The Story Continues
Chapter 1...Starting the Journey
Wednesday, Aug. 22/07
Leaving was hard; this being the third mooring line to be cast off. The first was the house and the second my car. Many of our friends in the marina were there to see us off sounding their boat horns as we sailed out.
Mike and Marlene Tremblay were aboard for this leg of the trip from Midland to Lake Ontario and we were really thankful they were there. The weather forecast was for shifting winds and expected thunder storms in early evening so we decided to anchor on the west side of Beckwith. Late in the evening once we were in our nice warm beds the strong winds shifted from south west and then to the south east during the thunder storm so Marlene and I sat anchor watch for most of the night. I hoped this wasn’t going to be a sign of things to come.
Thursday, Aug. 23
We left early for our next destination, and my old favourite, Tobermory. We had strong head winds which again meant motoring into 1 to 2 meter waves; but no worries. When we arrived in Tobermory, in the next slip was a beautiful 49’ Jeanneau named Azure Mer also going to Port Elgin, our next port of call. We were to meet her again.
Friday , Aug. 24
We left Tobermory early for Port Elgin in a heavy fog. We got as far as “Devil’s Island Channel” when we decided to head back and wait for the fog to dissipate. With a name like “Devil’s Island” we weren’t going to push it. Azure Mer left after we did, so you can imagine our surprise when she passed us in a hurry, with all sails up. We decided to also raise more sails – the competitive spirit was raising its ugly head. She still beat us going very strong in spite of half of her crew being in diapers!! How depressing.
Port Elgin was also the place where our barbeque was murdered on the sea wall when our stern hit when we left early next morning. Casualty number 1; but who’s keeping track; we needed a new barbeque anyway.
Saturday, Aug 25
Today we left Port Elgin for Goderich with a rough sea up to 3 to 4 meters. Marlene donned her favorite life jacket and prepared for the worst. It seemed to take forever but late in the afternoon we came close to the marina we were aiming for. Horror of horrors the approach to the marina was past the loading docks for the lake freighters and the crane was stretched right across the channel. We had no idea how high the crane was in comparison to our mast. Another boat, Cadenza II, also entered the basin hoping to enter. Both of circled the basin trying to determine if either of us could fit safely underneath. The port authority did not respond to our hails. After half an hour of circling we decided to go next door through the channel from hell. Remember the high waves I mentioned, well they were still out there making the entry to the other marine look like an episode of Mission Impossible with waves washing over the breakwall and screeching down the dog leg channel which necessitated a hard swing to the left after the first green bouy which was really close to the breakwall. Eyes bulging, toes curled and buttocks clenched we surfed down the channel. Roy, as always, did a great job. Time again to sacrifice another chicken on the bow to the gods.
Sunday, Aug 26
The next morning was sunny and glorious with diminishing waves with us motor sailed to Sarnia. We arrived at Lake Huron Yachts a superb yacht club with good facilities and great people. Rick Burr, the marina manager took us for a tour of Sarnia and shopping. Sarnia was voted one of the places we could retire to.
Monday, Aug 27th
Sarnia to Port Lampton
Today was actually a calm smooth motor down the Detroit River with a current pushing us along at a great rate of speed.
We ended at Ecart Marina tied to their sea wall which was the only place deep enough. At $25.00 a night which included hydro, extra clean new toilets and free laundry facilities – no problems.
Tuesday, Aug 28
This was a great trip continuing through the Detroit River passing by incredible estates and the Detroit skyline. Even the freighters we had been warned about were no worries.
Lakeview Park Marina was huge and one of the most expensive marinas of the trip. Since it was a municipal marina the staff suggested that we could anchor on the other side of the channel for free – which was apparently what a lot of boaters did upon hearing the price.
Wednesday Aug. 29 to Thursday Aug. 30
Our next destination was Pelee Island and Scudders Marina. When we first entered Lake Erie it was a little strange to see little white markers not far off our port side marking a long shallow ridge as little as one foot deep. I was imagining seeing someone just walking along the ridge up to their knees in water as huge freighters past by in the shipping channel.
The trip was only about 5 hours long but about half way there the weather station sent out a notice of an “Extreme Thunderstorm Warning”. When you hear that you instantly watch the sky and push the engine a little harder and storing loose goodies below. I really didn’t want that kind of weather (actually never) in a lake as shallow as Erie, especially when heading toward a equally shallow marina. We made it with not too much time to spare before the winds hit.
Note: Why is it that every time you enter a new marina with the sketchy info they give, it’s like trying to find “Elmo”. “Enter the marina and go to the gas dock go around the blue sailboat on the left dock and go to the end and hang a right” are directions not helpful when you can’t even find the gas dock! Never mind trying to find the teeny numbers on the end of the slips to find yours! We always requested that someone stand where they wanted us to go and wave to us frantically because we usually could hardly see even them.
The wind rose to almost 40 knots for over two days. The action in our slip was pretty violent since they put DRUM who is close to 50 feet (including all the debris on the stern) in a 30 foot slip – just clearing the gates; her back end jutted out into the channel. The noise from her tugging on the lines and pulling on the docks was terrible and caused Mike and Marlene sleeping in the forepeak a couple of sleepless nights.
When we asked about grocery shopping we were surprised to hear that there wasn’t anywhere on the island. Apparently if you want food (unlike the LCBO and Winery which proves that booze is a food group) you have to travel by ferry to the mainland. We were told that in the winter the inmates have to keep stocks of food because bad weather will make the trip difficult – even the men working on the mainland don’t come home until the weekend. When you consider the carnivorous flies and the “Boil Water Advisory” Pelee wasn’t our favourite.
Friday Aug. 31
Sad day – Mike and Marlene had to leave DRUM – due to health reasons. We will miss them.
No matter the winds, we left Pelee to sail to Erieau Marina. Yes, we actually set sail helping to push us through some steep waves which had built up considerably during the strong winds over the last few days.
Saturday, September 1st
We left Erieau early to sail to our absolutely favorite marina of the trip – Kettle Creek Marina in Port Stanley.
There is a lift bridge before you reach the marina and we were lucky enough to reach it just when it opened. The marina manager was very helpful and the facilities are wonderful and intimate. Just like visiting someone’s home.
Kettle Creek is a small private yacht club which occupies a small basin close to town. Food shopping was just minutes away and the evening allowed for a stroll through the little village past numerous great restaurants and shops. I wanted to stay another night.
Sunday Sept 2
Today we arrived at Port Dover Municipal Marina. We also encountered the first info gap between reality and our new computer charts.
During our approach to the marina, I was as usual hanging out on deck looking for the bouy markers with the binoculars. I could only find two of the three reds!!
We also noticed that all the local vessels sailed far to the left of the bouys- much farther than the bouys would suggest. Horror of horrors we saw the third red bouy not far from our port side!!! How the hell did it get there!!!
