Visitors and a broken boat

Visitors and a broken boat

Antigua has been a busy time for us; we have had 3 sets of visitors. First we had Cliff, then Ruth and Michael and finally John and Penny.

Always nice to see friends and family we have had to entertain our visitors interspersed with mending the various things that have gone wrong with the boat.

Poor Cliff didn’t get much sailing, in between a period of Northerly swells which made the sea lumpy and waiting for the electrical tech to look at our problem wind generator.

With Cliff at Shells fish and chips - Real English fish n chips!

 

First to get repaired was the Air Breeze wind generator that we had fitted in Bonaire last August. A fault with the internal regulator was diagnosed and battle royal developed between the manufacturer and the supplier as to what to do about the faulty piece of kit. Eventually after much pressure, Budget Marine supplied a new one. The manufacturer’s suggestion of returning the unit to them (at our cost) was quite frankly ludicrous!
 

Ruth and Michael brought out with them a box of spare goodies so we could repair our faulty engine alarm panel, unfortunately, this unit is still not functioning properly after several attempts to diagnose the problem.  At least we have an alarm buzzer even if we don’t have alarm lights. We think that this new module is faulty and so do the two engineers that have looked at it!



Ruth at the helm

 

John and Penny brought out our final tranche of spares and we have replaced our leaking stern gland. This was really very bad as we were getting several buckets of water a day in the bilge when we were sailing. The new stern gland was fitted while in the water (quite exciting!) and we have managed to slow the leak to a drip which only occurs when we run the engine. There is obviously still something not right in this area and we will need to investigate further. Thanks must go to Peter on ‘Ear to Eternity ‘, the Vice commodore of the OCC for helping sort the engine panel and fitting the stern gland, who we fortuitously met in deep bay when we were considering cancelling going to the OCC rally and hauling out instead.

In between fitting new stern glands, attempting to repair alarm panels and replacing the wind generator we have managed to do some sailing. With Cliff we had a relaxing time sailing up the coast of Antigua to Deep Bay, snorkelling and sundowners on the beach. We met another couple sailing a Westerly Corsair ‘Scavaig’ then back to Jolly harbour where we all had a party on Ann and Pete Thompson’s ‘new’ boat ‘Maia’ a Moody 376.

We were back in Deep Bay a week or so later with Ruth and Michael, after doing an island tour in a hire car, Shirley heights, English dockyard

The 'Master & Commander' of The 'Galene'!

and a drive to the highest point on Antigua (Mount Obama or Boggy peak).

Indian Creek from Shirley heights

That was one of the worst drives in a 4x4 I have ever had (never again).The road was so steep that at times we felt we should get out and walk, the 4x4 was not up to it.

They weren't kidding!

When we finally reached the top, the road simply stopped at a big gate “NO ENTRY” and virtually no room to turn round. There was a slightly worn path along the fence, so we thought this must lead to a viewing point. It did not. After a short steep climb there was a view down to Old Road Bluff through a small gap in the trees – simply not worth all the effort.

 

View from Mount Obama

 

The day after Ruth and Michael left us John and Penny arrived, onto the boat and off to Guadeloupe. A bit off a rough ride, the new crew survived the trip (minus their stomach contents!)

The new crew enjoying themselves

Local Pageant in Deshaies

 We stayed a couple of days in Deshaies then on to the Saintes at the bottom of Guadeloupe.





A local Pageant in Deshaies

 

John and Penny were keen to experience French culture and in The Saintes, Penny got the full cultural experience of nude male sunbathing; this was on a boat less than 30 yards away, a full frontal nude on the deck of a catamaran standing in front of the mast! Needless to say the binoculars were fully utilised that morning by both girls who claimed to be ‘bird watching! (The excuse the guys normally use!)

We also got the harbourmaster delivering bread ay 0700 in the morning, very nice.

Practice for the RORC Caribbean 600 - Brisk tradewind conditions

A brisk Tradewind sail - Note the speed!

Two nights in the Saintes, back to Deshaies and then to Falmouth harbour Antigua in time for the 2^nd ODI between England and WI’s (England won!)

