Caribbean Compass Yachting Magazine - March 2022

THE
amazing impact that one shoreside business can have on
yachting was bought home to me a year or two ago in Grenada
when some new investors got accepted into Prickly Bay Marina.
From a distance, they looked like many I have seen: arriving in glory with a container
and leaving quietly with a suitcase.
That is how it appeared to go as time went on. People with yachts in the bay were
no longer welcome to park there, whether they were residents with cars or cruisers
renting one for a week. They closed the bar and restaurant, ripped it all apart and
the whole place became a work zone with fluttering plastic tape and big lumps of
concrete. The best access from the sea to the L’Anse aux Epines area — with all of
its bars and restaurants, other amenities, and the road to Grand Anse and St.
George’s — was cut off. As a result the bay pretty much emptied out.
DECK VIEW FROM TI KANOT BY CHRIS DOYLE
sandwiched between two gated communities, one that takes up the whole north of
the island and the other that takes up the southwest. The restriction on the use of
one available dinghy dock has meant that most yachtspeople, both cruisers and
superyachts, no longer stop in the Charlestown anchorage. It is true there is access
to the island from the Sandy Lane Yacht Club and Residences, but wonderful though
that is, it takes you into its own elegant world of restaurants and shops, and you are
not that likely to go into Charlestown.
Charlestown can experience swells, but they are lowest between the two docks for
large vessels. A dinghy dock built into the side of the roll-on ferry dock could take
both superyacht tenders (which tend to just drop people off) and cruisers’ tenders
(which like to tie up). It is infrastructure that would be well repaid by returning
yachting business to the Charlestown community.
ALL PHOTOS: CHRIS DOYLE
An open-water aquarium was made into a cute dinghy harbor,
giving easy access to Clifton, Union Island.
DINGHY DOCKS WOULD BENEFIT CHARLESTOWN
AND HILLSBOROUGH COMMUNITIES
The yachts that left would have moved to other anchorages down the coast, so
Grenada per se would not have lost that much. But it made a major anchorage
unattractive, and in doing that, it did, in a small way, diminish Grenada. Happily,
the new investors disappeared after some months, leaving Darren, who had been
managing it before, to slowly pull it back together. He did a great job, and it is now
thriving better than ever and the bay is full again.
Those of us in the marine sector are all part of a community. In the early days of
chartering, the local charter companies were always helping fix bareboats in distress
from other companies. This never came from the head offices and might have been
discouraged from on high, but the base managers all knew each other and would
help each other out. Nowadays many businesses do what the economists think they
should do: look after the bottom line, take what they can, and ignore the needs of
the community in general. In this atmosphere we move into more gated and exclusive
areas, and “keep out” signs become more common. I think this leaves room where a
touch of government infrastructure could be a big help.
Caribbean governments are often quite supportive of the yachting industry. But
while they are willing to spend millions on a cruise ship dock, they only rarely spend
money on docks for yacht tenders. Bequia has probably been the best served, with
three SVG government-owned dinghy docks in Admiralty Bay. One, at the head of the
harbor, is shared with cruise ship tenders; one is at the public market; and one is at
Ocar. But for the most part, governments clearly believe that provision of dinghy
docks will be handled by the private sector. This sometimes works, but not always.
And when it does, it is often an act of enlightened self-interest by the dock owner.
Why should governments care? It is true that when you look at a dinghy dock, it
would seem to be for the sole benefit of those with dinghies. However, it goes further
than that: the whole of the yachting industry works on a multiplier effect. If yachting
folk can tie up their dinghies and get ashore, they spend money ashore: they buy
meals, take taxis, go on tours, visit a range of service providers, and shop for all sorts
of things. While there might not be enough revenue for any one establishment to be
able to support a dinghy dock on its own, the gain to the community probably more
than justifies the infrastructure. Making an anchorage more attractive by providing
easy shore access adds to the island’s allure.
It would be great if communities got together to do it, but that only occasionally
happens, as with the excellent PAYS dock in Portsmouth, Dominica. So we rely on
individual businesses, hoping that a dinghy dock will increase their business enough
to justify its expense, or, if a business has a dock for other reasons, that they will be
generous enough to allow dinghy owners to use it. Union Island was in a mess for
lack of a dinghy dock a few years ago, and it was a great relief and with sincere
thanks to Jean-Marc at Bougainvilla when he converted his open-water aquarium to
the cutest dinghy harbor in the Caribbean.
Charlestown Bay, Canouan
For years, yacht dinghies tied up at what was once the Tamarind Bay Hotel dock.
It was central and only place to reasonably get ashore. That changed completely with
the change of ownership of the property, which is now Soho Beach House, Canouan,
and part of the worldwide Soho House. I understand you can still gain access there
if you become a member (plans and costs vary but with minimal searching I came
up with about 1800 pounds a year). Of course, everyone coming ashore with you
must be a member, too, or you would not be welcome.
The effect of this change has been devastating to those in the Canouan community
who benefited from yachts, and who mainly live around Charlestown. There they are
The Tamarind Beach Hotel dock in former times. It is now off limits to most,
cutting off easy access to Charlestown, Canouan.
Hillsborough, Carriacou
Hillsborough was traditionally Carriacou’s main port. Every day ferries would come
and go, and people would pour into town off the dock. The current dock, which has
been abandoned and left to fall apart, was one of the first US-funded projects right
after the 1983 Intervention. It has served well.
Ever since the Grenada Port Authority made the decision to move the port to Tyrrel
Bay, which is more practical, I have been wondering on the effect this will have on
the lovely seaside town of Hillsborough. While a few yachts still visit, there are far
fewer of them than before. The anchorage is now underutilized for the lack of a
dinghy dock where they can get ashore. Hillsborough would very much benefit from
a pleasure boat dock here. It does not have to be the huge structure we had before,
but something more modest, where dinghies could tie up, day trip boats could pick
up charters and dive boats could pick up their divers. Tyrrel Bay serves the cruising
community well, but it is quite crowded, and a little dispersal to Hillsborough would
be good for both. Superyachts also seem to prefer Hillsborough Bay to Tyrrel Bay,
and a dock where their people could go ashore would attract more of them. No single
current business in Hillsborough is geared enough to yachting to make such a
project profitable, so the most likely way this might happen is as government-funded
infrastructure. If they decided to do so it would really help the community and make
Carriacou as whole even more attractive.
Hillsborough town dock, Carriacou, now abandoned by the port authority.
MARCH 2022 CARIBBEAN COMPASS PAGE 9