Anse la Roche anchorage viewI awoke early after a calm night which was only interrupted by one shower. I’ve got a walk scheduled with Sea Life at 14:00 for discovering fortification ruins. First I’ve got some changes to make to the web site which I’ve been putting off, because they involve using custom SQL and PHP on the website and thus carry a high risk of crashing the site should I do it incorrectly. But I’ve been at it for 3 hours now and have completed it successfully. I have 10,000 images on this site many of them did not have correct “alt” and “caption” fields, even though the raw data was available in the .jpg “IPTC” and “EXIF” fields.It has rained a bit this morning, so I’ve been exercising opening and closing my hatches. Once these clouds have passed, I’ll dinghy into town and get some grocery shopping done for fresh produce.
Grocery Run
Spider and web on the beachThe 1NM dinghy trip into town was fast, with little wind and no waves to contend with. The only other dinghy at the dinghy dock (and I use that term very loosely) was Sea Life’s tender; and I met them while going between the 3 main grocery stores. I really needed coffee filters (preferably Melitta ones, as the Hario ones aren’t available anywhere) and tomatoes. Naturally those two items were noticeably absent from my shopping backpack contents upon return.
Discovering Fortification Ruins
Talking to TimMark had told me that he’d discovered a long-lost cannon off the beaten path up on the hill overlooking Anse la Roche last year while hiking with Marjorie. Today we planned an expeditionary force consisting of the crews of Sea Life (Marjorie and Mark), Razorbill (Angela and John) plus Zanshin (Arnd) to revisit his discovery. Mark collected us and we departed the beach for parts unknown.Hiking up Anse la RocheMark departed the (somewhat) well-trodden path halfway up the hill and led us across an open grassy area. No cows were in evidence, but there was enough “sign” to force us to trod carefully.Anse la Roche from aboveThe meadows led us up, ever higher. I regretted packing so much heavy stuff into my backpack. Not for the first time did I think about switching to a smartphone camera rather than lug the big Nikon SLR around. The water was necessary, but did I really need that ASP to protect myself from wayward spiders and centipedes?
Cannon
Hidden CannonSoon we were back in the shade of the forest and had reached the promontory overlooking both Anse la Roche and the approach into Hillsborough. Here we found a gun emplacement. The cannon was still in place, but the stonework had been ravaged and displaced by both time and the roots of trees. Nature claims back her own very quickly in these latitudes.The cannon is corroded, but the numbers “27-0-13” could still be read.Secret cannonThese denote the weight, the first is hundredweight (actually, 112lbs), the second is quarter-hundredweights and the last is pounds. So this cannon is ((27*112lbs) + 0lbs + 13lbs) = 3,307 lbs. This means that, using a typical weight-caliber formula of the time, this is probably an 18 pounder.Trees inside the ruinsWe realized that there must be more ruins than just those of the gun emplacement. These crew-served weapons needed a considerable amount of logistical backup for the people and material. Mark led the way through the undergrowth as we went exploring, clearing the spider webs with a convenient stick. Soon we discovered the first wall (and a snake which slithered up a tree a we approached) and further on it was evident that we were inside a rather large set of buildings and surrounding walls. All of it falling to ruins, but the outside walls didn’t look thick enough for a true fort, so it was most likely just the housing area for the unit rather than a defensible position.
Instead of retracing our steps back along the way we’d come, we opted to continue onwards. Mark knew that we should intercept the path heading up from the beach if we continued, or enter the open cow pastures which we could use for orientation.
Delaminated hiking shoes
My hiking shoes, which had been sitting on the boat for years awaiting just such a trip, decided that they’d had enough and one sole completely delaminated. I held it on with shoelaces, but it sound like flip-flops for the rest of the walk. We soon me the path and walked up it until we reached the small dirt road, then turned around and returned all the way to the beach. The path was rather overgrown, which Mark said was due to Tim’s dinghy engine working well. When it doesn’t, the bar ashore has to carry all of their supplies in (and out) along this path. Discovering the fortification ruins was just a matter of leaving the path at the right place; now that we knew where to look, we could see the ruins of the walls.
Back aboard
I took a nice cooling swim upon return to Zanshin and read my book in the shade of the cockpit until the late afternoon. The first happy-hour beer tasted wonderful after the day’s exertions and I thawed out the last of my hamburger patties to make on the BBQ. I’d only some breakfast rolls left instead of hamburger buns, but I was more than happy with the result.