After several hails to the marina, we finally arrived at our slip and tied up. Not minutes later a sailboat came close and insisted he speak to the captain. “Didn’t you hear my call that you were sailing into danger” said the captain of the Adel. Apparently he had been trying to warn us with no success. We had turned down our volume because of the constant inane chatter and had missed his warning.
Apparently the last red bouy had been moved since our electronic charts had been produced. This bouy marks several huge boulders. My question is why would the bouy have been moved? I can see how shoals and ridges can form and move but how often do massive boulders go walk about? Anyway, we were spared and ever thankful.
Monday Sept 3
So here it gets crazy.
We left early and decided that rather than go to another marina, we would tie up at the Pleasure Craft dock of the Welland Canal. We arrived at the entrance of the canal at about 7:00 pm. Imaging our surprise when we saw a lift bridge directly in front of us – this was not in the brochure! Speaking about Government brochures – they give a whole different meaning to well marked and discreet signage.
The brochure speaks of entering the canal and tying up at the “well marked” pleasure craft dock and to use the well marked phones to contact the canal staff. Oh, and by the way, no one will answer your hail.
Here I was again with my binoculars looking for a dock with those markings. Nothing! All we could see was a tiny little dock big enough for 4 small 20 foot boats just past a red bouy marking shallow water marked “Port Colborn Municipal Docks”. There was no info on the lift bridge at all, any where. We decided, since they wouldn’t answer our hails, to circle for 17 minutes until the half hour was up just in case it lifted every half an hour. No deal – nothing. Just before we considered finding a marina for the night, a small sail boat entered the channel towards us. “Wimsey” also hailed the canal authorities and was ignored. We circled together in the canal and exchanged notes. They decided to enter the municipal docks and look around. They called us back and told us the depth was 7 feet – ignore the bouy. Yup, there, in very discreet tiny lettering on a public phone booth ala Dr. Who, was a sign advising you call the authorities here, pay your money and eureka – the bridge lifted!!! Money speaks.
However, according to Wimsey, the authorities didn’t want just one sailboat going through on her own – would we go with her? It was now close to dusk.
Decision made – going through with a little sailboat rather than a freighter sounded good – how hard can it be – just because you can’t see anything in the dark. Wimsey had done the trip once before during the daytime going the other way. It’s a go.
Just past the lift bridge in a poorly lit channel I noticed a small round bouy just ahead, right in our path. Focusing in with the binocs I notice that the thing reflected light. You’ll never guess, it was a guy swimming across the canal and the only reason I saw him was because he was bald and his pate reflected the light. Thank god he was bald!!! I never saw anyone swim so fast to get out of our way.
Nothing ahead of us now but a zillion lights; red ones, green ones, yellow ones and others – none of which mean a thing, nor do we have any depth perspective. We are following Wimsey’s only little rail light and heaven helps us if we loose that.
Just to our left is a really well marked embankment. Just as we got a little closer the embankment motored past us – it was a huge freighter whose rear end was lit up like giant Christmas tree from top to bottom.
We arrived at the first lock and were told to just hang in the middle – no lines – and wait to drop 3 to 4 feet.
On to the next lock with a drop of 45 feet. Roy and I each held on to a rope from the bow and stern for the 10 minutes it took.
I was starting to feel cocky – this is a breeze.
Ha Ha – the gods always have a surprise for the cocky!
Lock number five – there are now three sail boats – the third just snuck in between Wimsey and us.
During the trip I had come to notice that there are two red lights close together, low down which flash to green just before the gates upon to let us enter the lock. Well these two didn’t. They stayed red. So here were three sailboats now milling around in the canal trying to stay out of each others way and the lights stayed stubbornly red. This was the time that we realized that we could no longer put the boat into forward. A building wind now drove us toward the third sailboat who didn’t know we had a problem. Just at that moment we received a hail from the canal staff stating that we must get out of the way of the lock gates because a freighter was due to come through. You know that nightmarish feeling of not being able to do anything while observing the inevitable crash. With great dignity and unstoppable momentum DRUM drove her stern into the three foot high stone breakwall of the canal. Well at least we were now able to tie up at the wall to see what the damage was. Remember how big our dinghy davits are – well thanks to them – no damage. However, now we were tied to the wall with no forward with freighters passing by.
To make a long story short, we were towed out by a Pilot Boat through the last two locks and tied just outside just after 3:15am. I want to thank Captain Anil Soni for his assistance and support – what a great person.
The next day Roy spent the morning diagnosing the problem – a transmission cable with too much slack not allowing any forward. He fixed it – what a great guy.
Now on to Lake Ontario.
Tuesday Sept 4th
We arrived at our final destination, Port Whitby Marina a 6:30 pm. Now to fixing, cleaning and reorganizing for the next leg of the trip.
Thank You’s:
Roy and I would to thank everyone who helped us in some many ways over the last few months.
Our long suffering family, Mike and Marlene, Paul and Denise, s/v Nimbus, Maurice & Sue, s/v Stryder, Rene & Cheryl. S/Y Gypsy Blues, Alvin and Maureen, M/Y Permission Granted, Leo and Mary, S/Y Fidusen II, Bernise and Merv, M/Y Cool Time, Rich and Pam, sv Galadriel, Harley and Janice, s/v Blue Blazes and the wonderful staff at Bay Port YC– absolutely the best marina in Ontario.
We are now in Port Whitby Marina, Pier 8, Slip 13 until September 19 or so – if you are in the vicinity you are more than welcome to drop by – just give us a call to make sure we are here.
Regards Roy and Maggie
We had a lot of visitors while in Whitby – at one point 15 in the cockpit. It was great seeing all our friends. We were really surprised when Roy’s sister Pam and her husband Derek came absolutely unexpectedly for a visit all the way from England! We had no idea. We put Derek straight to work installing our new solar panels. We’ll see them again – if all goes according to plan, in England in 2009.
Leaving the family behind was even worse than I imagined it would be. Monique, Grant, Howard and Sandra ran along the pier waving until we were out of sight. That was really hard to see. We can’t wait to see Monique and Grant again in Hampton for the last leg of the journey. Even though Kryssy could not be there when we departed, it broke our hearts when we said goodbye earlier.
We left Port Whitby Marina on Lake Ontario, Sunday September 23, 2007 at 2:30 pm for our first over nighter. Mary Dobson joined us for this second leg with a new sailing course fresh under her belt – straight from daylight sailing on Lake Ontario to out on the Atlantic Ocean! Away we went with the jib and mizzen sail set (jib and jigger) and pulling towards Oswego on the U.S. side to have our two masts removed prior to entering the canal. We had a full moon and a calm night.
