We arrived in Curacao back in September and after anchoring overnight we went to Seru Boca Marina and prepared Innamorata to be left while we flew home to the UK for a month.

We flew back to Curacao on 14/10/2018 loaded up with a new, to us Wind Pilot (self steering gear) which took up most of our baggage allowance and some other goodies – we would have loved to bring more but sadly there was no space – it was a long flight via Brussels and then Dominican Republic so we were very happy to arrive in Curacao where our friend Rik kindly met us and took us back to the boat. As always we were happy to find all was well on board and soon had everything unpacked. One of the Supermarkets here provided a free shopping bus from the marina, Curacao marine and the dinghy dock in Spanish water so we took advantage of being able to catch it the morning after we arrived and restock the boat. The next day we headed out to anchor again in Spanish water and anchored in A anchorage.

   

Spanish water is a big lagoon and there are 4 anchorage areas, there is a designated area for the rally boats which was anchorage C but it involved anchoring and tying stern lines to a rope which we didn't fancy so we stayed in A, it was good to see some familiar boats anchored near by we had Bob and Ann from Baloo, Rik and Sanne from Incentive and a few days after we arrived Willy and Ria on Sun Ra who we hadn't seen since Portugal arrived, there were also quite a few Rally boats already here, Fergus and Nev on Two Drifters were not far away.

Santa Barbara Hotel Beach resort and marina – a couple of the rally boats were moored here’ it was a regular meeting point for a 4pm swim, bob and chat before the first rally group left in November- something we missed after they left.

  

Once we were settled at anchor we started to do some boat jobs – Steve fitted the Wind Pilot and we are looking forward to playing with it once we set sail – it should save us power drain as we will use it for long passages instead of the auto pilot.

The water maker needed some new seals which turned into a much tougher job than it should have been when two of the studs broke off when Steve tried to undo them, however after a lot of time and effort the seals got renewed.

I started to renew the Sacrificial UV Strip on the Staysail and Genoa – I chose the smaller easier to handle staysail to tackle first and was very please with the end result.

  

The Genoa however has proved much more complicated – we knew there was a tear in the sailcloth along the leach and I have brought some sailcloth back from the to repair it with and so I took the sun strip off and began the repair:

  

The project turned out to be much bigger than I had thought when after 3 long patches I managed to put my fingers through another part of the sail twice! After inspecting as best we could in the confines of the boat we realised that there are a few panels in a line where we have sailed with reefed genoa that are all rotten and we packed it away to be looked at in a sail loft where we will see if its worth repairing or not . In the mean time we have our old genoa up.

It hasn't all been work though – we went to a Suzie Too BBQ at Curacao Marine and a few other social gatherings.

  

Rik and Sanne have a hire car and were kind enough to take us out shopping etc a few times – the first time was a couple of days after we got back from the UK, it rained while we were out and the roads turned to rivers

  

When it rains here it rains!

In early November Suzanne who organises the rally was asked if some of the boats would like to take part in a parade in Willemstad to mark the opening of a new TV station in Curacao – about 15 boats agreed to take part – we all dressed our boat with flags and had a great time. We wanted to fly the flags of the countries we are visiting on the rally but realised that we didn't have an Aruba courtesy flag so I made one quickly the night before, for the yellow I used sticky tape which I sewed as well to make sure it didn’t fall straight off, it will be interesting to see if it survived the week or so we will need to fly it in Aruba!

Heading out of Spanish water to go to Willemstad

  

Approaching Willemstad

  

Willemstad and the parade

        

  

We were lucky to get some lovely pictures taken of Innamorata

Before we left Spanish water                                        On route to Willemstad        

  

  

Gradually more rally boats arrived, we are in the second group so leave a couple of weeks after group 1.

Anchorage C with lots of rally boats taken just before group 1 set sail.

 

Once Group 1 left (there were 41 boats in group 1) more group two boats arrived and we started having a few social gatherings, some of us ladies skived off boat work and went into town for the day.

    

 

Our much smaller group 2 Photo – a few people are missing as they weren't yet in Curacao or are meeting us later in Aruba or Colombia

And so we are ready to leave in the company of 15 boats – (there should be around 20 of us once everyone catches up) we will see what adventures the next few month bring, the rally is heading to Aruba Colombia, San Blas , Panama, San Andres, Providencia, Bay islands of Honduras and finally on to Belize in April.

Rally route – sorry not very clear!