April 2013

April
Mon 1^st
Rolly and windy stay on boat.



Tues 2^nd
Still roly and windy with rain; so..Painting and guitar practice, after boat jobs; putting in new hose and stopcock, checking boom ..cant fix it! We need to get to Martinique for a rigger. That is weeks away.



Wed 3^rd
Shopping for music bits, Boss RC30 looper foot switches, mic and stand. Trudy bought a Kindle...Check out, we are heading off to Culebra. There is a nice black lady at customs who was extremely helpful and charming, quite the best customs experience to date. That is 2 nil to the USVI. Head back to the boat and muck about with my new looper pedal. Any idea how we get some decent free books on the kindle?



Thur 4th
8:00 am passes and we get up late. Prep the boat and set off down wind. For the first time we try this without the main sail. The yacht hand book says NEVER use head sail alone. However asking around most yachts are sailed like this. The main sheet is tightened down and we are using a high tech topping lift, so the mast is held reasonable firmly. Off we go in 15 to 20 knots true wind and end up travelling at 6.5 knots with between 10 and 15 knots apparent. It is really smooth and Trudy has a huge smile on her face based on the comfort we are in. Culebra has a tricky entrance and the Pilot book makes it sound and look worse than it is. We concentrate for about half an hour and we are in Ensenada Honda; a beautifully calm bay with a nice cooling breeze. Yellow flag goes up and we phone Customs at the airport. Another pleasant experience, he calls us back as he is dealing with other yachts, takes down most of our details, tells us we can come to customs in the airport tomorrow at 10:00. He also lets us know we can take our yellow flag down and go ashore to enjoy ourselves. He is a sailor and advises us of a couple of other must go stops. There is, what lookslike a log in the water, but it turns out to be an iguana!
We go ashore to “The Dingy Dock” a local yachty hang out, beers aren't too expensive and a rum punch is only $3.50 I happy hour. We meet a lady who asks Trudy if she wants a pit bull as she has a rescue dog to give away; she drags Trudy off to her house to look at him. Apparently it was love at first sight but he would complicate our lives too much. Back on the boat a guy is sailing around, in the dark, on a trimaran that look like three canoes stuck together. He is laughing his head off whilst dodging yachts at about 10 knots!



Fri 5^th
Late start and head off to customs. Another very pleasant experience; although he does tell us that the nice lady in St Thomas gave us some wrong info. Still that gives the Us 2.5 to nil! We wander round town and stop at Zaco Taccos for lunch. Very cheap and excellent Mexican food. We end up at the Dinghy Dock again. It is on the waterfront and next to the dock there are a large number of tarpon over a metre long we wonder if they are edible. Tonight we meet Captain Pat, another lady slightly older than us who is looking for another solo sailor that she can join. From what we have seen so far Culebra is full of friendly and interesting people, very laid back and a million miles away from the rest of the USVIs.
Sat 6th
Took a day to find a laundry and do all our stuff. In between we find a cafe with internet and manage to register the new kindle.
Sun 7th
Guitar practice ..with new looper!
Mon 8th
We hire a golf cart for the day. Top Speed 25 mph and we get stuck going up a hill and have to push! In 4 hours we manage to see most of the island and its beautiful beaches. The best of which, Flamenco beach, has no shade and is full of people. Zoni beach is smaller and almost deserted so much better as far as we were concerned. We pass the only museum on the island which is closed. It is in such a remote place that we will not get to see it. The view of the next islands were brilliant with clear azure seas, quite intoxicating.
Tue 9th
Spend the day (seriously!) downloading Calibre, the software required to get kindle books.
We have a 54mps connection, the best available in the Caribbean so far, showing signal strength and quality permanently in the 90s and we still have trouble. Check out rudders as they are getting a bit sticky; we should have dropped them in Trinidad and lubricated them. So that is something else on the haul out list. (together with filling the hole in the hull!)
Wed 10th
Get up at 5:30 to take the $2-25 6:30 ferry to Fajardo on the Puerto Rican main island. We hire a car and travel up to San Juan after a necessary stop at the West Marine Chandlers. Trudy does some clothes shopping and I go on the hunt for a guitar. We are both successful. I find a fender telecaster for £325, an incredible bargain. Trudy spends nearly as much in Victoria's secrets. We have just enough time to drive through Old San Juan get back to West Marine to pick up some shoes and get back for the last ferry back to Culabra. Old SanJuan is a beautiful Spanish fortress town. Very colourful and we wish we had more time to spend site seeing. Traffic has been awful both ways and the 95 mile round trip has taken over 4 hours. We really do not miss the traffic. We drop the car off at the wrong park and with 5 minutes to spare I have to run around the town locating the right park and move the car. I am the last on the ferry. The Captain very kindly waited for me!
Thur 11th
Day spent playing with new toys whilst Trudy puts on a fashion show.
Fri 12th to Sun 14th
The Ensenada Honda bay is very tranquil with good holding so we enjoy a couple of days relaxing on the boat. The weather is beginning to cool down and is very acceptable.
Mon 15th
Up anchor and head for Viques the next Spanish island. It takes longer than we had expected as we faff about using the auto pilot to automatically tack and eventually succeed. We calculate that we are tacking through 122 degrees so we can make 61 degrees off the true wind which equates to 47 degrees off the apparent wind. Not brilliant but it will get us where we want to go. We arrive too late to go ashore so just have a peaceful evening on board. It is however very roly.
Tue 16th
We have anchored off Espiranza in the south of the island. We dinghy ashore in the morning and take a taxi, $6 for two, to Isabella, the other town on the island where the ferry lands from Fajardo. It takes about an hour to walk around. There is a pretty pink clock tower and in the main plaza there is a large stone built stage. There is one supermarket and two banks. Approximately a third of the island is out of bounds as the Americans were, until 2004 using this area for bombing practise. There is still unexploded ordinance littering the place. We had planned to head south for Martinique or St Lucia on Wednesday but the wind and swell seem to be against us for a few days so we postpone themove.



