More news from the Jolly Harbour Yacht Club

"Following a couple of great weeks on North Beach with dinghy racing, beach BBQ with food & booze to your choice, it is clear this has become a fun social afternoon for the Yacht Club. We shall be there again this coming Sunday and everyone is welcome. The first 2 weeks have given us a good idea of the format for the future. If you wish to race it is a meagre EC$5 per race for Members and EC$10 for Non Members, if you just wish to lime and enjoy the fun of watching the racing (and the capsizing!) there is NO CHARGE! BBQ grill and coals are supplied so all you have to do is bring your cooler, food and drink. The dinghy area on North Beach is perfect for such an afternoon with plenty of palm trees for shelter.
Come along and check it out and, if you feel up to it, challenge our current hot shot, "Big Al" Ashford to a race or two.
Rigging starts at 12:30, racing begins at 1:30 and the BBQ fires up around 2:30.
Bouyancy jackets must be worn on the water so if you have your own please bring it along although the Club do have a good supply.
See you there!
Pippa - JHYC Dinghy Sailing Director 2009
www.jhycantigua.com"

away from a computer for two weeks. WOW!

Together with some friends and my GF, we took two weeks and sailed up to a windsurfing event in the British Virgin Islands. I will blog more regularly again now and there is plenty to come on our adventure but for now a little movie taken by AcquaFilms of the event we took part in:



www.adventureantigua.com

It's hurricane season in the Atlantic again.

Actually it's been hurricane season since June 1st and as is normal, the Atlantic hasn't seen a named storm yet. The very old hurricane season rhyme went like this:
JUNE too soon
JULY Standby
AUGUST come it must
SEPTEMBER remember
OCTOBER all over

I am not sure if in the old days weather was very different, but as long as i have been alive this rhyme has been a month off. June and July in the Caribbean are as described in the Rhyme, but August and September should be grouped together with September being a far more active storm month than any other month.
We have also learned that October isn't totally all over, and if i remember correctly 2 of the 6 hurricanes that we have been hit by since the 1950s hit us in October. Anyway, the ryhme is a good guide when making plans for a sailing cruise through the Caribbean (as i am at the moment). In between storms which can occasionally pass the weather in the summer is the best all year in my opinion with beautifully clear waters and calm seas.
Interestingly, Antigua has only been directly hit by 6 hurricanes since the mid 1950s and I think all six happened in August, September and October. We have had many close calls and even some very bad weather from the cloud bands coming off hurricanes passing well to our North or South as in the case of Omar last year. Sometimes the only storm conditions we get are huge surfing waves which have been pushed in from hundreds of miles away where a passing storm is churning up the ocean.
In my lifetime, the worst hurricane we got was Hurricane Louis or Luis as it has now been called. That was a cat 5 when it hit according to the US Navy base which was here at the time but what was the worst thing about it was the fact that it was moving slowly. We had hurricane force winds for a day and tropical storm force winds or more for nearly two days. Many houses had damage and most hotels did as well. Both my mom's and my dad's houses fared well in that storm proving that if built well, wood can hold up.
Anyway, the first "blimp on the radar" was picked up by one of the super computer models yesterday (read more about these "models" and how hurricane forecasting is done here).
My good friend Steve mentioned on facebook that he had read on Crown Weather that there was something being detected. Here is today's weather discussion on this private weather site. Click here.
"
Interest Area 2: Another area I am closely watching is completely based on the GFS model. An area of impressive looking shower and thunderstorm activity is located over western Africa this morning. The GFS model insists that this convective complex will develop into a tropical cyclone as soon as this weekend. None of the other global models are forecasting development across the eastern Atlantic, so I remain pretty skeptical that it will happen. Also, the GFS model has been doing very poor with tropical cyclone forecasts so far this season in that it has been forecasting false storms and handling upper level patterns very poorly. So with no other real model support, I am pretty skeptical that this will indeed happen.

With that said, the environmental conditions are favorable for development and will remain favorable for at least the next few days. Sea surface temperatures, however, are actually below normal across the eastern Atlantic and this would inhibit development until this disturbance approaches the Lesser Antilles during Wednesday and Thursday of next week where sea surface temperatures rise to above normal for this time of year.

