The Caribbean, before the crowds

South of St Vincent the Caribbean goes quiet. The Grenadines run for roughly a hundred kilometres toward Grenada, thirty two islands and cays strung across steady trade wind water, and most of them have no airport, no marina and no intention of acquiring either. Getting here without a yacht involves small planes, ferries and patience, which is why the anchorages stay empty and why the sailors who know these waters tend to keep their voices down about them. This is the Caribbean as the whole Caribbean once was.

Proper sailing, short days

The trades blow a reliable fifteen to twenty knots across open channels between islands that sit an hour or two apart, which makes for the best pure sailing in the region: enough sea to feel honest, never enough distance to become a delivery. Motoryachts do the chain just as happily, but this is one place where a big sailing yacht earns its keep every single day. The geography orders itself into a natural itinerary, southbound with the wind free, from Bequia at the top to Petit St Vincent at the bottom, with nothing forced and nothing far, and the day's decisions rarely harder than which side of which island to swim.

Down the chain

Bequia is the front door, and Admiralty Bay one of the great natural harbours of the Caribbean. Port Elizabeth still builds yachts by hand and by eye, its model yacht workshops turn out miniature schooners of museum quality, and Princess Margaret Beach is a short tender ride from town. Mustique, privately managed since the 1960s, receives yachts at Britannia Bay, where Basil's Bar stands over the water and the hills behind hold their villas discreetly. Mayreau offers Saltwhistle Bay, a spit of palms between two half moons of sand, below the smallest inhabited island's single hilltop village. Then the Tobago Cays: five uninhabited islets behind the long arm of Horseshoe Reef, a marine park where green turtles graze the seagrass off Baradal and the anchorage is protected by coral alone. Union Island is the southern hub, its harbour at Clifton guarded by Happy Island, a bar built single handed on a pile of conch shells out on the reef. Petit St Vincent and Palm Island close the chain, private island resorts that receive passing yachts with easy grace.

In the Tobago Cays there is no island between you and Africa, only reef, and you fall asleep to the sound of the Atlantic breaking to windward.

Ashore

Life ashore is Vincentian, unhurried and unbothered by celebrity, which is much of why the private island crowd settled here in the first place. Bequia's seafaring heritage runs generations deep, and its Easter Regatta fills Admiralty Bay with everything from racing yachts to workboats. The Mustique Blues Festival packs Basil's Bar for two weeks each summer season in late January and early February, with the takings going to charity. The eating is beach barbecue at its finest: lobster grilled over driftwood coals by yacht vendors in the Tobago Cays, conch done a dozen ways, callaloo soup, roti, and tuna that was swimming that morning, washed down with Hairoun, St Vincent's own lager, or a rum from the shelf with no label on it.

When to come

December to April is the dry season and the classic window, with the Christmas winds blowing brisk and bright through the new year. The Grenadines sit at around twelve degrees north, on the southern fringe of the hurricane belt, so the summer months are more dependable here than almost anywhere further north, and May, June and July bring green hills, warm water and anchorages that feel entirely private. The Tobago Cays are at their best in settled weather, so a flexible itinerary rewards patience. For yachts, dates and a frank view on which islands suit which week, our charter team has sailed these waters and will say so plainly.