I even here that a doctor was involved later that night, but can not corroborate this story 100%. Lucky for him there is a Sport Division where you target smaller fish like Mahi Mahi, tuna and the like. Here you see the stronger man on his team having a hard time with a mahi mahi..:

Big Blue Marlin are for younger stronger crews like the Adventure Antigua Xtreme…hahahahahahah We fish this weekend and will report then.

Did Antigua Sailing Week "Suck" that bad?

Although this blog doesn’t usually criticize things in Antigua I feel that I need to RANT a bit about this year’s organization of something that has made me proud to be Antiguan for most of my life. Antigua sailing week was as big and as good as ever according to the organizers and “claimers”, but according to many it wasn’t nearly as good as it should have been. In fact so many people have said that “it sucked” that I felt as though I had to write something in the hope that some discussion could happen on the comments section below. I will post the comments if you make them. I mean if you have never been to one and are not a hard core sailor or party animal then I guess you will have though it was awesome.

The Antigua Sailing Week of years gone by was an international event that kept potential visitors excited all year long while they sat through the monotony of their daily lives. Sailing Week was organized by expats here on the island who had sailing and tourism based interests as a way to help enhance a different sector of the tourism product. I wanted to give you more history of the event and after digging through the website I finally found a bit of news that helped set the basis for my rant here on this blog. Read this statement: “It was just over 40 years ago that yacht broker Desmond Nicholson and Antiguan hotelier Howard Hulford came up with the idea of a spring regatta that would extend the tourist and sailing seasons for charterers and yachtsmen alike.” I think that the government of Antigua and Barbuda, the Stanford Financial Group, and the Antigua Hotels and Tourist Association and the rest of us need to read that carefully and remember why this event ever became an iconic one. I have to say that in my opinion Antigua Sailing Week has become marginalized and is now almost an embarrassment when you compare it to other nearby events or even the Antigua Sailing Week of the 80s and 90s.
The feeling I have about ASW is shared by many people who live here as well as many from abroad who knew what ASW was like in the old days.
In my opinion there are several areas of ASW’s organization that need to be corrected ASAP. The first is it needs to be run as if it were a massive corporation who’s success is essential or critical to all of it’s shareholders of which there are many…not only here in Antigua and Barbuda. Once we can come to grips with this then all the other aspects can seriously be taken into consideration, but as long as it is managed as a volunteer operated “fair” then it will keep cascading down the path towards mediocrity. Along with a great many Antiguans both sailors and “limers” (party lovers), I have attended the Heineken Regatta over the past few years. I remember the first time I went to the event as crew on First Run which was skippered by my Uncle Jimmy Fuller way back in the mid 80s. I think we won the regatta overall which was quite an achievement, but nothing like winning Antigua Sailing Week at the time. Back then Heineken was a small weekend regatta which went on while most of St. Martin carried on business as usual without actually knowing there was a sailing event going on. How the tables have turned. Most tourists here last week had no idea there was a regatta going on here until they saw all the yachts sailing past or pulling up into their bays. That’s another story though. After all Hulford and Nicholson started ASW to extend the tourist and sailing season for YACHTSMEN AND CHARTERERS alike. ASW has gone through a midlife crisis and doesn’t remember who the hell it actually is or what it stands for. Maybe the quote above should be a mission statement known by all who are paid to run sailing week. And paid they should be. You think Heineken regatta is where it is today because it's organizers are all volunteers? What is sailing week about now? I mean even I can’t properly describe it. Walking into Nelson’s Dockyard over the weekend some people told me they thought they were actually going through some kind of Jamaican “sound clash” with hard core Jamaican music being blared by massive skyward piles of speakers. Most of the “official parties” and events were soured by the need to “carnivalize” or “jamaicanize” them as well as the need by some of the interested parties within the “organization” of the event to control their interests.