When we left Oswego and entered the Oswego Canal, we totally forgot the buoy system ( “red buoys on the right when returning”). Oops!. Five times we hit rocks so hard that the whole boat shook and people on the banks stopped to have a look. There were no rocks marked on the paper charts. We slowly, crept back to the marina to find out what was going on. The manager said that the red buoys in this case were marking rocks and were not meant to be crossed – surprise! Stay to the left and stay away from the reds! Anyway out we went again, hugging the port side coast to the first set of 8 locks in the Oswego. No problems – Forward Ho! The locks open for each boat as it arrived – no waiting. It wasn’t until the Erie Canal (with 23 locks) that the authorities reduced canal hours to once an hour which meant that we could only reach locks 8 miles away or less. Locks further away meant waiting until the next hour.
On September 28th the gods caught up with us with a vengeance. Roy and our friend Paul had earlier fixed the transmission in Whitby – but the transmission lost its battle with life and died at lock 13 (I wonder if that means anything?). Again were towed just as in the Welland Canal), this time to lock 11 where Larry of Larry’s Marine took care of us. Lock 11 is in the town of Amsterdam in New York State where we were the guests of the Lock Master for 5 days while we waited for a new transmission to be couriered to us. Amsterdam is kind of a sad place whose only industry of carpet making left, leaving a depressed town full of huge Victorian homes selling really cheap. One home we saw was big enough to house 7 families and sold for $169,000.00. Smaller homes were to be had for $20,000.00. The people, without exception were incredibly friendly with the local car dealer driving us to the local food mart and Larry who fixed the transmission left us his car during our stay.
On Wednesday, October 3rd at noon we finally continued on our trip with our first stop being Ilion where we finally had a shower and a pump out (this is a critical sailboat activity causing huge amounts of stress in areas where pump outs are often non-existent). For those of you who don’t know what a “pump out” is – it is where the toilet donations are kept in two holding tanks on the boat until such time as a location where these donations can be sucked out of your boat – this process is repeated ad infinitum until we are on the ocean 12 miles or more from shore where everything is dumped overboard.
Finally we entered the Hudson River and reached Hop-O-Nose Marina on October 4th where our masts were finally re-stepped – continued on our way on Saturday the 6th for Kingston.
We arrived at Haverstraw Marina on Sunday the 7th. The winds were gusting to 20 knots and the marina staff are under the impression that sailboats can maneuver the same as a motor boat. Mary and I leapt off the boat as we careened into the slip and clawed at the lines to tie off the boat. One of the lines at the front was unfortunately over the life lines and caused the bow to come perilously close to skewering the large motor boat next door.
Mary is starting to wonder what “sailing” means because there is precious little of it – the winds always seem to be right on the nose so we pretend to be a motor boat and chug on through.
We arrived in New York City on October 8th. This was the first time we ever tied off on a mooring ball. Mary and I were on the bow about eight feet from the water surging up and down against a strong Hudson River current. With our boat hooks we were hanging over the bow sprit (this used to be called the “Widow Maker” in the old days – does that give you any idea what it’s like?) retrieving the lines hanging from the ball. These lines were covered with barnacles and other slimy stuff oozing between our fingers as we reached over the edge to tie them off while Roy at the wheel 25 feet further back and can’t see anything tries to keep the boat from running over the ball. Success – first time.
We spent the night walking Manhattan and having dinner ashore – bliss. New York was just as I remembered it – wonderful. And boy was it hot – 95 and humid – perfect. We left New York and headed south. We sailed by the Statue of Liberty through an incredibly busy harbor. Since the weather was changing, we decided to anchor behind Sandy Hook at Atlantic Highlands. The next day we transgressed our previous rule not to ever “enter a strange harbor in the dark”. The trip down was a lot slower than we had expected and we arrived at Atlantic City at 9:30 pm on Wed. Oct. 19th. No options – well being Atlantic City it should be well marked – right?
Oh it was well marked all right – all the casinos and buildings scrubbed any idea of energy saving – lights everywhere – except the channel we were in. We passed two red buoys which should have been lit and flashing – dark, just bobbing in the channel. Stress levels were steadily rising – where the H—L is the marina! Everything is dark but we can just see a steel pier to our left with an enormous pile of rocks off to one side. On the other side, past the buoys is totally dark. Just at that moment Mary calls out that a speeding work boat is bearing down on us at the same time as we go aground. We are stopped dead. Roy puts the wheel hard over and guns the engine to get us off and away. She passed us not even slowing down – did she even see us or not care. It is now official, I am having “Oh Shit” tee shirts printed for all crew. Sign up now to get yours!
Anyway, on our left we see a small marina right beside a restaurant – everything is closed and dark – it doesn’t look like Donald Trump’s marina, but at this point I didn’t care anymore and insisted that we go over and tie off. I was ready to tie up to anything and stay there for the night. Roy called the marina which was of course closed but talked to two boats who gave us directions. We finally arrived there a few minutes later and tied off at the closest pier – I was not going to maneuver down to our assigned slip in the dark – so we apparently stayed in “The Donald’s” slip. Wouldn’t you know it, as soon as we get to the most expensive marina, at $156/night, we had a gale warning keeping us tied for 3 days! Some much for our budget.
We left on Saturday, Oct. 13th to go to Cape May. The winds were 5-10 knots and waves less than 2 feet – it’s a go! Late in the afternoon the winds gusted to over 20 knots and we set sail – we sailed slightly over 8 knots. About two hours from Cape May, we looked at each other and decided to go straight to Hampton over night and use these great conditions.
Early in the afternoon we received a visitor – a small green finch half the size of a canary. He arrived absolutely pooped and sat in the cockpit puffing for a long time. He then cleaned the boat of every bug on it no spiders or flies were left alive. He took turns sitting on Mary’s finger and Roy’s shoulder and my legs, he was not afraid of us. As night fell, he disappeared. Early next morning he popped up again – we had no idea where he spent the night on board. He left us at Hampton to set up house in a new community.
We arrived on Sunday at noon accompanied by a pair of dolphins! We made it!!! From Georgian Bay to Hampton is approximately 1,500 miles precious few of which we actually sailed – Mary was really disappointed. Mary left to go back to Toronto on the 15th and what took us three weeks took her only 3 hours to return. Thank you Mary for all the help and humour you brought along.
So here we are in a beautiful marina with three weeks to get the boat ready and wait for our crew. Rene, who did the same trip last year, will arrive on Oct. 17th; Paul also a strong sailor, on the 30th and our son and daughter (Grant and Monique) on Nov. 3rd. We leave Hampton on Nov. 4th.
