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Larry's LogFriday morning was slow with us just listening to the radio nets, trying to get a handle on the damage to Grenada and the cruising boats there. The hurricane had really done tremendous damage and as far as we could tell, only a handful of boats escaped any damage and many more were completely destroyed or sunk. The island itself was devastated and had no water, power or communications. Tom and I went to shore around 10 to burn some garbage. They had left so quickly, there hadn't been a chance to bring it in and we had already accumulated some. Tom had also gotten Judy's so there was a fair amount to burn. After that, we went on a dinghy tour of the lagoon and then went back to the boats. I did some work on my engine in the late morning, finding the alternator belt was somewhat frayed and loose so I replaced it. Of course, that meant digging one out under the aft berth. I did that and tightened it - it seemed to be much better than before because the new one was slightly smaller. I also checked the oil level, transmission fluid and all hose clamps - everything else was OK. Steph came over while I was working and she and Diane talked in the cockpit while I finished. We then had lunch and relaxed for a while until Judy called us on the radio saying she thought she heard Clem crying. Judy had tried calling Mima but got no answer. So, I got the dinghy down and went over to see what was going on. It turned out that Clem was sleeping and there was no problem, but I went on board and Tom and I just started talking. I stayed for a while and eventually went back to Destiny for dinner. Diane and I went back to Mima later for drinks though - we planned to leave tomorrow and might not see them again for quite a while. Saturday morning was busy getting ready to leave. We got the outboard off, raised the dinghy itself on deck and I tied it down. Then we put things away below and on deck, just getting ready. We wanted to leave about 4 since the trip to Tortuga was about 80 miles and was best done overnight, so we could arrive in the morning in good light. Tom and Steph came over after I had just tied down the dingy to visit for a while. They also felt that we might not see each other for quite a while. We talked for a couple pf hours and then they went back to get lunch while we finished preparations and had lunch as well. They came back again around 3 and stayed until we were ready to hoist the anchor, at 4:30. We said goodbye to Judy over the radio, (we had actually already done that in Porlamar before the hurricane showed up) and motored out of Laguna Grande. I put the full main up but not the jib but as we left the entrance, the wind shifted somewhat to the south and eventually to the southwest. This was supposed to be downwind and with the current! We were motorsailing along and the wind started to drop as we reached the beginning of the Golfo, near the city of Cumana. At that point it was almost dark and I just kept motorsailing since the wind had dropped to 5 to 7 knots and was now on our port quarter. Sailing alone, we would have done only 2 knots, maybe. As it was, with the engine at 2000 RPM, we did 5. The evening and night were pretty uneventful except the wind did eventually shift to the East-southeast, but remained light. I had rigged a preventer but the main wasn't doing very much so I eventually just pulled it in and sheeted it tight. Strangely though, just before I did that, the shackle holding the mainsheet fiddle block to the traveler car decided to unscrew itself, releasing the mainsheet and letting the boom fly out to the side. Diane was on watch and she called me up and although she thought it was the preventer, I quickly saw what happened and got out a line to tie the mainsheet back to the traveler. At least I could control the boom that way. Once on deck I saw, with the flashlight since it was 3 in the morning, the shackle was still there and the pin was also still sitting in the shackle, just completely loose. I managed to grab the mainsheet as it swung in from the swell and as Diane held the boom (I said it was very light winds), I put everything back together. I had never seen that before. The rest of the trip was quiet. We got to Tortuga's first anchorage at 8am but it looked rolly so we continued to Cayo Herradura, which was protected from any northerly swells. The wind had of course, increased now to about 15 knots from the east-southeast so we actually had a very nice sail to Herradura (finally got to turn off the engine for the last 2 hours - we had motored all night). We went into the anchorage at Cayo Herradura and found the wind shifted, now from the south-southwest at 15 knots, meaning that there was a 1-2 foot chop in the usually very calm anchorage. It wasn't to bad