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Diane's Diary12/16 Sun It is a quiet overcast rainy day with little wind but we are still rolling some. The weatherman says, " This is a strange weather pattern" I updated my logs in the computer for 1.5 hours & took a one-hour nap since I didn't sleep well last night. Since we both we going a little stir crazy from being "housebound" for the last 2 days we took a walk around town even though everything was closed since it was Sunday. Now I know how people in Alaska feel when they can't get out of their house for days in the winter. At least it's warm here with no snow. We got back to the boat around 4pm, read, had a drink, an early dinner, then went to bed around 9pm. There was almost no wind tonight - we will have to run the engine to charge the batteries & run the water maker if this persists. We only had one slight rain shower during the night. 12/17 Mon I made a taco casserole this morning. Then I updated my logs on the computer for 1.5 hours. We went into town around 12:30 - went to the bank to withdraw cash to pay sail maker. He would have taken a charge card but wanted to charge us an extra 4% to do so so we decided to pay cash. We walked over to the sail maker - the awning is finished so we went to clear out & bring the dinghy closer to his loft. The dinghy engine is stalling out again - we need to get this fixed. The sail maker came out with his to make sure the awning fits & we new how to assemble it. The awning fits & looks great. We got a medium gray color. But we want to put in a rain cachment system sewn into the awning. So it's back to the sail maker. We got back to his loft around 4:30. He finished it around 5:45 - that leaves us about 15 minutes to hoist the dinghy before it gets dark. We just about did it before it got dark. It's definitely very difficult to hoist the dinghy in the dark so I'm glad we got it done, as I would like to leave tomorrow. Looks like we have a good weather window to leave. We both seem pretty happy with the awning. We will have to see if we think we need side panels. It definitely will be a lot cheaper to get it done in Trinidad. We also had a new textaline piece made for the center window. Alpha canvas had to make a new one for us since he made an error with the original piece but he made it out of the wrong material - he used the tighter texatline weave instead of the looser one so not as much air passes though. We will have to speak with him about it when we get back to Trinidad next spring. I'm sure using the wrong material was an honest mistake. We didn't notice it in Trinidad since there was no breeze at the anchorage anyway. We went to bed at 9pm again but we are back to rolling again but not nearly as bad as the other night. It rained in the middle of the night & between that & the rolling, we were both up before the alarm clock rang at 5am. We want to transit all the way to St. Lucia today & it's another 12-hour sail. 12/18 Tues We left Bequia with the sails up at 6:20am. There are 2 other boats also making the same crossing so we will stay in radio contact. Even though we don't need each other, it's nice to know someone else is there if we have a problem. It took about 1.5 hours to cross the Bequia channel. The winds were slightly north of east, 15 knots, and waves 2 - 4 feet. That's about as perfect as you are going to get in the Caribbean - especially during the winter months with higher winds. We motored for 3 hours up the coast of St. Vincent as there was almost zero wind & we needed to make time if we wanted to make it to St. Lucia before dark. It took about 3 hours of beautiful sailing to cross to St. Lucia - a passage that's known to have strong headwinds. Fortunately for us it was a perfect sail- low winds, about 15 knots, winds slightly north of east, & 4-6 foot seas. We sailed a little once we reached the lee of St. Lucia but it takes 3 hours from Soufiere to Rodney Bay & we wanted to arrive before dark so we had to put on the engine. Otherwise, we would have continued sailing, as it was a beautiful sail. We arrived in Rodney Bay around 5:30 - just in time to take down the sail & anchor before sunset. Even though I had taken the Sturgeon, I didn't get seasick at all. I'm convinced the heavy seas are what makes me seasick - I never seem to have any problems at home & we have been in some heavy wind. 12/19 Wed For some reason I didn't get a good nights sleep last night. I kept getting up in the middle of the night. I should have been exhausted after the long passage but I wasn't. We launched the dinghy & cleared in. This was the second time we have gone to St. Lucia & didn't have to pay any clearing fees - the revenue officer was not around & they told us to come back after lunch but we didn't. It started to really pour & we got drenched. Larry wanted pizza for lunch so we took the dinghy over to the other side of the lagoon in the pouring rain. Domino's Pizza didn't have anywhere for us to eat indoors - dumb mistake on the planners part as there was no place for us to eat. We walked to Pizza, Pizza where we ate the last time but it was closed today. So, we went to the Lime restaurant. We went there the last time & liked it but the roti I had was not nearly as good as Trinidad. We went shopping to 2 supermarkets to stock up on the things we can't get in the French islands - like cream cheese or mozzarella cheese. I bought a frozen pizza that was made in the US & we had this for dinner but it was nearly as good as the Del Giorno frozen pizza we buy at home. 12/20 Thurs I did my logs for 2 hours this morning. We were going to go into town, have pizza, & clear out so we could leave tomorrow. However, as we headed into town, the dinghy engine quit in the outer anchorage. Not again - we had been having problems with this engine - this is the third time. We managed to get the dinghy back to our boat as the current was with us. Thankfully, I have been carrying the hand held radio with me so if we had gotten swept away I would