The trip to the BVI’s (British Virgin Islands) should take between 10 to 14 days with about 70 boats signed up to go. My next chore is to plan for meals for 6 people for 14 days that needs little cooking and preparation. During the Carib 1500 rally, our progress can be tracked by accessing the web site www.carib1500.com. A self-contained, sealed AXTracker miniature transmitter will be placed on every boat. Every four hours it will send a new position to a Globalstar simplex data satellite which will forward the message to the Magnalox software interface to the web page at www.carib1500.com. In this way the positions of all 75 boats in the rally will be updated 6 times a day without need for human intervention. It will add to the interest in the event by the families and friends of our ralliers, but more importantly it will allow the race committee to arrange rendezvous with boats with problems and to anticipate night time arrivals. The Magnalox software provides user friendly tools that allow viewers to superimpose boat tracks and positions on both graphic and satellite image maps.
We have arrived in Tortola BVI after being at sea for 11 days and 19 hours. We actually motor sailed for 119 hours, the equivalent of 6 days! If you are wondering how we managed to motor with only a 75 gallon fuel tank, well we purchased a bladder tank from Australia that held an additional 50 gallons plus 2 jerry cans as reserve. As you already know, we arrived in Hampton on October 14th and got started with some shopping at West Marine. A few days later on the October 17 Rene arrived and now all the work needed could be started.
The first thing we decided to do was to look at what needed to get completed for the Caribbean 1500 safety inspection. Oops, not only did Roy have a full list of jobs to be done, we now ended up having three lists and not enough time to do it all, so after some prioritizing we all went to work. The first item to be installed as a new stove - having god meals on the journey was high on our priority. After about ten days Paul arrived and with those extra hands for about a week we managed to get everything that needed to get done, done. Wow, we even had time to do some extra jobs and organize the boat before the start of the Caribbean 1500.
Grant and Monique arrived the day before our departure, however their luggage was lost so one more issue to deal with, fortunately no delays as the airline found the bags and got them to the marina the night before.
Day 1 - Sunday November 4, start of the Caribbean 1500 and most people started leaving the marina around 10AM, Drum was slightly delayed as the Captain (Rene) felt we had to complete all safety procedures before departing, so at 12:25PM we left the dock. We made good time motoring to the start line, and we were actually in time to see it even though we are in the cruising class, so off we went with all the other boats on our way to Tortola BVI. Our first afternoon and evening where very quite with no wind and so we used the motor for the first 27 hours like most other boats in the 1500, after that we finally got some wind and where able to put up sails and move along in peace and quite. All crew did very well for the first part of the 1500 and we actually had some nice meals and good rest going into day two.
Day 2 - We entered the Gulf steam which is known to sailors as a very confused part of the ocean close to shore, and yes we did encounter some weird waves but got through very quickly while we were all able to eat and sleep.
Day 3 - We are all starting to get our sea legs after a rough night with lots of wind and waves however that day the fishing lines went out (no fish yet) and we are still sailing on he same tack we started 25 hours ago, wow this is great.
Day 4 - Started with some unique events in the early morning. As we are sailing along with reefed sail very nicely (yes still on the same tack) we get hit by a squall (a short burst of doubling of the wind caused by converging weather fronts) so lots of action and commotion on the boat for some 15 minutes. After all this settled we reduced sails and started motor sailing as the wind was dying. About an hour later the engine alarm goes off as it is overheating, not good. So Roy and Rene dive into the engine room and start to look for the cause but can not find anything. After some debate which included the assigned engineer Paul we started a step by step diagnoses and were able to trace the cause to an airlock in the water intake and fixed it, two hours later we are back on track and going under engine power. Okay so here we are on day four in the late afternoon with the engine going again, and although we are not getting the sunny weather we are hoping for, it sure looked like that breeze we are hoping for was hanging in the air. The forecast did say we could get some additional squalls in the range of 25 to 30 knots and it looked like we were heading for one just like that. Sure enough it hit us, but somehow it sure did not seem like 25 plus knot winds, the wind meter was saying double that amount. Bottom line we all got our life jackets on and went for a one hour roller coaster ride on some awesome waves (yes scary at times) while the wind was howling through the rigging. At the end of it all Maggie felt that Europe might have to wait for a while as she really did not want to do this again. The rest of the crew did very well and even made jokes during the ride (Guess the nerves were playing jokes on them) but hey this boat is built like a tank and she rode the wind and waves like a champ. That night the crew schedule, a system to share the 24 hour sailing experience went out the door as some people needed more sleep than others, and even the next day we all took our well needed rest while we had some wonderful sailing conditions towards the BVI's.
Day 5 - Was easy going with no additional events other than our regular duties such as eating, resting and sleeping.
Day 6 - We finally got in that part of the ocean known as the trade winds section, this meant we got nice calm conditions, sunny skies and a gentle breeze to sail. Now that we all had some rest the mood aboard became pleasant and relaxed for all to enjoy. These conditions also allowed us to make some minor repairs needed, we had a broken tang (some sailboat term) and a sail track on the Mizzen sail that needed fixing. In addition we all felt like having a good meal so the Galley slave (aka the Capt'n) went to work in the galley, however his labour was interrupted as we had a fish on, Yahoo a 15 pound black fin Tuna. So now we had the task of taking in the fishing line and getting the tuna aboard, and sure enough after some fighting the fish was on deck. Most of those aboard were a little sad about this fish dying on deck but the Galley slave already had his knife ready for cleaning, his mind was on preparing fresh fish, skip the meat. Well let me tell you there is nothing as nice as eating fresh tuna, and we all had seconds and thirds. Our day ended with a spectacular sunset, sorry landlubbers but this one you have to see as no description could do it any justice.
Day 7 - We started our day with some wonderful French toast as we have now passed the mid way point and as such time to celebrate. Again a wonderful day with sun and a gentle breeze and so our last little project (the one we did not look forward to) got started. Soon after departure we ended up having a plugged head and needed to take it apart, okay I won't describe this one in detail so lets just say we got it working again. Once fixed our boat engineer or in this case HEAD-mechanic even cleaned it. After this job done, it meant that some of us where not so fresh and a shower was in order, and since none of us had one since we left Hampton we all took one on the deck, wow now the whole boat and crew looks and smells wonderful again. And so as the day goes on we hang around talking, reading, resting, writing and just enjoying the day while looking forward to our midway dinner as this will be served with wine. The captain came up with some crazy idea like a dry boat, no alcohol. But not today we will have wine with dinner to be served soon! That evening, we had our mid way dinner, steak with mashed potatoes, carrots and a cream mushroom sauce served with wine, we all enjoyed it tremendously while motoring. Overnight we had a spectacular view of the Milky Way - so luminous it is startling.
Day 8 - We still do not have sufficient winds to sail and thus ended up motoring and motoring, this may sound okay as it is done on relatively flat water (knowing we are on a ocean it is really flat water) but since this is a sailboat we all prefer to have the wind propel us in peace and quite. No such luck on the day and evening of day eight. To relieve the boredom, Maggie decided to make bread so the boat was filled with the wonderful smell of baking bread. This was Maggie's first ever attempt at baking bread with a propane stove so the results were not up to Maggie;s standards - next time not so long in the oven.