Wed 17^th
Day spent trying to find a Mexican restaurant that had shut down and marine diesel engine oil as port engine is due a service. You will not find it on this side of the Island!! a $15 taxi takes us both on a trip all around the island to find the right oil. The site seeing is a bonus. Vieques is a much bigger and better appointed island than Culebra. The road are all very smooth and in good condition. The place is full of bars and restaurants but also it has some useful shops. Everyone is very helpful even providing information without being asked. We have been trying to learn Spanish but hasn't been necessary. After a few attempts most of the island inhabitants help out by speaking perfect (American) English.
Thur 18th
Port engine serviced; not much fun as sea a bit rocky. Oops forgot to turn on the diesel again so bleeding required. (along with bleeding swearing). The very nice customs man told us that we can check out by email and he would sent us the departure papers as a pdf file. We phone to see where this is and his colleague tells us that we need to come to the airport! Thanks! We could have done that yesterday. It seem that all the border protection officers try to outdo each other in one way or another.
Fri 19th
We are still watching the weather and it looks like we will get a window on Sunday so plan a trip to the airport on Saturday. Winds are quite high so we spend a roly day on board. Large fish spotted beneath the boat!
Sat 20th
Early start to get to customs for clearance out. Another very friendly and helpful guy. Full marks to the US. We get taxis to airport and to Isabella and they both take us to parts of the island that we previously missed. At the airport we stop for a coffee and a bite to eat. The cafe (garage) is run by a couple of old guys who look like bums the first of whom tells us the coffee is finished, but we can have the bit in the bottom of the jug! Do we want the special, beef hash eggs any way and toast? OK. One easy over and a scrambled. Too late, the “cook” has already done two easy overs. It is without doubt the worst prepared food we have ever had.
We frequently see iguanas up to a metre long crossing the road and Viques is renowned for its wild horses that roam freely and are always seen by the side of the road. Today we saw a mongoose for the first time and two minutes later see another!
Sun 21st
Up early, up anchor and set off for the South. We expect to pass St Croix by 5pm but get there by 3! over 8 knots but not quite the angle we want. We struggle through the night with force 6 winds and waves over 3 metres. We are adopting a 2 hour watch system but if we are not tired we stay on watch for as long as we can. It means the other person gets more rest and you are more likely to get to sleep if you are tired with all the rock and roll and banging around. We are not an ideal boat for large wind and seas. We put an extra reef in for the night and an alarm goes off on the starboard engine. Investigation shows the alternator belt has gone so its out with the tools in a force 6! a half hour later and we have our engine back.
Mon 22nd
Dawn comes and the wind and waves have died down to 2.5 metres and 22 knots! Sun comes out and it is a very pleasant sail. During the night the marine ply wall has detached itself from one of the forward bunks and the wind generator is rocking about due to a loose fitting. Plus the SSB aerial has detached itself. More maintenance required. Wind has still too much easterly in it which will extend our passage by about 20 hours.