Let’s specifically deal today with the liming or partying aspect of sailing week because I feel that it’s what the majority of the hard core complaints are about. I know that the Antigua Marine and Trades Association as well as some of the other core sailing companies and interests have more of a voice than I do when it comes to the actual racing, so I will leave them to try to make changes in that area. I know that changes need to be made there too because I have listened to experienced racers like my uncle as well as Carlo Falcone criticize the race management. After sailing in almost all previous sailing weeks, Jim actually completely stopped racing recently. Anyway let me move back to the party aspects of ASW because I feel this is where most of the correcting needs to take place.
Mount Gay Rum which by the way is not a sponsor of sailing week at all has been running the best run sailing week party for years and years. Of course they have an incredible wealth of experience in sponsoring and organizing parties and events within the international sailing community, and the only internationally recognized sailing event beacon is the Red Mount Gay sailing event hat. My dad has decades of Antigua Sailing Week hats from Mount Gay. Why are their parties so successful? Its this simple……they are organized for the yachting community and the yacht crews by paid professionals……all the rest of us join in because they are fun parties different from what we are used to in Antigua. Over at Galleon Beach or Calabash as its now called there are no crazy Jamaican hifi mountains, no speeches by politicians, or tourism/hotel officials, no other shows or carnival sidelines or distractions….just rum, happy sailors, some music, organized bars, and organized food…..Each person who is involved in ASW should go to this Mount Gay “unofficial” party and see how the entire event should be run. Hey guess what…? The entire Heineken regatta is run like the Mount Gay Rum party. Everything was flawlessly organized with specific events each day and night. The entertainment is always perfect….I mean how do you expect a party to be run properly when there is no clear epicenter….instead there are hifi systems and sub-parties all over the place. Anyway, in an incredibly intelligent effort to learn from the Mount Gay red hat party’s success, the Antigua Distillery and ASW decided to put on an official crew party to kind of open sailing week the day before the Red Hat party. They did this several years ago when they took on a more significant sponsorship and party management role within ASW. Their idea was very similar to Mount Gay’s with a free rum party on a beach. This time is was at Pigeon Beach and immediately it was a smashing success. Yachties and partiers from all over the place turned up in droves and for several years it was as good if not better than the Red Hat party. It was a true opening bash!!! Then something went wrong…..they felt as though they didn’t have enough control over the party with vendors and the like turning up. I am not 100% sure why but they did decide to move it over to Nelson’s Dockyard 2 years ago….this way it was within the national park and more easily controlled. Immediately the vibe changed and numbers dropped. This year the party was miniscule compared to years before and the vibe was totally lame. A party in the Caribbean on the beach can not be made better by putting it on the lawn of a hotel even if it’s within the national park of Nelson’s Dockyard. What was the problem with having an awesome opening party on Pigeon Beach? Anyone can see that this was a mistake. Ok here goes another mistake……. Lay day was as much a part of sailing week as the sailing was and as far as I remember it was organized at The Antigua Yacht Club with crazy games and fun for yacht crews as well as others. Fantastic photos and press reports described this event making it part of what made ASW unique. I am sure that someone will tell me that I am totally wrong, but it seems to me that Antigua Distillery took over the management of this party and felt that it would be better if it was moved over to Pigeon Beach. Now there were several things wrong with this decision. But first is the “if its not broke..don’t fix it” saying. Why change a good thing? Each year it was filled with excited and happy sailors and party lovers. None of the sailors had to get in cabs or take the long walk down to Pigeon Beach…..It was all right there in front of them. Many people who were not into sailing felt that this was the climax of ASW. Well it seems as though ASW needs a few blue pills because this year there was not much of a climax at all. OK so as I said they moved it to Pigeon Beach where as I have already said, hosted a great opening party in the past. Why couldn’t it do a good job on lay day? Well I guess because so many people loved lay day at the yacht club that they felt snubbed by the move to Pigeon. Ever since they moved it..the lay day party has been lame. It lacked any kind of energy and last years was sooooo bad that the Antigua Distillery and the ASW gang decided to not even have a lay day this year. It wasn’t until the week or two before that they sent out a frantic email saying that after all they would have it…but back at Pigeon. Ok so Pigeon wasn’t as good as the lay day at Antigua Yacht Club but at least it was a lay day right? Well they also decided to have an official birthday party over at Shirley Heights at the same time? Can you believe it? I don’t even have to say why this conflict of interest is crazy do I?
There are many other problems with the way the parties were organized or NOT organized but all in all I think that people who enjoyed the awesome party atmosphere of the 80s and 90s Antigua Sailing Weeks can only hope that something is done to change the way ASW has gone. This year I missed most of Sailing Week and went to the Tobago Jazz festival….I think I will book my flights earlier for next years festival because I know that I will not be the only Antiguan planning a trip there. If you like to party and are at all interested in seeing why people feel that ASW isn’t as good as it could be, then you should go to the Heineken regatta next March in St. Martin. They learned from us and now ASW needs to learn from them. All of the people involved with ASW should have to go!!! Face the fact that ASW isn’t as good as it used to be and many of us who know or knew better are not happy with the way it has fallen from grace.

I truly think that if people like Desmond Nicholson (RIP) and Howard Hulford could spend some time walking around during race week they would be incredibly disappointed.

new tour for the summer season

I think we are about to start a new tour using the Xtreme boat. The tour will be very similar to the regular Xtreme Circumnav but will not do the hour at Stingray City. Instead after picking up our guests and zooming along the West and North shores we will pull up to a nice reef for drinks and then a snorkeling lesson. After the lesson we will do a nice guided snorkeling session through the reef taking lots of time so that nobody feels rushed.

From there the tour will continue as the regular Xtreme tour: cruising up past Long Bay and the Pineapple Beach hotel and devils bridge towards Nonsuch Bay and Green Island.

Here we will do the usual hour long stop for the famous buffet lunch and beach chill time before thinking about cruising on.

past the famous but seldom seen Mill Reef Club, then past Half Moon Bay and Willoughby Bay with the Crossroads center, then past Mamora Bay and the St. James Club. We stop into the beautiful and secluded Indian Creek near the Sunken Rock dive site just long enough for you to shoot a few pics of the unique house on "Stanfast Point" and Lookout which is a little further downwind. We then will cruise along the massive volcanic cliffs of the Fort Shirley coast before passing The Pillars of Hercules on our way into Nelson's Dockyard where we will give you a proper historical commentary as we slowly cruise along the beautiful historical harbour. On our way back out the harbour we will get everyone set up with snorkeling gear for our exclusive snorkeling session at the Pillars.

Like much of what our company does, this snorkeling session is only done by Adventure Antigua. Another unique stop is the next and last official stop on this action packed tour.....Rendezvous Bay.

Unfortunately there are many rumors about a development planned for this beautiful beach. Up until now a busy day there is when we have to share the bay with a little dinghy.

