Windy and we’re flooding!
I’m writing this at 4 in the morning, we are anchored in the single anchorage at St Eutastious,(Statia), it’s blowing hard and Cassini is rocking and rolling rather too much for my liking. Having been awake since midnight I decided it was time to use the time to write a blog….. sleep is not going to be happening.

Both Simon and Nigel have been on deck to check things over in the past hour but quite frankly I can’t wait to leave here!

The last couple of days have been short day sails and single night stops. The first from Nevis to St Kitts where upon arrival we unfortunately discovered a leak in the fresh water system which meant we had emptied 100 litres of fresh water, through the bilges into the sea. Simon and I were ashore doing yet more bureaucracy to clear immigration so Catherine and Nigel set too dismantling the boat to find the leak and sponge and bucket the remaining free water. When we got back to Cassini, the situation was stable, the system was re pressurised (by switching to our other water tank). We all stood by various parts of the system and the leak was found. A union had come adrift and an easy fix with a new jubilee clip. Just the 3 hours from discovery of the problem to putting everything back…… and a bit of a tidy up at the same time! Well done Team Cassini…..and no money spent, even better!

So we left St Kitts on Sunday morning, 20 Nm to Statia, a straightforward sail, 2 reefs in the main and 1 in the headsail. Fishing rod out and a lovely tuna obliged, 2 dinners, some ceviche and a couple of lunches.

We arrived at the anchorage after 2pm, thought it unlikely that the customs and immigration etc would be open but felt obliged to go and check. There were only a couple of other boats here so if anyone was watching our arrival we wouldn’t have been hard to spot. Simon and Nigel went off in the dingy with 1 of our short range radios, (because, you guessed it….. we have no data/ phones working here). Amazingly the office was staffed but here for the first time all 4 of us were required in person rather than just our passports so having radioed back to the boat to warn us, back came Nigel to collect Catherine and I who had just settled down with a cup of tea and our books!
Immigration and customs were open but the port office wasn’t so will have to return later this morning anyway (to complete check in and do the checkout).

Absolutely nothing else was open, but we did walk past a bar advertising free wi fi and giving the password which we took advantage of to check mail and for Simon to complete the online paperwork for our departure the following morning.

The whole exercise of checking in/out, customs and immigration deserves a blog all of its own.

Catherine had prepared a veg curry for dinner which we enjoyed after a tuna starter. A bit of reading about St Maarten, our next stop and then off to bed. A few hours sleep and then woken by the wind and the motion and back to the beginning of this blog…..it’s now 4.35 and I can’t wait for dawn and to get moving again. It’s 30 Nm today, a bit longer but I’m hopeful of a nicer anchorage and more than a one night stop.

Sally