Two days of being non-stop – visiting Castries and zip-lining in the rainforest – means we’re still in our pyjamas this afternoon.

Something strange happened too. I woke up feeling it was time to leave St Lucia. For me, this is unusual. Usually I get rashy with places. This intrepid traveller, dear reader, has a habit of standing outside estate agent’s and staring at house prices. It’s confusing, but for some reason I’m always looking out for a home.

I’ve always felt the urge to eek each island out. We’ve had two months in Barbados, three in the BVI and Antigua, about the same in Trinidad and a whopping six months of hurricane season in Grenada. Always wanted to get to know each island. Make friends, settle down a bit, that sort of thing. Where are the estate agents?

This time round though, something’s changed. Now the urge to keep moving is strong – to see and smell and touch as much as we can. My confusion is gone. I am not in a nautical version of A Place in the Sun.

We are heading next for Martinique, the island north of St Lucia. Still barrelling for Antigua. But the beginning of the week has suddenly arrived. It’s time to root to our anchor. Why? This is how Lu’s school calendar was organised. The majority of her lessons are piled up for the first three days. It’s time to roll ‘em up and get to work. Delph goes more steady, so it’s all good.

Things are made easy for us in St Lucia. We have Gregory to keep us healthy. He comes along in his boat, selling fruit and veg. Gregory is a stalwart for the Rodney Bay anchorage. You can’t miss him. Even if you stay at a Rodney Bay’s resort – Gregory comes along and sells to beach goers too. My mum has a photo with him from 2013.

Then his vessel was more flag-based. Nowadays it’s grown its own roof-top garden. It is quite an amazing sight.

‘You don’t have any spare epoxy?’ Gregory asked as he exchanged buckets of fruit for money.

We smiled. Gregory said the exact same thing when we were last here. He had a leak in his hull then and needed to fix it. On cue, we watched Gregory pull out the cutout bottom of a water bottle and start bailing.

We explained our apologies. ‘No epoxy, sorry. But you can buy it from Island Waterworld chandlery. Not too expensive either – about $20US. Jack checked.’

Gregory nodded. We like buying from Gregory. He might be more expensive than the supermarket, but we don’t mind overall. He’s open to barter and he’s got passion fruit. Passion fruit is scarce now.

Last time, Jack gave Gregory a pair of shorts, still new. I gave him some pyjamas my grandma had given me which were taking up too much room in the cupboard. A couple of days ago, I had a child’s pair of flippers too small for the girls. Maybe he could use it as a Xmas present?

‘Thank you!’ Gregory sang. And off he went in his floating garden – to sell his fruit and ask for more epoxy.