Day 9 - The faster boats in the rally are starting to arrive in Tortola - we are in the last group of sailboats and it will take us a further three days. As the sun comes up we finally get some breeze so that we could motor sail and while the boat was still sailing relatively flat we had eggs and toast for breakfast, in really windy conditions eggs turn out kind of strange. We all enjoyed the gentle morning which continued to bring us more and more wind to the point where we were able to shut of the engine in the early afternoon and sail at 5 to 6 knots. Wow it is always a pleasure to be on a boat on one tack for hours and hours sailing gently towards your destination. As our speed drops slightly, Maggie starts musing about getting a faster boat! Forgetting all about the squalls of a few days ago and that we were thankful that Drum is 'built like a tank'!. Late in the day we were passed by a cruise ship - turns out to be the Queen Mary II. One of our fellow cruisers hails the Queen Mary and obtains an updated weather forecast. We eavesdrop on their conversation over the VHF Radio. They have all the fleet of sailboats on their radar and are giving us a wide berth as they cruise past at 25 knots. The forecast is for continuing winds and calm seas with chance of squalls as we get closer and closer to Tortola.
Day 10 - We are getting closer to Tortola as we are only 192 nautical miles away from the entrance to the BVI's meaning only a day and a half left to go. We here over the morning updates that the Queen Mary II has arrived in Tortola. We are still sailing along on that same tack from yesterday however we are now making speeds of 6 to 7+ knots, or in sailing terms "smoking". With winds like this we don't make eggs but hey the pancakes worked out well this morning so we keep eating well. Most of he crew right now are just taking it easy by watching a movie, resting, reading all while looking forward to our arrival hopefully tomorrow. As the day progresses, we realize that we would arrive in Tortola somewhere around midnight so we decide that it would be better to hang around the islands for a few hours and delay our arrival until Thursday Morning.
Final Day - We have little to share which is a good thing, the only minor point worth mentioning is that the bottom of the jib roller furling kind of collapsed just a few miles out from Tortola and thank god this did not happen some time early in the rally as it meant rolling up the sail and we no longer could use it. The other thing was once again a plugged head but we won't go there. We arrive in Village Cay Marina, Tortola at 8:00 a.m. We are thrilled to be here and must now de-salt the boat so she can be used for pleasure purposes instead, and o yes we need a BEER. Thursday was spent cleaning the boat - it is amazing how the salt gets everywhere - and celebrating. Friday Rene showed us where to buy provisions and other stuff that we wil be needing.
MERRY CHRISTMAS & A HAPPY NEW YEAR!!
I want to take this opportunity to thank our incredible crew: Rene - who was assigned "Captain" for the duration of the trip - for his sharing his knowledge and keeping his cool during several stressful situations; Paul "Head Mechanic" who searched out projects on top of sitting is watch and Monique and Grant who came to the trip without a whole lot of experience but participated with enthusiasm and gained a whole lot of knowledge.
We have spent a lot of time at Village Cay Marina awaiting repairs for the jib furling and bow roller both of which committed suicide during the crossing. The streets in Road Town are decorated for Christmas. Bright Santa's and snow men are displayed under the waving palm trees in 85 degree sunshine and Christmas carols, to a reggae/calypso beat, are blaring from every store. So, I decided it was definitely time to not only put up our Christmas tree in the salon but also write a Christmas greeting to family and friends while we sit around the pool sipping "Pain Killers". We miss you all and hope some of you will come and visit. Rene and Cheryl gave us some Christmas lights so Drum is looking very festive. Now shopping for the Christmas Eve dinner will take some extra care because a roasting turkey will be far too hot in the galley so it's either a pair of tiny chicken breasts for $9.00 or two large pieces of Tenderloin (aka filet mignon) for $7.00. No, I don't understand either. Then again there are hundreds of loose chickens running around Road Town and up to no good. Hopefully will meet up with old friends during the holidays or some of the new friends we have made along the way.
One new friend is Juergen who sailed his 60 foot, 100,000 lb sailboat "Caledonia" alone from Germany to the islands and then up to Labrador and back down here during the last 6 years. Wow, what a boat, she even has a sauna. Don and Gretchen whose sailboat "Star Pass" was hit by lightning earlier and lost 2 sails which were blown out during the rally, Bob and Maria on "Rockhopper" their 60 foot schooner and Rick and Gail on "Vision" their 49 foot sailboat whose autopilot died on the second day of the crossing which meant someone had to steer the whole way! Life is almost settling down to a routine when at anchor: getting up at 7:30 to listen to the SSB (single side band radio) to see where the other boaters are and what's happening where and the daily weather; a leisurely breakfast; baking bread early in the morning before it gets too hot; do laundry in a pail with a toilet plunger; go snorkeling, read or walkabout, and in the late afternoon meet up with other boats for Happy Hour and then either pot luck supper on a friends boat or late supper on our own followed by an early bed time. We seem to get and need about 10 hours of sleep - except when participating in a "Full Moon" party - at which point all bets are off as to when you get any sleep. Shopping excursions are very entertaining. On Trellis Bay, rum is cheap but tomatoes cost $1.50 each if you can find them; a small bag of about 20 baby carrots costs $3.98 and a lime 75 cents. You can buy "Placenta Cream" for your hair but no blond hair coloring. Movie videos start at $30.00 each and book stores are few and tend towards religion, cooking and juvenile - thank god I brought lots of both. Like child birth, the memories of the ocean trip have almost lost their biting edge and talk amongst several boating friends has centered around a future Atlantic crossing to the Mediterranean. This subject will have to be discussed ad-nauseum during several Happy Hours. We are also exploring the possibility of putting all our boats on a transport ship and catching a plane over....
On Thursday, Dec. 13th we spent 3 hours with BVI Immigration to extend our cruising permit for a further 30 days so we can now cruise the BVI's until Jan 15th. After that everything is written in pencil because we go where our fancy hits and weather allows. We definitely want to get back and enjoy the "Bubbly Pool" on Jost Van Dyke where huge ocean waves pummel their way between high rocks and cliffs through a narrow channel towards the shore creating a Perrier fizzy water effect in the little pool near the beach. We also have our own type of lottery entertainment here in the islands. When anchored on a mooring ball in Norman Island, the owner of the moorings does his rounds every morning to collect $25.00 per boat. There are usually over 20 boats in the cove and following no set pattern he scoots around doing his collections - but he doesn't always hit every boat, so some days you don't have to pay. However, he has also been seen chasing boats out into the ocean when they have tried to leave before he got to them. During our last stay of over 9 days, he didn't come over once. Yahoo - we won!!!! So much for simple pleasures. Our major repairs are now complete. We have a nice new shiny Bow Roller and a new jib furling unit. However once the furling unit was installed we then discovered that the jib had to be modified for the new furling unit. Luckily this was completed fairly quickly and at a very reasonable cost so we can once again sail and also anchor - free from Marina and Mooring Balls at last!