No SSB means no weather (GRIB) files by (free) radio, so the Iridium phone comes out for the first time and at 11:30 we request a weather file, not sure when it will be sent. In addition to the satellite phone we subscribe to “Airmail”. This costs about $200 per year and they send you emails by short wave radio (SSB) this is a very slow service and only accepts text emails so we can only use this in emergency. The weather files are also limited in size to 10K which is just enough for a couple of days passage. On line GRIB requests are almost immediate and provide massive files. But the SSB has a very simple file that gets sent sometime during the night; so you need to log on twice. 18:00 we try a tack and forget to plot a position so it is two hours later before we discover that we are going slightly west of north with a strong current against us. I wake Trudy for a tack, she goes back to bed and I have an issue with loose lines on the lazy bag and a crunching noise from the back of the boom I wake Trudy again to sort out both. We need to reef so Trudy gets no sleep in her three hours off watch. The wind generator is supported by a tripod held together by 5mm stainless bolts. With all the banging one is wearing thin. It needs replacing but it is at the back of the boat and high up too dangerous to attempt at sea. Gaffer tape and cable ties are employed to hold back the wear.
Tue 23rd
At 02:00 I check for a Grib file and it has arrived. Weather info it dated 12:00 yesterday so the two day forecast is already 14 hours old. We can expect easterlies for the next day and a half. We are sailing about 50 degrees of the apparent wind in order to sail within 120 miles of our destination, Rodney Bay St. Lucia this angle gives us 6 knots but a terrible slamming. Whilst trying to sleep you get woken by a huge crash which moves your bunk followed by 3 or 4 smaller bangs that feel like we just ran over some large fish. Very uncomfortable and deprives us of much needed sleep. Who said sailing was fun!
08:35 Spongebob Squarepants is seen floating by to starboard.
Wed 24th
A weird morning with winds up and down from 5 knots to 21 knots 3 times in the space of an hour. Shake reef out, put reef in put 2^nd reef in engine on, off on, off, put 3^rd reef in...dies to nothing then starts to climb but we have a 2 .2 knot current against us and 15 knots of wind is not enough to stop us going backwards. Hectic! 3 hours later it settles down to a steady 22 knots! We fly in the wrong direction. After bypassing Dominica we settle down, current reduces to a manageable 0.8 knots and we expect to be in by tomorrow. More ropes used to tie up the wind generator and we turn it off and strap it up..less danger if it collapses. Not sure what angle catamarans are supposed to heel (less than 5 degrees) but the waves are frequently lifting our windward keel to nearly 20 degrees.
Thur 25th
Arrive in Rodney bay at about 4:30 am, quick prep of boat then bed.
Later we go ashore to check in, get some internet and get a few vitals.



Fri 26^th
Prepare a list of boat fixes, jobs and stuff we need to buy. Head out to chandlers and hardware shop. Try to by rocker cover seal but the ever helpful Ian Cowan says he will make me one.



Sat 27^th
Start jobs, reattach wall panel, drill out wind genny support and attach larger bolt, change diesel filters.



Sun 28^th
Remove rocker cover.
Mon 29th
Take rocker cover to Ian and he makes up a gasket on the spot. We also need to my some monel rivets 30 at nearly $5 each!
Meet up with “Chinaman”, actually he is from Guyana and an amerindian descendent, he comes on board and plans a new stainless steel bracket to brace our wind generator. We should collect this on Wednesday.
We buy a new pressure cooker, essential boat cookware! More clothes shopping for Trudy followed by another fashion show. This time I am trying to download software to fix my modem.
Trudy cleans bilges.
Tue 30th
Fitted new bilge pump, new lines on lazy bag, rocker cover gasket, strip light in starboard engine room. Half a day spent downloading modem software and firmware to try to get my SSB modem working. All engine checks. We need to fit new zinc sacrificial anodes.