though and we anchored in 12 feet of beautiful, clear, turquoise water at about 10:30. It was really nice to be in the islands again. After putting on the sun canvas, raising the solar panels, hoisting the dinghy to get some air below and putting the cover on the mainsail, we finally relaxed. There were only 4 other boats and we were a bit surprised at that many since it was so soon after the hurricane. Playa Caldera, the first place that we had passed, also had about 5-6 boats. Interestingly, there were still many of the rickety buildings put up by the fishermen to live in during the season so we figured that the wind and seas couldn't have been too bad here. The sun was bright, the breeze comfortable and we were making 17-18 amps between the solar panels and the wind generator so we started the watermaker again. It was also nice to be able to do that without having to run the engine. We just rested and tried to recuperate from the overnight passage. We wanted to get to Los Roques in the next day or so. The wind had been from the south-southwest all day but at just about 5, within the span of 5 minutes, it just shifted to the east. Then it got calmer and almost died completely. The night was very comfortable but at about 11, there was a severe squall that came through with some gusts to about 40 knots but very little rain. It didn't last long and we got back to sleep about midnight. We got up the next morning, listened to the SSB radio net and then just relaxed the rest of the day, except I did re-tighten the new alternator belt. The rest of the day we didn't do much except read and relax. The wind was back from the south-southwest and the boat was pitching a little in the swell. The couple from Oasis, who we had seen but not met in Porlamar, came over to say hi in the afternoon after it calmed down a little and they said that the wind just started to come from that direction the day we got here - oh well. Anyway, it calmed down again that evening and again shifted to the east-southeast for the night. Around 3am I woke up from a squeaking on deck. The boat had started to roll a little and the dinghy was rubbing against the deck and making noise every time the boat moved. It couldn't be ignored so I got up, went out on deck and lashed it so that it couldn't move from side to side. The stern of the inflatable had actually started to walk down the incline of the foredeck so I pulled it back and with the lashings, stopped the movement and the squeaks. On Tuesday, we planned to leave that night for Los Roques and the only things that needed to be done were tie down the dinghy to the deck, take down the sun canvas and stow some things below. I did though, do some little things like re-glue the hatch gasket on the main hatch and fix the way the boathook attached to the shroud but mostly we just relaxed during the day since we would be up most of the night. The wind had come back to south-southwest in the morning and was stronger than yesterday. With bright sunshine and the wind strong, we ran the watermaker again without having to run the engine. I even had to feather the wind generator a bit because it started to freewheel, meaning the gusts were above 20 knots. Later in the afternoon though, it went back to about 15-18, SSW. I got the dinghy tied down around 4:30, we had dinner at 5:30 and left at 6:20. The trip was pretty uneventful and we even got to sail for about 8 hours, although not very fast. During the trip I heard some noises from the autopilot that I'll have to check though. We got to Boca de Sebastopol at about noon and had the anchor down near the little island just past the entrance about 20 minutes after that. The water was quite deep there but we found a shallower spot. The water was also quite green and murky - couldn't see the bottom at all. Perhaps this wasn't too surprising since the island is mangroves and water near them tends to be murky. After anchoring and doing the typical post-passage chores like putting up the sun canvas, raising the dinghy on deck to get some air below, putting up the solar panels, etc., we just relaxed from the trip. It got pretty hot though - the wind was very light now, only about 5 knots and the sun high. In the evening, mosquitoes attacked us just before dinner - they hadn't bothered us anywhere else, even in Laguna Grande. Oh well, last year we only had a small problem with them and maybe it was just this anchorage - I hope so. That night the breeze picked up and seemed to blow the bugs away so we got a good night's sleep. I had turned on the GPS anchor alarm and it went off once during the night and got us up in a hurry, thinking we were dragging. But after checking everything and getting a bearing on the small island near us (the only visible reference) it seemed that the wind had just shifted from southeast