To all, have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Hope some of you visit us in the new year.
CHRISTMAS WAS GREAT NEW YEARS WAS EVEN BETTER
Location: Isla De Culebra, Spanish Virgin Islands
Date: January 30, 2008
Christmas was great – New Years was even better.
We left Maho Bay in the USVI’s for New Years in the British Virgins – Trellis Bay. Apparently, that was the place to be, so we left extra early on Saturday to make sure we would get a mooring ball in this beautiful bay next to the airport on Tortola. Lee and Sharon on Allegro left earlier and said they would tie their dinghy to reserve a ball for us because the charter boats flock there at the best of times but on special occasions it’s like finding the last parking spot at the mall on Christmas Eve. No problems; we arrived early in the afternoon and the place started to fill up. On New Years Eve the scene was completely different – the last mooring ball was just behind us and 3 different boats descended towards it a great speed with their boat hooks at the ready in order to snatch the line from the others. The winner got to tie off and the losers continued the search circling the anchorage like vultures circling looking for lunch.
Things got pretty hairy when a catamaran who was trying to maneuver ran over a mooring ball which already had a boat tied to it thereby straddling the ball and unable to get off and running into the other boat. Lots of screaming and scrambling with fenders and boat hooks and people scurrying back and forth on both boats to see what was breaking next. Several boats got run into during the festivities because when the mooring balls ran out people started to anchor instead in any teeny, shallow area with minimal skill. As Rene said, anchoring is the major cause of divorce amongst couples – I was seeing why. However, we personally are improving in that area with only minimal heated exchanges.
The evening festivities were great; yummy food at several outdoor restaurants, dancing to islands music, meeting up with friends on shore, phenomenal fireworks at midnight and then the sounds of drunk dinghy drivers negotiating in absolute darkness trying to find their boats while singing and calling out into the warm evening breezes. Some apparently gave up and slept on the beach.
After New Years we left Trellis Bay and sailed to Virgin Gorda and then on to Norman Island, Benures Bay and met up with Rene & Cheryl on Gypsy Blues, Lee and Sharon on Allegro and Rick and Gail on Vision. We spent several great days in this, our favorite anchorage so far.
We went to Jost van Dyke for an evening and then on to Cane Garden Bay on the North Side of Tortola; a beautiful little town but a really rolly anchorage. From there we went to visit “The Baths” on Virgin Gorda and on to Cooper Island. This area of the Caribbean is becoming very, very popular with the sailing charter companies and creating congestion in the bays and anchorages. The ‘Baths” were our first stop that day and we arrived just before noon at this beautiful site which is a long white sand shoreline sporting giant boulders and rocks along its length and creating ruin like crevices and basins where huge waves crash through creating secluded shallow pale blue/green pools which fill and empty with each wave action. Absolutely beautiful and filled with people both from charter boats and giant cruise ships. Again, this anchorage was so full with every mooring ball taken, we had to anchor. Late afternoon we decided to continue on the Cooper Island, a small delightful resort and anchorage with approx 30 mooring balls. With my binoculars out, I spotted one last ball, just vacated. What luck! I walked forward to the bow to get ready to pick up the ball’s line. Then, out of the corner of my eye I saw a smaller charter company sailboat speeding past us, aiming at the ball. She was standing on the front holding the boat hook like a javelin and he was pushing the accelerator up to the red engine line. They roared past us, eyes forward ignoring my gestures. Just as they got to the ball, a small dinghy speeding from the opposite direction lunged at the ball and laid claim micro-seconds before them. All is well in the universe Ha, Ha, Ha.
Oh well, instead we proceeded back to our favorite anchorage at Benures Bay. You guessed it – also full. So with darkness falling swiftly, we headed towards The Bight and anchored there. And so ends another day in paradise which is rapidly filling up.
We checked out of the BVIs on Jan 12th and scooted around the USVI’s, Francis Bay on St. John and Red Hook on St. Thomas to do some provisioning and take the dollar bus up to TuTu Mall where they were selling hundreds of bikinis – the bottoms only. No one had any idea what happened to the tops. The anchorage at Red Hook was one of the worst we have encountered to date. Every time the Ferry passed by it created a wake plus the large swells from the north, which slammed the boat violently up and down and side to side for a couple of minutes p. Then all was still until the next Ferry passing; every 15 minutes until midnight resuming at 5:45 am. This caused extreme activities in our aft cabin with Roy and I being rolled around and into each other most of the night. It was like foreplay all night long.
Our next anchorage was Charlotte Amalia in the USVIs where we met up again with Rene and Cheryl and Lee and Sharon. What a great place. We stayed for six days anchored in a large harbour filled with clean turquoise water filling up daily with up to 5 large cruise ships and a large number of sailboats. The old part of town built in the 1800’s has narrow streets and laneways reminiscent of New Orleans. We found a great little restaurant “Gladys” with good food and in a charming setting in company with our boating friends. The new mall adjacent the cruise ship docks has great high end stores and the “Bad Ass Café” with free internet access for the price of a coffee.
On Jan 24 we headed to the Spanish Virgin Islands and checked in at Dewey in Culebra. The trip was fairly routine with some large swells and as always, the wind in the wrong direction. While motoring along with the large swells passing us, we heard a loud pop. One of the two towing lines from our dingy had parted. With the large swells we decided that the remaining line would propably last the rest of the trip – another 2 hours. Nope, 30 minutes later it also snapped and our dingy slowly drifted away in the opposite direction. After some extreme maneouvers by Roy, i.e. hanging through the life line, balancing on his knees with one hand on the rail and the other trying to capture the bucking dingy, she was subdued and imprisoned against Drum. The trip continued to the sounds of rubber scraping against the rub rail and violent swells trying to launch the dingy into the deck.
The next day sailed on to Culebrita to meet up with Rene and Cheryl. This is also on my “favorite” anchorage list. A quiet lagoon, a little rolly with the northern swells but absolutely private with just our two boats. White sands, palm trees, clear water where you can see the bottom at 35 feet. Rene and Roy dove for conch for our supper – we ended up with 6 beautiful large shells and a great feast of breaded conch, curry rice and salad with lots and lots of wine and pain killers. At dusk when the sun was gently sinking behind the palm trees, two small deer came out to walk along the beech.
The next day we climbed to the abandoned light house. What a beautiful place it must have been with numerous large rooms with high ceilings and black and white marble floors. The roof is gone now and the ever present wind blows through the large windows which were probably only ever shuttered overlooking several beautiful anchorages. The gracious large doorways lead through to high entrance halls and stair cases leading to the tower and to rooms retaining painted pale yellow walls.