You see no man made structures when you sit on the beach enjoying our traditional rum punch on this last stop. From there we cruise along the south coast passing the fantastic hotels of Carlisle Bay and Curtain Bluff, going down past Cades Reef and Cades Bay towards the South-West corner that is Johnson’s Point where we pass Turners Beach, Blue Heron, and OJs. Keep counting as we are passing some of the most beautiful beaches in the Caribbean along Antigua’s Leeward Caribbean side. The tour will be less expensive than the regular Xtreme Circumnav as we won’t have the additional expense of Stingray City, but it will be very similar and as good. If it works well this summer we may just keep it on for select days this winter too. We’ll see. Look for this tour on our website and in hotels next week.

its not just whales that are being killed

The topic yesterday raised quite a bit of interest, comments and emails, and I feel that more time needs to be spent on the issue of Antigua and Barbuda support for international whaling. More will come in the future, but there is another issue which is somewhat related. You see, Japan’s interest is not only for whaling and there are many who feel that whaling is just a tiny part of their own brand of “manifest destiny”. Japan is preparing for a much larger war I think which has to do with international protection of other species sometime in the future. Tuna which are increasingly being seen as a threatened species are an essential part of Japan’s culture. There are many other threatened or endangered species that Japan consumes and will fight to keep killing.
One such species is the Hawksbill Turtle. The photo above is of me holding a baby hawksbill that had been injured by predators. It was all healed up but missing most of its propulsion on one side. It is an incredibly endangered species which we speak about in great detail on our eco tour and which is protected by law in Antigua during the nesting season. In fact, that season begins now, and we are lucky enough to have one of the world’s best ongoing studies on them. Each year two scientist from the University of Georgia come to Antigua to study these amazing creatures over at Pasture Bay on Long Island just East of the airport. The study is co-sponsored by Jumby Bay which is a 5 star resort on Long Island. Click here for more info: http://www.jbhawksbillproject.org/ One of the most amazing statistics, and there are many, about these turtles is the fact that only 1 out of every 10,000 eggs that are buried by the momma turtles reaches maturity. A mature turtle is about 12 years old. Japan is the worlds largest consumer of Hawksbill turtle products and each year fights international protection of this species. How can our government align themselves with Japan when we use turtles in the marketing of our main economic product. We even have turtles on our passports!!!!! My sister Franny is doing her thesis on Turtle Conservation as i write this and is so incredibly upset and ashamed with the situation in our country.
Anyway, I will keep today’s blog short, but I hope that some of you can come up with interesting ideas on how to change our country’s position. On a closely related note….i am in tobago at the moment and am spending time with the Clovis family from the Kariwak resort. Tanya Clovis is part of the SOS group which helps to protect turtles here. Last night we had the unexpected pleasure of seeing a huge Leatherback turtle nesting on a beach here. She was probably about 500 lbs and it was just amazing seeing her do her thing. I didn’t get any good photos as taking flash photography can endanger the lives of these beautiful creatures in several ways.

Tanya is also looking after a Olive Ridley turtle which appears to have been hit by a boat. Two days ago I had to help change her water and the photo I took here is of her eating her favorite meal. Jumbo shrimp! She is putting on incredible weight and today we are going to try to take her for a swim in the ocean. Hopefully she will be able to swim properly and more importantly dive on her own soon. All of these animals are killed each year as by catch in commercial fishing which is another reason Japan is extremely concerned with people or nations who think that protection of these animals is a necessity.

Lets kill more whales....???

I took the photos above while out catching mahi mahi with my cousin David one afternoon. These lovely creatures pass through our waters each year.

Many people are quite shocked when they find out that several of the governments in these tiny Caribbean islands support countries like Japan, Norway, and Iceland in commercial whaling. I can just hear some of you saying: “WHAT!!”, but although unfortunate it is true. Japan decided to use manipulative democracy and outright bribes to persuade islands like Antigua to vote alongside them at International Whaling Conventions so that they may be able to protect and peruse their interests.
One of the biggest problems when it comes to marine environmentalism in Antigua and Barbuda is that our people do not swim. It’s that simple to me. I have been told by ministers in our government that because they don’t swim they are not interested in going boating at all. Because people don’t get a chance to see all the cool and interesting stuff out there they don’t understand or care as much. There is incredible ignorance within the government when it comes to marine related matters and so much so when it comes to whaling. Look at this government statement printed in today’s Daily Observer. Speaking about why they have chosen to side with Japan here is what they say:

“It is a matter of
food security and the preservation
of our right as a sovereign
nation to build international
alliances,” it said.

That almost sounds ok but then you read: “A government statement
said the island has
always been guided by its
“principled support for the
sustainable utilization of our
vast and rich marine
resources in a manner and at
a rate that will ensure that
these resources are available
for generations to come.”

Absolute crap!!! Read the rest of the article on OBSERVER ARTICLE
Our marine recourse has nothing to do with voting for increased whale kill quotas for Japan, and when Japan is offering financial “aid” in the form of useless fisheries plants the argument is even more ridiculous. Our fishing industry is not being helped by Japan of our government and I am the first to say that instead of making sure it is there for generations to come, it is being ignored in a way that there can be no doubt of its demise long before my generation passes the torch. Our fishery is being utilized alright but by Guadeloupe…something which our government cares not to regulate at all. At the end of the day, our government’s position on fisheries is just this simple: they are using it as an excuse to take specific “aid” (bribes) from Japan, and have chosen only to educate themselves on the Japan argument for international whaling. They know more about that than they do know about conch farming, Mahi Mahi catching, reef fishing protection and regulation, tuna fishing….or anything else that is directly related to our waters and fisheries. It’s a political argument which no opposing political party has chosen to ridicule yet. The only people trying to expose how crazy our island’s support for international whaling are individuals and NGOs like http://caribbeanwhalefriends.org/index.htm which is a site that was launched today. There is a heap of info on this topic and i will add links in the near future. You can write on message boards and send letters to our toursim offices to show them how horrified you are that they could side with japan. They need to know that this can not and will not go on. They will lose support from people like you and me.

rest in peace Timmy

Timmy seen above at the front of Xtreme on the way back from a staff trip to St. Martin worked with Adventure Antigua for a short time back in Feb and March last year. Mostly he worked on the Eco Tour with Captain Shamel who was running the show at the time. He came to work with my company when i had to go off for my third knee operation.