At the Sir Viv Richard Stadium

 

 Next stop Deep bay, more beach sundowners, finding Beyzano there who we had last seen in Bonaire and finally back to Jolly to drop off departing guests. With John and Penny we sailed nearly 200 miles in 2 weeks, not our normal pace. It would normally take us either a couple of months or a couple of days! But at least they got to see several islands on their cruise.

Sundowners with 'Beyzano' and 'Ear to Eternity'

 

Time for Laundry, a trip to the dentist and some provisioning then we are off to Dominica for the Ocean Cruising Club 60^th anniversary rally in Prince Rupert bay Portsmouth. More social events and hopefully we can arrange some diving as well.

Escape from the BVI’s

Escape from the BVI’s

 

Sunday 12^th January. We finally have what looks like a weather window to sail to Virgin Gorda and then on to Antigua. It is only 15 miles to our planned anchorage in North sound Virgin Gorda, the winds have reduced to a moderate F4 from the East.

On the way to Virgin Gorda

We motor out to the end of Scrub island and then are able to sail NE to the top of Virgin Gorda. We enter Gorda sound via the Northern passage leaving Mosquito Rock to starboard and keeping well north of Colquhoun reef. The entrance looks narrow but is marked by buoys -they get cruise ships in here so it cannot be that narrow.

The Anchorage  - Leverick Bay

 

Once through the entrance we head towards the anchorage at Leverick bay. The anchorage area off the marina is densely populated with moorings at US$30 per night. We find a space close inshore and drop the hook in 6m of water, a sandy bottom and we are dug in well and safe for the night. By the next day all the mooring balls are taken by a variety of charter boats, mainly catermerans.

Our plans are to spend a couple of days here, replenishing our stores before heading to Antigua. Cliff has already arrived in Antigua and we need to be there by the 17^th January when Anita is planning to join him and us.

Our New Dinghy in Leverick Bay

 

On arriving at Leverick bay we find we are short on internet access having managed to use up all our airtime on the dongle. The only way to get to Spanish Town to recharge the airtime would be an expensive taxi ride so we will wait until we reach Antigua where we can top up. We find mobile phone signals are also poor here so we have limited conversations with everyone.

A Pearly eyed thresher in the café at Leverick bay - These are usually forest and woodland birds, obviously at the seaside on holiday!

 

Wednesday 15^th January

The forecast looks good for the next few days and  spurred on by our need to get to Antigua we probably left a bit earlier than we should. A couple of days of easterly followed by a day of South Easterly should enable us to make our easting to get to Antigua.

A very steep road at Gun Creek

 

We motored round to Gun creek and checked out. At 09.30 we are away. Ho hum, we should never trust weather forecasts, (how often have we said that), the seas are much bigger than predicted (2-3m) and with a strong easterly breeze F4/5 we are struggling to get our easting in.

Necker island - leaving the BVI's

After a day and a half of travelling slightly east of south, we tack NE, Rowena is sick from a stomach bug and I have got a chest infection. The boat is bashing into heavy seas and F5 winds, we have green water everywhere - over the sprayhood and in the cockpit, the wind generator has packed up and we are having to run the engine to charge the batteries. We are thoroughly miserable. The good news is there is a full moon so the nights are not too dark.

A rainbow at sea!

 

Eventually we manage to sail to the SW of Nevis (Dogwood point), it is 0300 on Saturday morning, Antigua is 50miles due east, guess where the wind is coming from? EAST!! Whatever happened to the predicted SE? We cannot motor directly into the wind and seas so we motor sail at about 110 degrees. Eventually the wind moves slightly south of east but not enough to sail so we motor all the way to Jolly harbour marina to check in in the afternoon.

A welcome sight - Jolly Harbour fairway buoy 

 

Exhausted but relieved to be in Antigua we check in, and move to a berth in the marina. The boat is covered in salt crystals and the sprayhood is white, there is salt crystals all over the rigging it looks like we have been in a snowstorm. We will have to spend a day washing the boat and sorting ourselves out. Considering the conditions and how hard we were slamming into the seas it is remarkable that we didn’t break anything. We now have Cliff, our first visitor for the year and shipmate from last year’s Atlantic crossing with us.