have been able to call for help. Larry took apart the engine again & after 2 hours, thought he solved the problem. We put the engine back on the dinghy again, started it up, but then it died. We tried calling S/V Mystique anchored close to us. We knew they were home because the dinghy was there, but no answer. (We later found out they were sleeping) So, I put out a call on the VHF radio asking for someone to please tow our dinghy into shore. S/V Sunshine Daydream answered our call. We had met them in Grenada when they were anchored next to us but really didn't know them that well. They graciously offered to tow us in. We had called Rodney Bay Marina & they said someone would be available to look at the engine. It was about 3:30pm when we arrived. We had to pay OT at customs after 3:45 so decided not to check out until we found out what was wrong with the engine. A local day contractor looked at it & discovered water in the engine again. We are definitely going to have to put on the big filter. This is the third time we have had this same problem. Larry had put a smaller filter on but obviously this was not doing the trick. We are definitely getting water in the engine from someplace but where? It could be the fuel tank itself but I doubt it. At least there is nothing seriously wrong with the engine. It took an hour to fix & by this time it was nearly 5pm. We went on the Internet for a while & then headed back to the boat. We stopped by Sunshine Daydream as they were going to pick us up in their dinghy if the engine could not be repaired today. Nice people - we thanked them for all their help. They hardly knew us yet they went out of their way for us. But actually we would have done the same thing for any cruiser also. That's the cruising spirit out here. We all rely on each other. Our dinghy is like our car at home & without it we can't get around. We really depend on it. Most of the time it's too windy, like today, or the current is too strong, to row. Anyway, we didn't want to use the dinghy after dark in case it gave us problems again. Most people turn their VHF radio off after dark so we may not get help if the engine stopped. Sunshine Daydream had invited us to go out for pizza with them but because of the dinghy we decided not to go. 12/21 Fri Today is the shortest day of the year. From now on, the days will get continually longer. Not as long as up north however, maybe about an hour later at the most. Larry worked on putting a little filter he had on the dinghy. Hopefully, this will solve any more problems. I made cucumbers & sour cream, & a chicken casserole. After I finished these, it was around 10am so I worked on my logs for 1.5 hours. At 11:30 we dinghyed into town. The engine appears to be working well. We cleared out of customs, looked in some shops, & went to "pizza pizza" for lunch. We got to watch CNN on TV while we waited for our pizza. We had not seen TV or heard the news, since we left Trinidad several weeks ago. We did some last minute shopping at the supermarket - it was almost cleaned out. Guess everyone was doing their Christmas shopping. I'm glad I did most of my shopping the other day as they were out of a lot of things. We went to get duty free fuel for our dinghy & met Sunshine Daydream. They asked us to join them for a drink so we did & bought them a drink for helping us out. We didn't stay too long as we still had to get the dinghy on top of the boat. Unless it's a very calm day or we are on the same island, we always hoist the engine on deck. This usually takes less an hour to do completely - we need to remove the oars, take out the gas tank, engine & anything else. Then we use the halyard to raise it. Then tie it down on deck. Larry worked on fixing the lifting strap - he had to glue it on again. He also drilled the dinghy to put on the big filter. So, we got back to the boat at 3:30pm & proceeded to hoist the dinghy. After that, I updated my logs from 4-5, & 7 - 8:30. We went to bed early. 12/22 Sat I was up early - the Friday night party at Gros Inlet village kept me awake with it's loud music. We are rolling again - not as bad as Bequia - but still not comfortable. I definitely did not get a good night's sleep. We got the boat ready to leave, had breakfast but decided to listen to the Safety & Security net on the SSB at 8:15am daily on 8104 followed by Davis Jones' weather net. The trip should only take 3 hours & we were not in a rush. We finally left the anchorage with the sails up at 9am. S/V Mystique was also leaving at the same time. We put the full mainsail up as the weatherman said the winds were going to be light. This was the first time we had the full main up in a long time - generally it's always single reefed. We had a beautiful sail - winds about 10-12 knots, slightly north of east with seas mostly 4 feet occasionally up to 6 feet. We saw several dolphins. Actually, I forgot to report I saw a whale on our trip to Bequia - about 10 feet from the side of the boat. I only saw it for a few moments though. Larry didn't see it though. Anyway, we got up to St. Anne Martinique in 3 hours. There were approximately 200 boats in the anchorage. We knew our friends on S/V Kristali were somewhere in the anchorage but with so many boats in the harbor we had to call them so they could tell us where they were. Finally, we saw them & anchored relatively near them. It was very crowded compared to when we were here in May - there were only about 20 boats then. But it's Christmas week so I should have expected it to be more crowded. The weather is nice too - in the low 80's with a nice small breeze. It was definitely hotter in May. It's actually very comfortable. Anyway, we anchored & Kristali came over in their dinghy as ours was hoisted on deck. We were really happy to see tem as we last left them in July in Grenada. We went to Trinidad & they went to Venezuela. They left at 3pm & we had lunch. They were coming back at 6pm for cocktails. They stayed till 9:30 & we were really glad to see them again. |