This weekend he was killed in Miami when the motorcycle he was riding was hit by another car. He was going pretty fast and wasn't wearing a helmet. The car sped off leaving him to pass away on the side of the road. There couldn't be a more horrible end for such a young person whatever you thought of him. I feel as though i have to say a few things here about him as many of my crew were very close to him as were many others in antigua.
Last night i spoke to a young friend who said that she couldn't stop crying and i know that this terrible accident has had the same impact on many...some of whom didn't even know him.
I knew him and don't want to say too much other than to say that he was a happy person who had the ability to liven up a situation. His smile was friendly and his manner calm. Some think that he made some very bad decisions over the past few years, but i think like many teens who have had a rough time along the way, Timmy had the integrity inside him to mature and come out a better person. It is just so sad that he couldnt achieve this. Many things in life are yet to be accomplished and we all should think for a second about how fragile and how short life really is. "Live ya life.....", is something that Timmy is known to have said very often and one of the saddest things about this is that he didn't get a chance to live a long healthy and fullfilling life. He will be missed by many.

All you need is love......

“Wan Lovv” is the exact way that people from Antigua would pronounce “one love” and it is a concept and belief that many religions and or philosophies hold as a core belief. In Antigua when I was a kid there was a unique tribe of Rastafarians called “The Wan Lovv” tribe and these particular Rastafarians believed extremely strongly in the one love principal and practiced a religion which held on to many of the hippie sort of beliefs. I did a wiki search on the Rastafarian faith and didn’t think that the One Love tribe came close to that. After I did a search for hippie on wiki and realized that the tribe here more closely resembled hippies than strict Rasta beliefs. Remember that old hippie band from England that sang “all you need is love”? Anyway, one of the tribe members changed his name to “wan Lovv” I guess in an effort to spread his faith. I guess it would be like a Christian preacher changing his name to “Love Jesus” or something like that. I dunno for sure but to this day I think that he is the most interesting Rastafarian I have ever met. Wan Lovv started working for the Ross family nearly 30 years ago first at their service station and eventually onto the first of the Wadadli Catamarans. He spent 18 years on Wadadli Cats and recently retired. I remember when Inigo and Xabier Ross first started Wadadli Cats how Wan Lovv would help them with the tour cleaning and cooking. One of the reasons I would love to windsurf up to Bird Island from Dutchmans Bay was to get a bit of his delicious chicken. Also, it was so interesting to me to be in the company of someone who really was a “wan Lovv” tribe member. He is full of compassion for people and is extremely gentle and goon natured and unfortunately you don’t come across many people like that in this world. I mean you know immediately when you meet him that his calm loving manner is strangely genuine. When I started my company Wan Lovv told me that he could come and help me out on his days off from Wadadli Cats, and he did work with me quite a few times during the early eco tour days until my tour got busier and I employed full time crew. After leaving Wadadli Cats he decided one day that he wanted to still be involved in the excursion business, and he thankfully made the decision to try something different. After making sure that Xabier was ok with me employing Wan Lovv I took him on last Monday. So far everyone at Adventure Antigua is delighted that he has chosen to be part of the family and I can only hope that he puts off full retirement for as long as possible. If you come out on the tour be sure to say hi if he’s on board.

Antigua Sailing Week turnes 40

First I would just like to thank people for the concern, suggestions and thoughtful comments about the situation spoken about in my last post. Let’s move on:

The 40th annual Antigua Sailing Week starts this weekend with all the excitement that one of the world’s biggest sailing events is expected to bring. So far there have been several massive pre race parties and I have been to two of them.
The racing action starts on Sunday and you can check the race and official party schedule on http://www.sailingweek.com

I have actually raced a few times and can tell you that being out there racing each day and then expecting to keep up with the hard core party schedule isn’t easy. Sailors will be sailors though and as you would expect the amount of alcohol consumed in Antigua this week will be staggering just like the sailors.
The first official party was the Antigua Distillery free rum party which was held inside the Nelsons Dockyard on Thursday evening. Cavalier Rum which is what I call the Antigua distillery has been a big sponsor of sailing week for some time and has been throwing a free rum party for years now. The free rum party has been going on for much longer though and was originally started by Mount Gay. When the Barbadian rum was dropped as a sponsor Cavalier took up the position and started having the “official” free rum party over at Pigeon Beach. From the start the party was massive and everyone was there each year early. If you want to see Antiguans on time just give them the hour when u will start serving free rum. I was there at the front of the line each year. The party on the beach was wonderful and the atmosphere set the tone and standard for the rest of Antigua Sailing Week. For some completely crazy reason Cavalier decided to move the party from the beach into the controlled environment that is Nelsons Dockyard. I think the problem as they saw it was the fact that it was more difficult to ultimately control the party down on the beach whereas is was totally controllable at Dockyard. Well not only was it controllable but it was also not as good. This year the numbers for the party were tiny compared to the old free rum beach parties and even the atmosphere was tamed down. That didn’t stop me from making sure that they off loaded their free rum. It was fun but I think that it needs to be sent back to pigeon beach next year. After the last drop of free rum was consumed people still stuck around for a few more hours until the massive Soul2Soul Back 2 Life party at Abras got started with the famous UK DJs.
The next day was an early tour so lifting my head off to shut up the alarm at 6:15 was not too cool. Yesterday was the second free rum party organized by the original free rum bad boy Mount Gay Rum from Barbados. As usual they put on a massive free rum and free hat party at Galleon Beach where almost all the racers as well as half the island turned up to get wasted. Woooo hoooo!!! What a party…the setting and mood was perfect as usual and I think everyone had a great time……The crazy thing is that even though this party is not an official one…it is always the best and most organized of all Antigua Sailing Week events. The organizers need to stop trying to change things and just use some common sense. Anyway, long before the party ended I got a water taxi back into Nelson’s Dockyard where my ride was. (I didn’t drive.)
The sailing action begins on Sunday where over 215 yachts race half way around the island to Dickenson Bay where a massive party will be set up.

