The Privilege 75 sailing catamaran Matau offers charter luxury in the Grenadines, where the pace and view are far different from other Caribbean locales

By Kim Kavin

Capt. Virginia Wagner is deep in concentration at Matau’s helm. The Privilege 75 sailing catamaran is firmly anchored off Petit Bateau in the Tobago Cays, south of St. Vincent in the Grenadines. There’s a bit of wind and a solid current, plus at least a dozen bareboats entering the already bustling anchorage. I sit quietly out of the way on the flying bridge, assuming that Wagner is doing careful mental calculations about our scope, our swing, and our safety come sunset.

“Would you just look at the color of this water!” she blurts. “My God!”

This is a woman who has been cruising in the Caribbean, and in particular the Grenadines, for the better part of 20 years. She is a captain so in tune with nature that she has navigated some 120,000 miles by celestial navigation—consistently to within four-tenths of a mile using nothing but stars and sextant. And still, the unspoiled beauty of the Tobago Cays has the power to leave her awestruck in the middle of a random January afternoon.

“It’s just a different kind of charter experience down here,” she says, launching into the best personal campaign for a charter destination that I’ve ever heard. “The Grenadines are still fairly undeveloped compared to the Leewards. You don’t have the big chain resorts. There’s really nothing to buy except fruits and vegetables. The pace here is a lot slower. That’s not to say there aren’t boats, because there certainly are more sailors here. But even the bareboaters are real sailors. Very rarely do you see a muck-up, whereas in the Virgin Islands, you see a muck-up every 20 minutes. People cruising here, they’re not novices. There are very few markers and an awful lot of reefs.”

It’s a soliloquy worthy of Shakespeare, the way Wagner steadies her gaze firmly on the turquoise horizon while letting the words flow. I can’t help but lean over Matau’s upper-deck rail for another glimpse at the water myself. The closest colors I’ve seen to what’s beneath our hull are not in the rest of the Grenadines, nor even in the South Pacific, but instead in the Exumas chain within the Bahamas—where it’s darn hard to find a crewed catamaran operating at Matau’s level of luxury.

Our itinerary was from St. Vincent to Grenada, which Wagner says is ideal for a 10-day charter. Some guests squeeze the trip into a week, but that can push the pace needle past the relaxation line.

“If you think of the Virgin Islands,” says Annapolis-based charter broker Ann-Wallis White, “they’re a necklace of islands. It’s a little, controlled environment. The Grenadines are that same necklace stretched out and expanded by about 40 percent. You have to accomplish a certain amount of cruising every day or you’re not going to make it to your airplane on Grenada the last day.”

In the Tobago Cays, be sure to request a beach barbecue. I moseyed up the sand during sunset at Petit Bateau, with Matau anchored not 50 yards away, and meandered into a grove of trees where a pair of locals who call themselves Scrappy and Scrum were broiling what they promised would be the best lobster I’d ever tasted. As they showed me their fixings for potatoes, rice, and salad, Matau’s crew were back at the beach covering picnic tables with cloth and candles, and making sure our beer and wine were chilled. I tore into my first juicy lobster tail as the stars came out, letting my feet dangle from the picnic bench like a giddy child.

I did take a moment, before leaving, to thank Scrappy and Scrum for the meal. They work with a lot of charter yachts, they tell me, so I ask where Matau falls in their rankings.

“It’s not just the beautiful boat,” Scrappy says, “but Captain Virginia. She really is the best captain. And I’m not just saying that, mon.”

How precious, I think, to find such mutual admiration in so glorious a charter destination.