Cliff on 'Le pearl noir'

Unfortunately Anita, Cliff’s wife is unable to join us due to family reasons back home in the UK but we will spend some time with Cliff catching up on their Mediterranean travels and drinking a few cold ones (as you do!).

It is good to be back in the Eastern Caribbean although it has been a mission to get back here from our summer retreat of Bonaire and Curacao. I think next (this) summer we will do things slightly differently.

Christmas in St John

Christmas in St John

We finally managed to escape from Charlotte Amalie Christmas eve; we are bound for Francis Bay on the North shore of St John. Our plans are to share Xmas with ‘Badgers Sett’ and another OCC boat ‘Eye Candy’.

Strange customer in a bar! "Two pints and a packet of crisps please"

 

The winds and swells have dropped and we manage to sail almost all the way. An interesting note is that the alarm panel on the engine has stopped working so no overheat, oil pressure or charging alarms or lights; yet another job for the skipper to fix. Hopefully it is only a loose connection. (Not so, it has turned out to be a faulty electronic module so will have to run ‘blind’ until one can be carried out to Antigua in January).

Our Christmas anchorage - Merry Xmas in signal flags on the mizzen

 

A full Christmas lunch in the tropics, avocado for starters followed by roast turkey, roast beef, roast potatoes, plenty of veg with Xmas pudding and rum butter or apple crumble and custard for dessert. Phew! We still managed cheese and biscuits as well. All washed down with Champagne, wine and a bottle of port to finish! Just a light Christmas lunch. We managed to get back home as it was getting dark. A very good lunch in excellent company, even though we were missing family and friends back home.

Even 'Skipper' got in the Christmas spirit 

 

 On Boxing Day, we had a walk to Leinster bay and the ruins of the old plantation and sugar mill at Anneberg. We see a white tailed deer cross the road, a mongoose and as we walk back through the mangroves several white cheeked pintail ducks, the first ducks we have seen in the Caribbean!  A swim and ‘Sundowners’ on the beach rounded the day off nicely. The snorkelling in Leinster bay is reported to be good so we will go round there tomorrow.

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Leinster bay has a little island (Waterlemon cay) which has a ‘no boat zone’ surrounding it. Snorkelling off the island we see the usual reef fishes, lots of bar jacks and a southern stingray.

 

We dinghy to the beach for ‘sundowners’ and see another stingray in the shallows, then a Jack leaps out of the water closely followed by 1.5m Barracuda! In the trees there are Banded Kingfishers, Pelicans diving for fish, a Solitary sandpiper on the shore and a mongoose foraging on the beach. Never a dull moment here!

 

St John is almost all marine and nature reserve, managed by the US National parks service, anchoring is discouraged so you have to use the moorings at $15 a night. If it keeps the bays and the marine life healthy you shouldn’t complain and there is certainly a lot of life here.

Our plans are to visit the bays on the SE coast (Hurricane hole/Coral bay) but first we have to negotiate The Narrows between the US and BVI’s. This narrow strip of water always has the current flowing west and with the wind from the east was a very hard sail short tacking to get around the eastern end of St John.

 

The old harbour of Coral bay (previously called Crawl bay as they used crawls to keep turtles in for food – not politically correct now!) was the original harbour used for exporting the sugar from St John, not the prettiest but easy to see why it was used. From the small village here we can ride the bus $1 each way across the centre of the island to the capital of Cruz bay on the western side, which we do.

Coral Bay Anchorage

 

We thought that we should visit customs to check out but they couldn’t have been less interested! The BVI’s is our next stop and we will be there for New Year. Our plans are to sail to Road Town Tortola and check in there then explore some of the smaller islands and anchorages on our way to Virgin Gorda. From Virgin Gorda we will sail SE weather permitting to either St Martin or Antigua. The Anagada passage between the BVI’s and St Martin has a reputation that needs respecting so we will wait for suitable weather before crossing it.