My two boats are chartered by long time local customers who want to follow some of the racing and end up at Dickenson to party.

Everyone on the island who has a boat will be there and as is usual there will be way too much alcohol consumed once again.

I am off to the Tobago Jazz Festival and will be missing the action here. Will try to stay in touch as I will be taking my laptop too.

Unfortunate event.

Yesterday we had a very troubling thing happen on our eco tour that I want to mention. I would love to know what people think about it too. Of course you can leave anonymous comments if you like as well.
First of all I have to tell you that Trevor has gone off to England as planned to play county league cricket. He does this every year and although we are very sad to see him go, we are also happy that he is doing something that he loves so much. We will take him back on board next autumn when the cricket season is over there. We have hired a new staff member and I will introduce him properly on another post. He has been working non stop in this sort of business for 18 years and is generally recognized as being one of the best tour guides and “boat men” in Antigua. We are delighted to have Wan Lovv on board with us.
Anyway, back to the problems from yesterday. I had given Tony a day off and the tour was being run by Francis, Louis and Wan Lovv. As has always been our practice, we invited guests to come on and not worry about paying for the tour until the end…which I have always felt is a nicer way of doing things. Many people store their bags down in the cabin, some keep bags with them on deck, some keep only cameras, some keep waterproof money pouches. For the most part though, people keep their bags down in the cabin. As is usual, the first time the guests come off the boat is at Bird Island when one of the crew takes everyone on a small hike and nature walk. Two of the crew remain on board preparing lunch and getting stuff ready for a snorkeling lesson. The next time its possible for all the guests to be off the boat at the same time is when we are at hells gate. There are 5 choices of things to do and one of them is chilling on the boat. Yesterday all guests left the boat with Francis leaving Wan Lovv and Louie behind to clean up and get the snorkeling gear ready for the next stop off Welch Rock where our final snorkeling stop is. As Francis anchored up at this final stop a gentleman came up to him loudly shouting “I have been robbed…I have been robbed.” At first, Francis thought he was joking, but quickly realized that he wasn’t. All the other guests on board stopped what they were doing to see what was going on. He and his wife had been sitting in the front of the boat on the driver’s side (in front of Francis) the entire day and unlike most of the other passengers, had kept their bag with them. The guest said that his money had been stolen out of the front pocket of his bag which had been left on his seat. It had been folded inside a money clip together with his credit cards. The clip and the cards and all the other things from his bag were there. He said that the only people that could have stolen it were Wan Lovv and Louie. All of this wasn’t being done discreetly and Francis explained that he would call me to find out what I wanted to do. I was so shocked that I couldn’t think of what to do other that to ask how much money was missing. Francis relayed that only the money to pay for the tour $140 US was missing. They didn’t have any other money with them at all, so I told Francis to let them know that we were terribly sorry that this has happened and to let them know that he didn’t have to worry about finding more money to pay us. I told him that it would be the company’s loss and for this event not to take away from the enjoyment of his holiday. I told Francis to take the crew aside and question them and to also let all the guests know that they should check their things as well. He told me that he didn’t have to as everyone had heard him saying that he had been robbed. No other bags had been tampered with either below or above deck. I also told him to ask the guest what he felt should be done, and suggested that we could inform the police about the robbery. Unfortunately the guest was irate and upon getting back to port said that he wasn’t interested in seeing the police (who are always at the port) and told Francis that he needed to do a better job of watching his crew. This of course was again not discreetly said in private and made for an extremely bitter end to what had otherwise been a fantastic day. In fact the boys ended up with US $180 in tips after the tour yesterday.
Maybe they ended up with more………???????? I have never ever had reason to think that any of my staff with me now or any of those who have moved on have stolen anything from me or from my guests. One time over the past 8 years we had a camera stolen on board which ended up being taken by another guest….(long story but camera was returned), but this was the first time that one of my guests had cash taken in a situation where one or more of my staff was implicated.

I met the boat in Jolly Harbour and questioned each crew individually about the situation. From what i could tell Wan Lovv and Louie had always been together throughout the day especially when the guests were off the boat. As Wan Lovv is new on our boat i had asked the other crew to carefully guide him on how things run on our tour. They were never out of eachother's sight.
OK so what do I do? I guess I should now make the change to collect all moneys as people come on the boat like all the other tours do…..
This almost guarantees that I get the correct money at the end of the day, but it wouldn’t guarantee that other moneys or valuables in the guest’s bags were completely safe. It’s a tough one…there are many solutions which all have pros and cons. At the end of the day its something that I would like input from prospective guests and guests who have been with us before. What do you think about this situation and do you have any ideas about ways to make sure that it won’t happen again?

Antigua Classic Yacht Regatta and photos

Today is the last race in the Antigua Classic Yacht Regatta. Actually the main part of the racing finished yesterday, and today’s race is the single handed race where the captains arte expected to race alone against each other. I can tell you that sailing some of those classic yachts with all the different rigs is difficult with a large crew let alone by yourself.

I drove for Roddy on Friday and for Ian on Saturday. Francis drove Roddy again on Sunday and I am sure that Acqua Films will come up with another awesome video of the Antigua Classic Yacht Challenge as it is now called.