So, with all of this said, there is the possibility of something to watch in the eastern Atlantic this weekend into next week, but I have very low confidence of it actually happening.
"

I also think that it's kinda early for that type of thing. I also think that the massive amount of African dust in the air at the moment will do as it normally does and stop any storm from getting strong. Read more on African dust coming across the Caribbean here. In that blog post there is a link showing how this increased dust levels kill storm production. Interesting stuff. Anyway, I am not cancelling my sailing plans just yet. This time next week i hope to be 200 miles from home in the BVI enjoying Pussers Pain Killers!

Fathers Day on the Caribbean Island of Antigua

Well with American cable TV in every house in Antigua practically, Father'sDay has become quite a big deal here in Antigua. It's a very nice excuse for the family to get together and have some fun and that's what some of the Fuller family did yesterday.
The two dad's were my Dad and my brother.
I used the Adventure Antigua sailing boat "Ocean Nomad" to go out for a bit of cruising and lunch and then a nice afternoon sail back to Jolly Harbour. We counted over 20 turtles and it was a lovely way to chill. Pinning down my Dad is never easy and it was nice to be out there.
Of course this blog isn't just about telling you the reader what i have been up to. This blog is also about promoting my company, and you too can enjoy a bit of cruising and sailing if you book a sailing tour or charter with us. For more info and photos go to www.sailing-antigua.com
Here is the family slide show from yesterday with three generations of Antiguan Fullers.
We missed the rest of the family who couldn't make it yesterday. Hopefully we will go out with the whole gang soon... maybe for Nell's birthday next month.

Major training setback before international windsurfing regatta

As many of you know, I did windsurf course racing for about 16 years non stop all over the Caribbean and in various places around the world. My all time favorite windsurfing regatta was the HIHO (hook in and hold on) held in the Virgin Islands. This year is the 25th time the event is being held. I first went to the regatta when i was twelve years old about eight months after i started windsurfing back in Antigua. At that time is was being held in the USVI. I was as hooked on racing as i was on windsurfing and since then have done about a dozen more HIHO regattas which are now held in the British Virgin Islands. After i stopped competing professionally the only regatta i kept doing was the HIHO. Anyway, about seven years ago i broke my knee while kitesurfing at Jabbawock beach in Antigua, and since then I have had an array of knee problems, operations and headaches which have done a pretty good job of keeping me from windsurfing, surfing or kitesurfing. Back in 2007 I was asked by some friends to take them and their windsurfing gear to the HIHO and together with the other two Adventute Antigua captains we took off in the Eco Tour boat on a 10 day holiday.



I took along some windsurfing gear at the time telling my girlfriend that i may try to do a race or two just for the hell of it.

I blogged about it later, but to sum it all up... we had an amazing time and i ended up doing the entire regatta placing first overall. It was a big surprise, but the knee didn't like it at all. Since then i haven't used my big powerful racing gear at all and missed going to HIHO last year as well. This year having the classic sloop (yacht) i thought it would be a good adventure to go back down to the HIHO and the BVI again. Two weeks ago i dusted off my big 10 meter sail and scraped the muck of my one design winsurfing board and went out. While in NYC last month i managed to purchase a special knee brace which i hoped would help protect my knee from any further problems. Anyway, being back out on the board was fantastic and the old feeling of ultimate freedom mixed with spikes of adrenalin gave me a great natural high which i had beed addicted to for so long (in the old days).
I managed to go out several more times up until last weekend enjoying each session as much as the one before. I wanted to go out there this past week but had many other things going on including taking over the Adventure Antigua phone and emails while my sister is on holiday. Anyway, the weekend was going to filled with windsurfing. I had only a week left to get up to speed and i needed the training. Yesterday i arrived at Jabbawock beach and started rigging. It was so sunny and hot that half way through setting up my gear i had to run and jump in the water to cool off. The water is so wonderful at this time of the year. Warm, clear and wildly refreshing!
I got back to my sail to give some more tension and while pulling one of the lines i heard a huge bang. Immoderately i knew what had happened and started shaking my head. It was only a week earlier i was reading a story about the Air France disaster where they were saying that it could have been a problem with composite materials that caused the crash. Some friends and i were speaking about it and also commenting on the rudder break of on our friend's Volvo Ocean racing yacht. See the interview with local Antiguan Shannon Falcone here by clicking this link.
Anyway, my 100% carbon fiber mast had snapped above the boom and that was the end of my sailing for the weekend. Stopped before it even started. This type of top of the line racing equipment is not something you will find here in Antigua so i knew this was a big blow to my plans. Mykl enjoyed her windsurfing session while i had my rigging problems so at least one of us had fun.

