Jamaica to St Martin
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Jamaica to St Martin At last, the OCC burgee showed up – only took 17 days from USA! After a week or so of rain, the sun is back. Our masthead unit which we sent Jamaica Post to the States has shown up there and is being worked on as we speak. Told them to hold it till we have an address in St Martin. An American leaving the anchorage today told us we had an “excessively beautiful boat”. We knew that, but still proud! We could leave Jamaica for Haiti but, of course, now there’s no wind so we are sitting about twiddling our thumbs waiting! Finally looks like enough wind for us to leave for Haiti, so all cleared out, bill settled, out to supper and ready for the off. Nice to see the officer issuing our clearance document, thinks the boat’s called “Right Richmond”!
Luckily we checked our email before we left and the stupid tosser from B&G Florida has posted the masthead unit back to Port Antonio! So we have to check back into Jamaica today and sit around for ages waiting for it to arrive!
We think that we will go along the coast tomorrow, maybe to Montego Bay, so the marina have called the Customs and Immigration guys to clear us back in, and issue our transire to go to MoBay. Set off into horrible lumpy seas. 2 hours into the trip I’m debating whether this is a good idea! All this bobbing about is making me feel sick, we would have 2 worse days coming back and all for a change of scenery! Share my musings with Mike, who agrees to turn round. We go back in the anchorage to wait for our masthead unit to turn up. Will have to get the Customs guys back again to clear back into Port Antonio!
Uninhabited Errol Flynn Island in Port Antonio Bay Very welcome lighthouse on the way back
Check online today to track our wind instrument sent from Florida to here. We note, with some amusement and a lot of irritation, that it has been successfully tracked from Florida to Japan via Hong Kong! So, it’s now in Osaka having cleared Customs there, ready for delivery! Can’t wait to see its next destination! Tear the tosser at B&G Florida, off a strip. He says he’ll ask US Postal Service what’s happened but he’s not sure what response he’ll get. We plan to leave at the weekend if the weather is right for St Maarten and tell him to send us another one there! Might get new one instead of our repaired one, you never know. Paul, the marina manager, says he’ll “sort” our dockage in the marina, if I’ll make a canvas awning for him. Silly question, we move in to the marina! Our awning repaired, Paul’s made and a new Nemo floor covering for our dinghy to protect it from UV. Paul dropped by earlier with 2 massive chunks of wahoo, enough for 4 dinners for the 2 of us. So we invited him over for supper which is what I think he was aiming at! Nice evening aboard and he now has a posh canvas awning to keep out the torrential rain we’ve been having, and to keep out the sun, when it shines!
Contents of 1 avocado with a teaspoon to show scale! Huge amount of flesh – bit like Jamaican ladies! Happy Birthday to Tanya, she’s sunning it up in Barbados! Over the last week I have spent hours typing up RT1’s log book (before we had a laptop on RT2!) and it’s finally finished. Now to tackle the Index! Back out to anchor to save a few pennies and then back in to marina to clear out, stock up at the market, grab some electricity and lobsters! Port Antonio is a great friendly town which will be lovely when it’s finished! They are currently a long way into a project to replace all the water mains and drains in the town, which means that every road in town either has large holes or is being filled in. The constant torrential rain we’ve had most of the time we’ve been here has turned the temporary road toppings to sludge and, as a result, all the roads are also covered in mud where it’s been driven through! It’s meant to be finished sometime soon but our guess is that they’ve still got a few more months of disruption.
Haiti We knew this whole journey to St Maarten was going to be tough going as we are head to wind all the way so we’ve broken the journey into lumps. We set off, pouring with rain still, motored out clear of the island when the forecast breeze came in. We’ve been sitting at anchor or in the marina at Port Antonio for 6 weeks waiting on the wretched wind instrument, (No, Steve Smith and Tanya, not a trombone!) so I spend a lot of these 2 days feeling seasick.
Raining but happy……………. hit by a wave, not quite so happy!
