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Diane's Diary12/8 Sat Well, we left Trinidad last night at 5:15pm with sails up in an East- Northeast wind 15-20 knots & 5-7 foot seas. I got really seasick even though I had started taking the Sturgeon 3 days ago but 2 doses per day instead of 3. I was dry heaving I was so sick. It was definitely a rough passage or maybe it was anxiety combined with not having been on the water for a few months. Larry had to go forward on the boat 3 different times & I worried about him falling off even though he had his harness on. The jib sheet got caught under the dinghy; the roller furling line jammed & then he had to take the jib down as the roller furling line broke. We encountered 3 squalls along the way with gusts up to 35 knots. Luckily, they did not last long. We saw the last squall approaching & it looked menacing. The jib was still up & since the line broke, Larry had to take it down by hand, which meant going up on the foredeck in the pitching seas. It's a good thing he did, as it was the fiercest squall yet with blinding rains & winds screaming at 35 knots. We actually were making such good time that we had to slow the boat down or we would have arrived in Grenada before dawn. We slowed the boat down again on our approach to Mt. Hartman Bay because a freighter was trying to cross our path & was having a difficult time as he was heading dead into the wind & bucking a lot due to the high seas. We saw a squall line as we were approaching Mt. Hartman Bay - could we beat it into the Bay? If not, we would have to stay outside until it passed, as there were a lot of reefs in the area. We just made it inside the first starboard buoy when the squall hit. Luckily, we could still see the buoys ahead of us. We would never have attempted to enter the harbor during the squall if we had not been so familiar with the harbor. We just made it into the harbor just as the squall hit & the rain increased dramatically & visibility became close to zero. We were able to make out one boat, S/V Moonrise, we knew from Bequia. We just motored around the boat until the squall subsided in about a half hour. However, with the jib down, & visibility so limited it was difficult for me to see. But luckily, I could see well enough to know there were no other boats we could hit near by. The squall finally passed & visibility improved so we could see the harbor again. S/V Pride was still there - almost where we left them last July so we anchored near them. We were both exhausted & needed to sleep. I slept in bed from 8:30 - 12:30pm; Larry tried to sleep on the settee but couldn't get to sleep. I was so exhausted I was dead to the world. When we woke up, we were still tired & decided to take it easy for the rest of the day. I think we'll need a day or so before we move north. Lori on Pride had gone home for a while but Bob was still onboard so we invited him over for drinks at 5pm. He stayed till around 6:30pm & it was nice catching up with them. I'm sure since Lori is home he was glad to have someone to talk with. Although there are a number of boats in Mt. Hartman, not many are occupied. After he left, we had the turkey enchiladas I had made the previous day. Thank goodness I had made them, as I was too tired to cook. We watched our last episode of "West Wing" I had recorded while we were in Crews Inn but did not have a chance to watch. We were so tired we went to bed by 8:30pm. I had a very restless night sleep & couldn't sleep very well. 12/9 Sun I made bacon & eggs this morning & caught up in my logs. We were both very tired so we are going to take it easy today. I helped Larry rethread the roller furling. I washed all the dodger windows with the 303 fabric Guard. Now that we have the new covers for the dodger windows I'm sure the plastic in the glass will last a lot longer. I made cucumbers & sour cream & we had a nice easy quiet day. Larry put the rest of the snaps on the handrail covers. With all the canvas we now have on the boat, hopefully the UV from the sun won't affect the boat as much. Bob drove us to the dock & we took showers & had a beer at the bar. We didn't want to launch the dinghy for one day so he graciously offered to pick us up. Thank you Pride! It's amazing what cruiser do for each other. We also dumped the garbage - this is something you have to do when you can, as it's difficult in some places to get rid of it. 12/10 Mon We were going to leave today but the weather forecast was not that great. After listening to several different weather nets we found it was not going to get better in fact it was going to get worse. So, we decided to move to the leeward side of the island & position ourselves to transit to Bequia the day after. So, at 9:45 we motored the 2 hours over to Grand Mal Bay. We were going to keep going to Union but that was another 30 miles & could take us over 6 hours which meant arriving after sunset. We do not like to arrive at any port after sunset so decided to just spend the day in Grenada. We picked a quiet fishing anchorage but unfortunately it was right near the road & so was very noisy. We were the only sailing boat in the anchorage. I was a little paranoid about this so we put the hatch boards in when we went to sleep. Thankfully, nothing happened. 