to east and the alarm was set at too small a radius so I adjusted it and slept well after that. After the radio net in the morning, we left the (now breezy) island of Buchiyaco for the island of Francisquis at the northeastern corner of Los Roques. After getting the anchor up (I like my new windlass) we sailed with just the jib in 15 to 20 knots from the southeast and had a great sail up the narrow channel between the reefs. The water wasn't as pretty as it was last year - green and a little murky, but it was still very beautiful and we got into the lagoon at Franscisquis a little after noon. After eating lunch, we had some things to do. I put a jerry jug of water into the starboard tank since that one isn't plumbed to the watermaker, launched the dinghy and put all 4 jerry jugs of diesel into the fuel tank. We had used about 30 gallons of diesel already and we wanted to get some more at Gran Roque tomorrow. It's much cheaper in Venezuela than in Bonaire! Hopefully the supply boat will be in. Diane did some hand laundry since we had run the watermaker again and had some extra - nice to have enough wind and sun. Friday morning and it was blowing pretty well, as it had all night. It continued into the afternoon from the southeast, about 15-20 knots. It was nice to have the power from the wind generator but it also meant that Gran Roque would be a difficult anchorage since it's a completely open roadstead to the south and southeast. So, we decided to stay in Francisquis another day and just did some little things around the boat - I checked on the squeaks from the autopilot and Diane defrosted the freezer. Diane also spoke to a local boater who said we shouldn't have any difficulty getting fuel tomorrow so I hope he's right. We did finally get off the boat and went to shore in the late afternoon - it had calmed down to only 10 knots so we went to a little beach nearby and walked around and then had a swim. It was the first time I had been in the water in almost 9 months and it was really nice. We left Francisquis Saturday morning about 9:45 and headed for Gran Roque to get fuel and some provisions. The wind was up a bit, about 15 knots from the southeast, but not as high as yesterday so we figured we could get everything done in the morning and make our way to Crasqui in the afternoon. We motored the 2 miles over to Gran Roque and the supply boat was there. As we passed by, we asked if they had diesel and they said yes so we anchored behind them and went over. I had towed the dinghy since it was such a short distance and in protected waters. I also didn't want to try to put the engine on in the chop I knew was going to exist there. We anchored and it was a bit of a challenge even to get in the dinghy with a two to three-foot chop coming into the anchorage (the wind was again from the southeast and there was a pretty good fetch from that direction). We managed though and dropped off the jerry jugs at the 'Luciano I' and then I brought Diane to shore and dropped her off at the dinghy dock - she wanted to get some more supplies and drop off the garbage. A bit tricky getting to the dock without running into the rusty metal but we did OK and then I went back to the boat. As I came back, I got pretty wet and saw that the boat's forefoot was coming out of the water in some of the bad swells. The snubber line was stretching pretty well, but doing its job. Diane called me 20 minutes later on the FRS radio and I went in to pick her up. There was a guy that was nice enough to help us get the bags in the dinghy and we again managed to avoid the rusty dock. We dropped off the groceries and went to get the filled jugs. It was more expensive that PLC but still much cheaper than Bonaire would be so I was happy we did it. It was tough to get the heavy jugs on deck from the dinghy but with Diane's help, I lifted them up and she grabbed them and swung them on deck. We were really bouncing around so we decided to eat and put things away when we got to Crasqui, so I put the jerry jugs in the cockpit where they wouldn't fall and we sailed to our next destination, about 8 miles to the west-southwest. We had been at Gran Roque for only 90 minutes. We had a nice if a little bumpy reach to Crasqui and anchored in 13 feet of water just off the long beach there. It was still blowing about 15 from the southeast and after the anchor was down, we put up the sun canvas and ate. Diane helped me put the covers back on the jerry jugs and then I put them on deck near the tie down board and lashed them in place. Hopefully we wouldn't need any more fuel until we got back to PLC. Our motoring range is about 700 miles so unless we had to start running the engine a lot to charge the batteries, we would be OK. The rest of the day was spent just relaxing - we weren't used to so much activity!! |