Patrick from Windsurfing Antigua called me today and said he had a 75% carbon mast of similar size back at his house. This good news means that although it won't be a racing spec mast, but at least i can train some more later in the week before our departure. For a cool story on the HIHO you can check this link.

Good movie showing Caribbean fishery problems

This movie was done in Jamaica about their fishery, but it is almost word for word what has happened here in Antigua. It's interesting that while Japan is pumping in millions of dollars into Antigua's "fisheries" not any of that money is actually going towards helping sustain the fishery. After reading comments from anonymous on the the blog from a few days ago (click here) you would think that more was being done to help our fishery.
I notice that gill nets were not featured in the movie about Jamaica which means that their fishery probably isn't as bad as ours here in Antigua. Gill nets used all around Antigua and Barbuda are the single biggest problem with our fishery.
The local small scale commercial fishermen of Jolly Harbour area set nets every day in the inshore breeding areas including mangrove inlets and other shallow areas.

Almost all reefs, bays and coves are netted heavily here as well and almost all of the fish consumed at the hotels has been imported. Conch and lobster caught here are exported usually under the radar to the French islands and most of the off shore waters are heavily fished by fishermen from Guadeloupe. Anyway, the movie is an excellent insight into the usual Government lack of understanding and lack of controls with regard to fishing. Have a look:

The end of an era: Sunsail hotel

There has been much talk about this and it certainly looks like after 10 years of operation, Sunsail is finally closing up shop here in Antigua. They were operating on a lease out of The Colonna hotel which is actually an Italian owned property i think. Anyway, the Sunsail brand went through some huge changes in the ten years that it was operating here as it was purchased by different companies. Towards the end i think TUI which is a budget travel company managed to get their hands on it and that was the start of the end. Operating a biz in Antigua is never going to be cheap and you have to be very careful how you run the place.
I had huge problems with Sunsail about a year ago when they were in the middle of changing their managers. The top brass back in the UK seemed to not have a clue about what they were doing and it seemed as though the staff here in Antigua were equally messed about. It's a terrible shame that the hotel as we have known it won't be running anymore. I looked for news on this on their website but it's as if they never had a hotel here. Twitter and other social media networks are buzzing with upset people who wanted to come back here once again and enjoy the typical sunsail Club holiday in the Caribbean.
When i started Adventure Antigua doing my Eco Tour ten years ago it was only with Sunsail. A guy called Roger was the GM there at the moment and he helped me get started and pushed me to get a bigger boat. At first i could just take 6 of his guests at a time, and very quickly we got the Scarab so we could take more. For years Sunsail was my main hotel for Eco Tour passengers as the fun loving outdoors type staying there loved my tours. Here you can see a bunch of Sunsail staff as we passed Hawksbill Hotel. I took them out for the day to say thanks for pushing my biz as hard as they had done. This must be back in 2001 or some time around then.

One of the other things that maintained my close relationship with sunsail was that most of their beach staff windsurfed whenever they had time off. In fact, while i was out there windsurfing they would be out before and after work too. I became very close with many of their windsurfing staff and there were many of them. I don't know how many people worked the beach but it was usually about 15 people and almost all of them windsurfed. Many local kids were hired to work the beach and learned about boats and sailing. I hired several of them over the years after they left sunsail. It's very sad to hear that it won't be opening back up for so many reasons and I suppose most of all at the moment is the job losses. At a time when we need all the tourism that we can get and all the employment we can get I think that Tui and the others who may be involved have made a big mistake here.
I suppose that's what will happen when hotels are absentee managed and owned and lease properties in the Caribbean. I have heard that Sandals was looking at the property, but you never know in Antigua. We'll have to see. Still nothing in the news as far as i can tell but the people at Sunsail Clubs UK: 0844 463 6706
say they are not doing biz in Antigua anymore. The staff at the hotel say they haven't heard anything either, and it seems that without any good reason they are being left in the dark. I feel bad for them.