The winds were fairly light which made the sailing seem less exciting, but with lighter winds there are always more critical decisions to be made by the skipper and crew. The lighter the winds are the more critical it is to use the best tactics, and there is no event out there where tactics are more crucial.

Tonight is the awards ceremony and I know that there are a few Antigua based yachts that are in contention for the overall trophy and coveted Panerai watch. As usual, the organization and participation was fantastic and I am sure this unique event will be getting great international press coverage. I took way too many photos on Saturday as Stevie was helping me drive. I put a few here for you to enjoy. If you wanna see more goto my photo site.

The Antigua Sailing Week parties start on Thursday and the first day of racing is Sunday. Sailing Week is always a much larger more modern event and although its facing increasing competition from St. Martin’s Heineken Regatta, it is generally regarded as the premier sailing event in the Caribbean.

Yesterday was Earth Day....

Earth day came and went once again without much attention here on the island or internationally being paid to its significance. Earth Day according to WIKI was started on April 22nd 1970 by a US senator by the name of Gaylord Nelson.

His funny name didn’t stop him from getting 20 million people to participate that first year. His steps to start this first “environmental teach in” has now become something which about 500 million people take part in each April 22nd. It is a day when people are encouraged to celebrate, learn and or teach more about our planet’s environment.

I find environmentalism something very tricky in fact. My dad has always been some sort of eco warrior here on the island and I guess his influence as well as my love for the natural environment helped me to become equally interested in the earth day principals of celebrating the earth’s environment and helping others see its fragile beauty.

On an island where there is always a great deal of development going on around you there are always stressors on the environment.

Also with such a terrible lack of environmental education within the government we have seen a very slow move towards protection of our environment. When the laws are finally drawn up to protect the mangroves, the fish or the reef….implementation is a further hurdle not even on the horizon. Being an eco warrior here isn’t that easy and faced with losing battles after battles some people just give up. After “fighting” for years on behalf of Antigua’s environment I recently decided to change my tactics. I felt I was becoming more and more disenchanted and made the conscious decision to take a few steps back away from fighting what seemed like a losing battle and to try to appreciate what was left more. While appreciating the environment I would try to show people what makes it special TO ME in an effort to change people’s perceptions about what it is that we are losing very quickly.

A little side note here: Yesterday I noticed that the lovely mangrove area next to the main road which runs between Jolly Harbour and Valley Church was being attacked by heavy machinery. I have no idea who the owner or developer is but someone has decided to fence some of the land adjacent to the mangroves and main road and to build a small road in between the fence and the swamp. In order to build this little road huge old mangrove trees were dug up this weekend. Yes on Earth Day mangrove plants were being dug up on the main land in plain view on Antigua. Anyway, on the weekend I was sure that it would be very difficult to get anything done so I waited until today. The property by the way starts next to the Coco’s turn off and almost appears to be owned by them although this may not be so at all. The first call I made a short while ago was to the Ministry Of Environment. Their website gives an environmental crime “hotline” so I called that one. A lady answered saying that of the three “officers” that were supposed to be there, one was off island, one was on sick leave and the other wasn’t going to be in the office that day. I told her that digging up mangrove was a pretty big deal and asked if there was anyone I could speak with. She said that I had better call the fisheries department. I wasn’t going to even bother with that one. The next phone call was to Cocos hotel since their main sign was along this fence and property. This time the person in the office there had no idea what I was speaking about. I don’t think they even knew what mangroves were, so I told them to have the owner give me a call. I know he recently was in a bunch of hot water with the government over environmental planning so I am sure he would be interested in this issue. Anyway, as you can see there seems to be very little interest in getting anything done here and sometimes banging your head against the wall hurts more than it helps. Many of the young Antiguan kids that I know seem to be more interested in the environment than their parents are and I guess time will tell if the next generation is willing to make changes. For now I think I will continue to enjoy it more than just rant about it. Of course I will also try to educate others about our environment as well.
Recently I found out that we have a recycling center here which is collecting #1 and #2 plastic bottles and containers as well as aluminum cans. I think they collect and crush them in order to send them off island to be recycled. It’s a great initiative and something that I decided I wanted to be part of. If you are here and want to learn more about it please email me or call me on 725 7263. Adventure Antigua now is taking all of our recyclable material to their collecting center on Barnes Hill. It actually feels good to do something however small it may be. Another nice thing that has happened recently is that Harney Motors is collecting all used engine oils to be used in the production of diesel. I am not sure how the process works but it sure feels good to take our waste oils to be processed knowing it will be re-used. There are many ways that we can all chip in to help the environment and we must not give up totally.

With all the guilt trips the hard core environmentalists are willing to share out and all the people on the opposite end of the scale who just don’t seem to care, it is easy to become disenchanted, but with the general theme of earth day which is to inspire awareness and appreciation for the Earth’s environment, I think we can make a difference.

Antigua Classic Yacht Regatta 2007

The 2007 Antigua Classic Yacht Regatta starts today with the skippers meeting coctail meeting going on as we speak. I was invited to go, but will try to avoid the free drink thing tonight as i have an early start tomorrow. Roddy and Ian from Acqua Films have hired me once again to be their boat driver over the four days of sailing.

My job will be to get them as close to the action as is safely possible without getting in the way or giving too much wake to the yachts. I guess i should have started out by explaining what the Antigua Classic Yacht Regatta is all about. This event is now the most prestigious of its kind in the Caribbean and probably ranks out near the top internationally too. I think that in order to be eligible to register your yacht must be an older wooden boat or at least look like it is.

