Serendipity in Falmouth Harbour by Ann Vanderhoof

Ann’s new book, The Spice Necklace: A Food-Lover’s Caribbean Adventure, is a follow-up to her national bestseller, An Embarrassment of Mangoes.

That Receta’s first visit to Antigua coincided with the annual Classic Yacht Regatta here was totally unplanned. Supposedly, we were stopping only briefly, quickly heading on to Barbuda to meet cruising friends. But when you’re cruising, it’s a very good thing to cast your plans in Jell-O.

Barely visible among the sleek, varnished-to-perfection, highly pedigreed yachts getting ready for the regatta at the docks in Falmouth Harbour, we saw a rough-and-ready boat we knew: the 40-foot, white-cedar Carriacou sloop Margeta-O II, owned and skippered by Cyril Compton, “Uncle C” for short. The Antigua Classic Yacht Regatta has a class for traditional Windward Island sailboats – the sort that were once built as working boats. The Margeta is still a working boat, and Uncle C had come to Antigua for his first Classic Yacht Regatta straight from a week of fishing in Grenada.

Uncle C aboard Margeta-O II

As luck would have it, my husband Steve – with long experience racing around the cans in Toronto Harbour – was invited to join Margeta’s crew. We already felt a connection to this boat – we had watched her being built on the beach in Windward, Carriacou; had been at her launch; and had sailed on her with Uncle C from Carriacou to the Tobago Cays (the full story of these adventures is in my new book, The Spice Necklace) – and for one of us to race on her would complete the circle. Barbuda was put on hold.

Each day, Steve returned from the race encrusted with salt, with flakes of orange paint from Margeta’s peeling deck stuck to his arms and legs – and a smile from ear to ear. Margeta has no engine, boulders for ballast, secondhand mast and sails, no electronic gizmos, not even a ship’s compass. (It had broken; Steve’s nickname onboard became “the human compass.” In addition to being a jib grinder, he was in charge of the handheld GPS someone had brought along, giving directions to Uncle C or Eddy at the tiller to keep them heading straight to the next mark.)

Margeta may have been laughably low tech and jury-rigged compared to the other competitors, but, boy, could she fly. She was first over the finish line in her class in three of the four races and took the class trophy for Best Elapsed Time, as well as several other prizes. (She came second in her class on corrected time.)

Meanwhile, I was a winner, too. I watched the races from a perch among the cacti on a bluff right above the finish line; I went to the daily parties (including an elegant Cream Tea at Nelson’s Dockyard); and, of course, I went out of my way to try traditional Antiguan food – lingfish (saltfish stewed with tomatoes, onions, and other good stuff), funghi (cornmeal polenta with okra), and ducana (sweet potato mashed with coconut and spices, and steamed in sea grape leaves).

Steve was invited back to crew on Margeta this summer, in the Carriacou Regatta. Right now, our plans have us nowhere near Carriacou then. But plans, Steve keeps reminding me, are cast in Jell-O.

Ann Vanderhoof at the regatta’s Cream Tea

Ann Vanderhoof’s new book, The Spice Necklace: A Food-Lover’s Caribbean Adventure, is a follow-up to her national bestseller, An Embarrassment of Mangoes.