We are back in Culebra for a few days. Yesterday we took a bus trip to Flamenco Beach. A beautiful beach with the most extraordinary fine white sand; just like icing sugar. We spent the day with Rene and Cheryl and Marilyn and Gary (Cheryl’s mom and dad) walking the beach, nibbling lunch and just plain talking, lazing and playing with the sand. We also terrorized a small crab by walking in front of him to limit his escape route. He looked just like a little Disney character; six (or maybe it was 8) legs, traveling sideways at great speed with his little eyes bulging out on stalks. When he stopped he would squat down – when he moved he rose up on his legs – the up and down action and poke out eyes were hilarious. I want one. I’m really missing my pets.
Next we head to Vieques and then with Rene and Cheryl and Lee and Sharon off towards Puerto Rico at the end of the week.
Longer term we plan to be in St. Martin for March and then slowly south to Trinidad and Venezuela.
One thing I can’t understand, no matter where we go and who goes with us, I am the only one who comes back covered by bug bites. Not like the comparatively gentle mosquito bites from home, but large red bumps which itch something awful to the point where you find yourself clawing away at them. Guaranteed, when sitting on the sandy beach for ten minutes I come away with an itching bottom but I can never see anything large enough to have done the nasty.
Until next time….
Chapter Six - Puerto Rico and Beyond
Location: Culebra...heading to Puerto Rico
Date: April 11, 2008
Well it has been over two months since our last newsletter and a lot has happened in that time. In the last newsletter we were in Culebra and heading for Puerto Rico. This Chapter covers the trip to Puerto Rico, the return to the BVI’s via Culebra and the USVI’s, and the eastward to St. Martin/Sint Maarten, St Barts (St. Barthelemy), St. Kitts and Nevis, Montserrat and finally to Antigua where we are now.
Chapter Six - Puerto Rico and Beyond
It is now February 5th and we have arrived in beautiful Puerto Rico. Have you seen the movie “Captain Ron”? Well, this is the marina where they filmed his famous docking at high speed scene, at the fictitious island of St. Haag. This marina was so big that they use golf carts to pick cruisers up from their boats and cart them around within the marina. This was a great place to practice my Spanish. During discussions in the marina office, we were talking about the names on the toilets identifying men and women and how it is sometimes confusing. The discussion went as follows; women are “damas” and I proudly added that my husband would then be a “huevos”. There was absolute stunned silence followed by uproarious laughter by staff and friends. I had apparently called Roy an egg – which coincidentally is also a very rude slang for a testicle. Back to the Berlitz home study books.
We meet Rene and Cheryl again, at long last and together with Lee and Sharon we invited fellow Canadians, Linda and Peter from “Kynda” for a close squeeze dinner on Drum. Kynda kindly gave us a new Canadian flag to replace our old soldier which had fluttered its way into shreds.
Rene and Cheryl left the next morning so, with Lee & Sharon, we rented a car and toured Old San Juan. This is a busy place with beautiful buildings, great dining, cobblestone streets lined with huge trees grown over with lianas and department stores. We also did another major provisioning because all we seem to do when not sailing, swimming, touring or hanging, is eating and drinking. I have rediscovered the pleasures of Baileys Irish Crème (1 litre bottle at $16.00 US) and happy hour on whose ever boat, sucks those bottles dry in a hurry.
On the 7th we visited the Puerto Rican rainforest “El Yunque” which lies below the constant cloud cover. The paths make for easy walking through giant houseplants. I was surprised to see that the most common flower was the “Patience Plant” which is also comfortably at home in my mother’s garden in Toronto, Canada; at least for the summer.
The forest is warm, humid and misty green with gently dripping rain drops falling everywhere, but, precious few critters. The water falls from gentle trickles to large pools being fed by three story falls were very popular with the hikers. Lee took the initiative to strip down and get right in under the falls – great pictures which will hopefully soon be put into our web site.
We left Puerto Rico on Feb 11th after a great visit to a beautiful island – we can heartily recommend anyone to visit.
On the return trip to Culebra we met up with Gypsy Blues. The forecast was for high seas and strong winds expected to increase within a couple of days. Keeping this in mind we all decided to anchor in Dakity Harbour just behind a reef at the entrance to Culebra. With the expected storm conditions, we all took a mooring ball and also added our anchors – just in case. Conditions didn’t improve much and so when we left for Charlotte Amalie (St Thomas, USVI) on Feb. 16th a distance of only 20 miles, it took us all over 7 hours with 30++ winds and 10 feet waves. Our engine took this opportunity to take time off - again – it wouldn’t start when we finally tacked for our final approach to Charlotte Amalie. Roy was in the engine room trying to restart and I was trying to steer while the bow of the boat kept submarining in the steep waves. Roy got it restarted but this is something we have to get fixed before we go much further. This was the third time the engine had overheated and the problem only occurs when we start the engine in rough conditions. We talked to a whole lot of people on what the problem might be – lots of ideas but no solutions so far.
At least we are back in Charlotte Amalie, one of our favorite anchorages, and had the best pizza – ever!
On Feb 23rd we left to go back to Maho Bay in St. John. Another rough crossing with 35+ winds and 15 feet waves on the nose – this weather is becoming very common. The locals say that they have not seen these kinds of high winds in a long time.
A lot of the Caribbean 1500 were anchored in Maho making ready to go to St. Martin on Feb 25th. We can’t go before we get our engine problem fixed.
Oh well, we had a great dinner in the Maho Bay Resort with Light Heart, Liquid Courage, Phaedrus and Allegro along with a large crowd which always fills this resort to capacity – little surprise when a large complete dinner is only $17.00 each.
February 25 we left to go back to Road Town in the BVI’s to get our engine seen to. We hope “Parts and Power” will be able to trouble shoot the problem and fix it. Based on past experience we are really impressed with Parts and Power. We booked them to see us on Tuesday morning, but they showed up at 5:30 pm on Monday to get a jump start on the problem. Sebastian spent a couple of hours checking out the cooling system but could not find the cause and left with a promise to discuss the problem the next morning at the daily Parts and Power round table. Unfortunately no one had any new ideas. Now what do we do?
Later that day we went into Parts and Power to pick up some spare parts. On the list were new impellers for the water pump since we had used up our spares when troubleshooting our overheating problems. They did not have the same impellers that we had been using and looked up the part number and low and behold we discovered we had been using the wrong impeller all this time! The impellers we had been using were 2.8mm too short! This was enough for the impeller to suck air instead of water resulting in the engine overheating. Needless to say we bought a whole bunch of impellers. Yahoo – we are up and running again!