The organizers like to differentiate their regatta from the larger and less organized Antigua Sailing Week by saying that their competitors drink more champagne and less rum, but I think anyone on a yacht consumes copious amounts of rum whatever their vessel looks like. When Adventure Antigua was starting out i did plenty of driving for Michael Kahn who is a pro photographer that would come down to shoot the regatta. Check out his images. Lovely stuff. I got side tracked yesterday and didn’t finish posting this, so here it is a day later.

I shot the images on Wednesday. Hope you like em.

billion dollar bridge

Usually I don't meddle too much directly in Antiguan politics as there are way too many people doing that as it is. This time the story is just too good to ignore. First of all, I have to clearly say that everything I am about to describe has come to me third hand, and so far I am unable to verify if the story is actually true. Whether it is or not doesn’t take away the fact that it's a great story.
Last Saturday we were sitting down for a big breakfast with several people and one of the people said that she had been told by a house guest that a politician was planning on building a bridge from Antigua to Barbuda. "WHAT!!!!!???", I said. I told them that their house guest must have heard wrong because nobody could be so silly to think that it was possible or even viable. It must have been a joke or more likely they must have misheard. She said that the house guest had heard it on the radio and that the politician had also said something about the "fact" that before humans had arrived on the islands, the islands were joined and deer were able to walk freely between the connected land mass. This nearly had me rolling on the floor in hysterics. I checked my watch for the date but April 1st was weeks before. Surely this politician was speaking about the offshore Guiana Island with its deer. The island is so close to the mainland that conceivably a bridge could be built and once upon a time the shallow section on the South West side could have allowed deer to pass between the two. My breakfast buddy agreed that her house guest must have heard wrong and the politician must have been speaking about Guiana and its deer. After all, with all the political debate and fervor surrounding Guiana Island a bridge would be something spoken about. Anyway days later, I find out that not only was there some truth to the story in the Antigua Sun newspaper, but it wasn't a joke either. The article didn't appear to mention anything about the deer and also didn't get into any proper debate about the possibility of the noble plans.
I think the Allan Stanford owned Antigua Sun dropped the ball on this story. There is so much to this story that could be written about that I am just gonna have to attempt to put a few thoughts down myself.
Lets first speak about the deer, but in doing so please let it be known that I have not found out if the politician did actually say anything about them. If not the following is just food for thought that you can chew over if you like. I am about to say something that may come as a big shock to some Antiguan readers. It may be so controversial that if I was not a proud Antiguan, I could be thrown off the island. Here goes: THE DEER ARE NOT INDIGENOUS. The word indigenous means native or originally from. In other words the deer we have in Antigua were not originally from here and were actually imported to the islands very recently in the historical scheme of things. The fallow deer is actually what environmentalists would call an alien species. Furthermore in the general scheme of things environmentally most alien species are regarded as being a negative strain on the local environment. Deer are seen as an extremely dangerous and destructive alien species to the indigenous plant life found on the area which they have either invaded or been brought to. It’s not that difficult to see that deer restrict the growth of plant life and there are hundreds of scientific articles and journals describing this. That’s another story, but the point is these deer were not originally found here and the indigenous people, the Arawak Indians, did not ever see them. The deer were imported long after the Europeans arrived here. A very good site for historical info is http://www.antiguamuseums.org/cultural.htm Look what they have to say about the deer.

"N A T I O N A L A N I M A L
The European Fallow Deer. (Dama dama dama)
Suitably, two deer are very prominent on our nation’s coat-of-arms. Deer do not live on any other island in the Eastern Caribbean, but they have thrived on Barbuda and Guiana Island (off the north coast of Antigua) for centuries. Deer are not indigenous to Antigua and Barbuda, but then no other mammal appears to be except perhaps a bat or two. It is thought European Fallow Deer were first introduced from Norway into England at the time of James I. It is not known exactly when the lessees of Barbuda, the Codringtons, introduced deer into Barbuda, but there were as many as a thousand head in 1740 and by 1827, they were a “nuisance” for they stripped the vegetation. In 1784, three thousand were reported, whereas a century later, there were only about 300. Deer were introduced onto Guiana Island sometime after 1811, when Bethell Codrington bought it for raising stock.
There has been some confusion as to whether the deer were Fallow or White-tailed, but it has now been ascertained they are Fallow. There are at least two varieties, black and common. At the beginning of this century the hunting license fee was œ1 for 3 deer, and the season was from January to April and from July to October. It is no longer common to see deer in Barbuda. There are quite a number of them on Guiana Island on the north coast of Antigua, which are carefully protected."

Let’s move onto the idea of constructing a bridge to Barbuda.
The worlds most powerful and richest country is considering a similar bridge and plan so that one of its smallest islands can be properly developed and its 8000 people can more easily travel back and forth. That bridge would span a slightly shorter distance of about half a mile. The water is much shallower between the mainland and the island there too but the cost of this bridge seems to be about US $315 million which the USA thinks is too much at the moment. If we consider that construction is always more expensive here and that the water is way deeper and the distance way longer…I can conservatively estimate that the cost of a bridge to Barbuda would be about US $16,380,000,000. Over Sixteen billion us dollars is possible to find these days I guess. The boys from Google each have found that kind of cash pretty quickly, but somehow I think that our little Gov will have a little more difficulty coming up with an idea similar to that of Larry Page and Sergey Brin.
All in all I think this story is filled with fantasy and humor and worth of more discussion. Whatever happens in the future with this bridge...let me just say that I would be the first person in line to drive over. The pic above shows why.

laughing into spring

Several weeks ago I wrote saying that spring had arrived and each day more and more signs of spring show up around Antigua. It’s such a lovely time all over the world depending on when it actually happens, and Antigua is no different. When we were in Barbuda for the Easter holiday one of the biggest tell tale signs that show that winter is over was the arrival of Laughing Gulls. These gulls arrive each year around this time having flown down from the South East Coast of the USA where they scavenge in the winter. They arrive here as huge schools of pilchards and other tiny fish are hatching out. You will see them feeding all around the coastline in big flocks trying to catch little fish. They will also feed on anything else they can get their beaks on and if you are here in the summer you will have to guard your lunch carefully if you are picnicking on the beach. I have seen them clean someone’s plate as they walked off for coffee leaving their full English breakfast unguarded. Watch out!! These laughing gulls start laying eggs some time around the end of May on many of the off-shore islands around Antigua.

