Blue Beyond goes sailing ..On Her Own..
Blue Beyond , The adventure begins.
Mark and Maxine Frost
Tue 3 Mar 2009 13:25
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We left the Jalousie plantation , but not before we
had an early morning snorkle which was just outstanding , because we are in a
Marine Park it is all protected and for very good reason , we saw all manner of
fish and coral in impossibly clear water , even had a barracuda come near ( not
my most favorite fish ) , just lovely.
Out Trip down to Veaux Fort was short and bouncy
and we then had to find somewhere to anchor , not our most favorite activity ,
we opted for a sheltered area away from the fish docks , it was very
pretty , we were only two miles from the airport so we went ashore to find a
taxi for the next day to take Gary and Kathryn to the airport . well, what a
place this was, a real working town , poor , bustling , hot , smelly , a
taxi was duly organised and we did a bit of last minute shopping , Gary bought
me a plant which I am really pleased with , much easier to look after than a
dog!, we had our last game of euchre ( the boys were the champions ) and went to
bed .
I woke in the night as the boat was rolling and
lurching quite violently and woke Mark , it didn't take long to realise we had
come adrift and were now two miles out at sea ......so all hands on deck
..
Mark and Gary got the anchor up and we then had to
come back in and re-anchor in the wind ,in the dark with reefs all round
us at 3 am ... so not funny..... anyway we managed , and then did the very
british thing , we all sat and had a cup of tea .At least we were lal safe and
hadn,t gone aground on a reef which easily could have happened if the wind was
in another direction.
We said goodbye to Gary and Kathryn , sad to see
them go we had such good fun , but we will see them in a month, our plan was to
have a day to tidy up and then depart to Bequia , we took an afternoon stroll
over to the main bay and as I have said this is not a tourist place , and we
walked down the wrong road, pigs and goats running around desparately poor
shacks , we just braved it out and smiled at everyone who was coming out of
their houses to look at us , anyway we survived but went back the main road way
.....
We had now worked out how to set all the anchor
alarms to alert us to our drifting and just as we got out of bed they went off ,
but , the anchor bouy had somehow become wrapped around the prop , so again we
were now drifting , couldn't put on the engine , I managed to get hold of the
anchor buoy with the boathook while mark was putting his flippers on and at the
same time put my hand on the fishing rod and put the large hook right
through my hand , this was not good , I had no time for my normal screaming
and hi-sterics , we were in trouble , so I just pulled the hook out ( lots of
blood)and Mark went in to un prop us , at last we could get the boat under
control , we got the anchor up and came in again to re-anchor , but it wouldn,t
hold so we tried again . and what is the worst than can happen? the windlass
stopped working !
we now had to pull all the chain in by hand and a
50kg anchor , we were now well hacked off , hadn't even had a cup of coffee ..,
anyway all was pulled in and we had no choice now but to go back to
Jalousie so as we could tie up to a bouy.
There are worse placed to be and it will make
clearing customs and immigration easier than in Veaux Fort , as we would have
had to go to the container port for customs and the airport to clear immigration
, so hey ho
But, as if nature wanted to make up for a lousy
morning the sunset this evening was one of the most spectacular we have seen ,
and with a beer and siting between the Pitons , life ain't that bad
.......
 fishing boats between the pitons . |