On to Benures Bay on Norman Island to meet up with Allegro again before they leave to pick up a friend and then on to Trellis Bay and then to Spanish Town to check out and get ready to go to St. Martin. What a great sail – we actually reach 7.4 knots with jib and main only; a first for our tubby girl, unless we are actually surfing, which is another story again (over 10+ knots surfing).
We left Virgin Gorda at 3:00 pm, for an over night 82 mile sail to St. Martin in company with Moody Blue and Moonshine – two Canadian sailboats we met in Virgin Gorda. After a mild, easy motor sail with winds of 15+ knots and 8-9 foot waves, we arrived after 14 hours. We anchored in Simpsons Bay Lagoon, by “The Witch’s Tit” (honestly, this is the real name) close to Gypsy Blues and Allegro, who arrive at 5:30pm that evening.
Spent a great day in Philipsberg, Sint Maarten with Rene and Cheryl and Lee and Sharon. Unfortunately, Rene led us to his favourite store “Grand Jewelers” where they practice the fine are of very persuasive sales. Nobody got out alive, including me. It’s very hard to leave when they slip a ring on your finger for your inspection and never actually let go of your finger as they twist and turn the ring to make it sparkle while haggling price. While the haggling was taking place, we were plied with bottles of beer and wine thus creating a very mellow mood where the purchase of a ring actually appears to become a necessity. Lee figured out that at the end each beer actually cost $400.00. We finished the day with a great lunch at “The Blue Bitch” while watching the surf run up a white sand beach and a steel band playing on the boardwalk while holiday makers walked along in anything from a thong to a knitted one piece on various size bodies. Doesn’t sound too bad does it? Oh ya, we also bought more booze at the Duty Free. St. Martin is another great island with lots to do and everything you could possibly need, available.
Part of our daily routine was to pickup fresh baguettes in the morning, visit Shrimpy’s Bar (for free internet access), sightseeing with Gypsy Blues, Allegro and Light Heart, and happy hour at the Yacht Club where we cheer every boat coming into the lagoon through the lift bridge.
Early this week the 15 – 20 foot swells traveling down from the north hit the Caribbean closing some marinas and making northern anchorages untenable. It also kept yachts from leaving including us. Rene and Cheryl left for Antigua right after Rene’s birthday on March 23rd. We decided to wait for a better weather window when the winds and waves have subsided more.
Simpsons Bay Lagoon was very rolly with very strong winds and squalls which caused two boats on two separate nights to drag their anchors. One boat crossed right in front of Allegro and only the quick thinking of 4 or 5 yachties who boarded and re-anchored her kept the story from turning nasty. Both boats were vacant with very little anchor chain down.
After three weeks in St. Martin, we were very ready to leave; so on March 30th we left for St. Bart’s. The anchorage was very rolly and after one sleepless night we left early and headed to St. Kitt’s at 7:00am for a 42 mile run. The trip started in 20+ winds with moderate waves – a great sail. That is until we rounded the north end of St. Kitts and from that point on it was on-going squalls with high winds and blowing spray. St. Kitts from off-shore looks very agricultural and green with large slopping mountains anchoring clouds. We stopped and signed in at Customs in Basseterre . Our final approach to our anchorage at White House Bay was during a squall at 6.30pm, just as daylight was fading. We, including Allegro and Light Heart, circled until the gusted abated somewhat. It was not a good night.
The next day we and Light Heart re-anchored because the winds were up to 46 knots in this secure anchorage. It has been squally like this for over a week now and is not expected to reduce for another couple of days. At night the noise is terrible and wind gusts roar through every 20 seconds causing the boat to shudder and veer on her anchor.
The laundry is piling up since St. Martin a week ago. With these winds any laundry needs a peg every inch or better still button the shirts around the life lines. Makes the $10.00 U.S. a load in St. Martin sound good.
April 1st it was time to get off the boat – enough with the wind and rocking. We walked along the road past hundreds of wild goats and cows grazing everywhere. One of the locals stopped and asked whether we wanted a ride. We decided to walk instead to the beach bar he said was only 20 minutes away. He must have forgotten the 20 minutes were by car! Four miles later we were dragging our butts to the beach bar. Because we were only going for a walk only Dave had money – thank God – enough for 2 buckets of beer. Nobody wanted to walk all the way back and we had no money for a cab – only for beer – there are priorities you know.
The locals are great, friendly people and “De King” took pity on us and gave us a cab ride back to our boat, free. (We gave Doctor Elvis some money to give to De King, the next day).
Yesterday, April 2nd we did a tour of Basseterre with our guide Doctor Elvis. All drivers here use their horns constantly. According to Doctor Elvis; several toots to say hello and several more to say watch out. Consequently every driver constantly uses the horn at every turn, stop or sighting a friend.
One of the best places we saw was Romney Manor; a grand park like setting with giant trees festooned with lianas and flowers buzzing with hummingbirds. On our way to Fort Brimstone we passed a “Carib” beer delivery truck. To our amazement, Doctor Elvis asked us if we want to buy any beer. We heartily agreed at which point he slowed his taxi and waggled his fingers to the delivery truck to have them pull along side. Deftly 3 cases of 24 were unloaded to our taxi at a rate of $21.00 US – less than a dollar a bottle. We continued on to the fort and on to do some provisioning – again. We can strongly recommend Doctor Elvis to anyone wanting a personalized tour of St. Kitts.
April 7th we left beautiful St. Kitts for a one hour sail to Nevis. Unfortunately, we only stayed one night and left early on the 8th for the 35 mile sail to Montserrat. Again the weather forecast was way off reality with winds up to 30 and waves and swells, steep, close together and almost on the nose. We arrive at 3:00 just in time to check in at customs have happy hour on Allegro and off to bed.
What a glorious island! Lush, green and filled with flowers and lots of abandoned villas. We had the former Chief of Police – Winston – give us (Drum, Allegro, Light Heart and new friends on Andiamo) a tour. We had no idea on the amount of damage caused by the on-going eruptions of the volcano “Soufriere”. The entire south end of Montserrat is off limits with the original capital of Plymouth devasted by 15 feet of ash in the eruption of 1997. Our guide, Winston, lost everything, including his house. Soufriere is still active with steam rising from the slopes. The locals, numbering approx. 5000 have all moved to the north of the island and live with the threat of another eruption. Apparently the seismologists were not able to pin-point when an eruption would take place, but the cattle on the island knew way in advance and moved out of the area. Accordingly to Winston, when the evacuation order came and the people moved out of the danger zone, the animals were left behind. Later when people went back to assess the damage they noticed that the animals had gathered together and gone up a mountain away from the flows, ash and gases and very successfully survived. Does that mean cows are smarter than seismologists?
It is now April 10th and we have arrived in Jolly Harbour Antigua after a 25 mile sail from Montserrat.
We hope everyone reading this is well and enjoying these articles – feedback would be helpful.
Till next time, DRUM signing off.