New Years Eve was spent quietly in Road Town Tortola after a good sail across, but a stressful time trying to anchor with very little room. A yacht already aground did not help, so eventually we picked up a mooring ball. While we were having dinner we watched as two boats eventually managed to get the yacht afloat again and safely onto a mooring.

Refuelling stop

After filling up with water and diesel at Fort Burt Marina we sailed south again to Great Harbour, Peter Island, a lovely anchorage in bright blue water against low densely forested cliffs. Good snorkelling along the edge, lots of fish, a Flamingo tongue on a rock and a Hawksbill turtle feeding. On the cliffs we watched smooth billed Anis feeding and an American Kestrel hunting. Another new bird , an American Oystercatcher appeared the second evening poking amongst the rocks on the waters edge with his solid deep red bill.

Swimming with Turtles

There are no shops here, just one restaurant on the other side of the bay, but you don’t have to worry about running out of anything. A great motorboat “Deliverance” is a mobile shop that calls  every day with a great variety of foods and they will even take the garbage.

We had planned to leave on Thursday for Fat Hogs Bay to do the laundry and some shopping, but it was blowing hard and we could see how rough the sea was outside the bay, so we stayed until Friday and had a nice sail north again! We picked up a buoy at 1100, they are free in the daytime, and by 1430 we had done all the chores and set off to go round the corner to Trellis Bay. We had to motor  until we were round the headland as it was directly into the wind, a brisk sail up the Bluff and by 1630 we were neatly anchored amongst a maze of moorings and boats.

Trellis Bay Anchorage

As we write this it is blowing 25-30kts with some very nasty squalls! We are anchored in Trellis bay on the eastern end of Tortola. The bay is pretty with an island in the middle with a bar/restaurant plus bars and a grocery store on the beach. The bay is filled with mooring balls at $30 a night, but we are anchored for free in 3m of water. Everything we need at the moment is here although the airport is a bit intrusive but the aircraft are all fairly small if fairly regular.

The forecast for the next week makes it unlikely that we will even be able to reach North Sound, Virgin Gorda, our starting point for the Anegada Passage, until the weekend.

Local Forecast!

 

Still in St Thomas

St Thomas Tuesday 17^th December

We are still in Long Bay, Charlotte Amalie because the wind remains 20 – 25 kts easterly with 2-3m swells and regular rain squalls, and wherever we go next it will be east. When we arrived in the squall the anchorage was quite empty but as the days go by, more and more boats are coming in. On the return from one shore excursion we see Badgers Sett, who we last saw in Bonaire.

Ok-we are in the group of 3 in front of the barge with the crane - the only ketch!

That evening was the lighting of the Christmas Tree in Havensight Mall so we have our reunion there. First a couple of beers at Mojo’s , then the tree and a stroll around all the stalls. Arts and crafts and all kinds of food, nicer because it is done by locals. We all enjoy Pinapple’s famous rotis.

At the tree lighting

We have another few Safari bus excursions - in pursuit of a new o ring for the petrol generator and inland to Tutu Mall for some photographs. The traffic is amazing  and made worse by road works all over the place.

Half way up the hill behind town is an old lookout tower, now called Blackbeards Castle. 

Blackbeard's castle - Note the flag at 1/2 mast for Mandella

We decided to walk up and see the views, taking in the 99 steps, laid from ballast bricks brought from Denmark.

The 99 steps

 

 The boats would then return laden with sugar and rum. There are many pretty colonial style houses,  some are museums, with narrow streets and steps everywhere. 

Friday night was “Miracle on Main Street” when all the shops stay open late and offer discounts. There are again food and craft stalls, pan bands in the streets and a parade of boats lit up for Christmas. Another very festive evening in good company with four other boats.

Tomorrow we hope to go to St. John, if the weather is as forecast. We hope all of you are enjoying the run up to Christmas and we wish you all Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year, maybe a bit  early, but wifi has been very difficult to get here, and St John is mostly a nature reserve, so we are not sure if we will find any there.

P.s We had an Inglorious sail, out of the harbour tacked into a F5/6 with 2-3m waves and decided to go back! It was horrible even if the water was warm, it was still coming over the sprayhood!