12/11 Tues Well, we had the sails up & left the anchorage at 6:15am. I didn't get seasick at all this time although I had started taking the Sturgeon 3 days prior 3 times a day. We had a nice sail to Bequia but naturally the wind shifted from east to northeast right on our nose so we had to motor the remaining 3 hours. We wanted to arrive before sunset & it was going to be very close. We set the anchor about 10 minutes before sunset. BTW, there is no twilight here in the Caribbean - when the sun sets it gets dark almost immediately so there's no twilight. We made the 65 miles in 12 hours. 12/12 Wed Both of us didn't sleep well last night - the wind was really rocking & we were really rolling in the anchorage. Larry found a leak in the fresh water system that needed immediate attention. We can't afford to lose any of our fresh water. We launched the dinghy but by then the bank was closed. We could have cleared in anyway but we didn't have any EC currency & would have paid more if we only had US dollars. Since it's no big deal on Bequia, we decided to hold off until tomorrow to clear in. We went to speak with the local North Sail maker - Grenadine Sails. We had seen the awning he did for S/V Pride & we definitely needed one also. We have heard the boat stays about 10 degrees cooler with an awning & we definitely believe it. Since we are going to stay out another year, an awning is essential. He also did work for S/V Rejoice & they were happy with the work also. Unfortunately, he was on the island of Mustique & would not be back until tomorrow. OK we will come back tomorrow. We walked around the island a bit & it was much cooler than when we were here last May. There was a nice breeze blowing now - back then it was just hot with no breeze. I remember sweating like crazy just walking around town back then but now it was actually pleasant out. That's the difference between the summer & winter weather - the wind blows more in the winter but that also makes the seas rougher. We got back to the boat around 4pm & I made a baked ziti for dinner with the ingredients I bought in Trinidad. 12/13 Thurs We went to the bank & got some EC - the local currency. We went to speak with Grenadine Sails about doing the awning & he came out to the boat with us to take measurements. We drove him back to the dock looked at his color chart & got back to the boat around 1pm. He is going to call us this afternoon with an estimate. I worked on my food inventory sheet in Excel. He called in the afternoon. For about $650USD he will do the big awning plus a small one for the bow. This does not include side panels for the big awning as we would rather do them in textaline & he does not have the color to match. We can always get this done at a later date if we decide we need side panels. So, we told him to go ahead & start it. The cheapest price we got in Trinidad was $850 USD but this did include side panels but not the pole we need. Grenadine Sails promised it would be done on Monday - great, as we would like to leave on Tuesday while we still have a good weather forecast. We had a very bad roll during the night & high gusty winds. We had about a 2-4 ft swell in the harbor. We later found out the winds were up to 42 knots inside the harbor. Neither of us got much sleep as we were rolling too much. It wasn't even this bad in Marigot, St. Marten last January. We were concerned we would drag or another boat would drag down on us, but luckily nothing happened. We did find out the next day that several boats had dragged. No damage to anyone though glad we were far out in the anchorage. 12/14 Fri Today was such a stormy day with high winds & a rolly anchorage that we didn't get off the boat the whole day. I took a nap from 1- 4 as I didn't get much sleep last night & the winds seemed to have calmed down some. We had so much wind & the batteries are fully charged that we watched 2 videos tonight. That's only something we do when we have enough electric. We also ran the water maker twice today since we had so much electric. The wind is really gusting again tonight but thank goodness the severe rolling seems to have stopped. Glad we weren't out sailing in this weather! 12/15 Sat Well, the winds are still bad but the intense rolling has stopped. I made muffins from scratch but I wasn't too happy with the recipe. I finally finished working on my Excel food inventory spreadsheet - it sure is very time consuming. Now I have to get Larry to print it for me. I made a corn chowder soup from the just delicious soup mixes I had. In the afternoon I worked on updating my logs in the computer. Larry worked on the self-steering wind vane - a $3,000 toy we haven't even used yet. I'm sorry we bought it- I would have rather had dinghy davits. We still don't have the wind vane working yet- he needs to buy some blocks we don't have. It would be nice to get it working at least once during this trip. I really don't think it's worth it unless you are going to take long ocean passages & we are not. |