Just this morning I was on Dickenson bay beach meeting the eco tour when I heard one of the beach vendors complaining about “these dam birds……they make so much noise and harass the tourists when dem ah eat.” I thought that was pretty funny.
There are more funny things about them though. When they are making their nests you will see many of them jockeying for a good position on one of the islands and they look and sound like they are arguing. I have sat there and had a good laugh myself as they appear to scream and shout at each other.

Once they have nested and the little grey chicks begin to leave their nests something amazing happens up around Bird, Exchange and Rabbit Islands. We often see a single adult sitting on the water with about 12-20 little grey juveniles screaming instructions…or so it appears. I am not kidding either. If you come here in August or September you will see this for sure. Just ask Tony to show you the laughing gull school and he will know what you are talking about. These birds are also very aggressive with other birds and we have seen them actually eat other small birds like finches and hummingbirds. I have seen a large flock of adults almost work together to push a small bird over the water in order to kill it and eat it. The crazy thing is that only one gull gets to eat it. Spanish point in barbuda is where we have seen that. These birds will also steal and eat other bird’s eggs. They are nesting the same time as the tiny least terns unfortunately for the terns. They also will eat little hawksbill turtles if they get the chance and you will hear about that problem on the eco tour if you come. All in all these laughing gulls are hard core survivors and although they are pests to many they are interesting in their methods and do signal spring’s arrival. Don’t get too annoyed with their laugh!

photography you say?

While at university getting my business degree my curriculum directed me to take several electives which were any classes could fit into my work schedule. You had to do them and the choices were not always that interesting to me. After all my school was primarily an engineering school and the study of fluid dynamics sounded extremely difficult no matter how interesting. Instead I was lucky enough to be able to pick three different environmental science classes over on year, a human sexuality class, and I did a advanced open water diving certification which was offered as an elective too. Cool huh? I had almost ran out of “easy” elective options and the only class that was left that looked easy enough to fit in while trying to get through Managerial Accounting, Finance, and Economics classes was a course in Photography. Surprisingly is was a three credit class over three months which was quite a bit for something I thought would be so simple. Hey I could handle it…and I had heard that there were always cute girls in that class too. I borrowed a camera and signed up for the night class. From day one, I realized how wrong I had been about this class. As usual because Florida Tech was mostly filled with engineering majors the cute girl thing didn’t materialize. Now I don’t want any engineering majors to get upset with me, but back in the very early 90s most of Florida Tech was made up of men and the few women there fit the unfortunate engineering major stereotype which at the time wasn’t my kind of match. Anyway, I was there to learn and in this case learn about photography. My teacher seemed to be a nice guy who was quite obviousely extremely talented, but I was sure that he must have been a drill sergeant in his last life. For the next three months he forced us to do an incredible amount of work and I ended up trying to find time to deal with my other business classes. He was specifically interested in making sure we understood the technical aspects of photography focusing on the subtle differences that changes in shutter speed or aperture could accomplish. Very surprisingly I found out that I actually enjoyed completing the assignments and it ended up being a favorite class of mine. After graduating I didn’t spend much time taking photos since it was so expensive to get them developed. I was spending every available cent on my windsurfing career anyway, so my camera got moth balled and forgotten. Then came the digital revolution and all of a sudden you could get an inexpensive digital camera that you could manually adjust the settings like you would on a proper 35mm camera. I got one and immediately fell back into it. Over the past few years I have done quite a bit of photography for two main reasons I guess. One is because I find it quite relaxing and the other is because I like showing people the adventurews that my friends and I get up to. Not everyone will get an oppottunity to see some of the things I have been lucky to be part of, and I know that many enjoy the images. Some time ago I was shown a site called Flickr which is one of the many photo sharing sites on the net. I kept on getting harassed by friends to email them photos I had taken while out at the beach or at a party and emailing images is always a time consuming business. On flickr there is a simple uploading tool that you can download which helps you put your photos of any size onto the net in seconds. Once they are up there then you just have to email the ling to your friends and then they can pass them around or not. Flickr was purchased by yahoo recently and it has turned into one of the biggest photo sites on the net. All you have to do is type in a search for a particular photo and flickr is one of the sites that comes up. For example if you type in “photos of Antigua” into a google search you will get flickr coming up first. More and more people are finding my photos on the internet and often if they are flickr members they will comment. Most of my friends here on the island who have cameras have flickr accounts now and I think the site encourages people to take better photos. Anyway, I have always kept this particular flickr account separate from my business as its been quite personal in some ways, but recently more and more people are finding it and keeping it separate seems silly. I have been adding photos for what seems like ages and they are not all from Antigua. Hope you don’t waste too much time on them. The site is http://www.flickr.com/photos/antiguan/ enjoy.

PS Today is Tony’s birthday and tomorrow is JD’s. Happy birthday to both of these great guys. I am so lucky to have them working with me. The photo above is of JD taken at his dad’s wedding on Saturday. The other is of Tony just after doing one of his famous dives. The one at the top was taken on a private charter i did last week.