“Boat boys”, waiting impatiently, for us to anchor!
As soon as we get near the lagoon we are surrounded by local lads and boys in dugouts and paddles made from palm fronds wanting to show us the island, take us to the market, wash our laundry, wash our boat, sell us coconuts, bananas, mangoes, wanting biscuits, water, paper, pens – you name it, they want it. We were firm with them saying we would talk to them once we were anchored. Anchoring achieved, they were on us! The first to approach us was a young man called Jasmin, (there was also a lad called Lily) so we stuck with him and told the others we were Jasminites! That, mostly, worked!
We had a lovely morning being shown round Kay Kok, the nearest village, by Jasmin. He informed us his girlfriend is going to have a baby in the New Year so any baby items, particularly milk, would be gratefully received. Will pass this info on to cruisers heading west. They also need old sails for their fishing sailboats. We had bought some exercise books and pencils in Jamaica and handed them in at the local school. Gratefully received, but the prof really wants a laptop!
French
speaking, hurrah!
Jasmin
Hotel swimming pool, no guests!
Kay Kok medical centre Conch shell sea defences
Mum doing the washing, tot looking on
A village of extremes, beautiful tourist hotel with massive empty restaurant and families living in huts doing their washing in the sea. But, still it was beautiful. Getting back to the anchorage we are met by yet another “boy” wanting something. We told him we really didn’t need anything else, but it turned out he was a council official wanting $5 anchoring fee! We only had $10 and he said he’d come back with our change. Philosophically accept we won’t see that back, but a few hours later he comes back. Faith restored! He, also, accepted my offer to write a translation of the French document he had requesting the anchor fee, as lots of cruisers speak Spanish but not so many have French
Dominican Republic I was informed yesterday that there was no need for an early start. I assumed that meant there was no need for an early start! Silly me, at just before 7am Tigger is on the coach-roof above the cabin doing important pre-leaving tasks. Goody, by 8am we are off! I love a lie-in! A very indifferent motor and sail in variable winds.
Puerto Rico Although we anchored last night in Dominican Republic, I’m trying to avoid going into other ports and having to go through the hassle of clearing in, last time we checked in here it was a nightmare! We were anticipating an easing of the trade winds at night to get us past the island but we hadn’t reckoned with a ferocious katabatic wind coming off the mountains making it a very uncomfortable sail in big seas. (NB – If there’s a next time, do this in daylight!) With lessons learnt, we decide to plough on, we position ourselves hard up against the coast at sunset the next night and were able to sail due East all night at a good speed in strong winds.
Going, going, gone!
The next day is much the same but when we finally clear Dominican Republic, the wind eased to barely enough to sail but enough to make motoring difficult in a chop. Crossing the Mona Passage was not much fun. Just off Mona Island, we were hailed on the VHF by “the United States Coastguard, Captain” wanting our inside leg measurements.
Lovely sleep and we wake reasonably refreshed. However, as the day progresses I begin to think another long sleep is in order to catch up with our good humours! However, Mike has inflated the dinghy so we can venture ashore. I’m below tidying up some of the detreitus from a 3 day sail, tacking, when Mike says he wished he’d got the dinghy drier in Jamaica before he packed it away as there is a “veritable aquarium” grown in it with Nemos and mini star fish. Really, I say, I thought we’d got it really dry, I can’t understand that. We can’t get it any drier than that. We lock the boat and, still confused, I get to the dinghy. Oh, I’d forgotten I’d made that lovely PVC floor to protect the dinghy floor from UV. I say, doesn’t that look great. Mike says that’s what he was talking about when he mentioned the aquarium. That had gone straight past me! He’s so hilarious (not!)
As we remembered from 2011, there isn’t much here at Boqueron but we find a mini supermarket to replace some staples (the “cupboard bear” has been visiting again!) We have milk, eggs, bread, pretend crabsticks, beer, rum and wine so bring on Christmas, I’m ready for yer!
When I took this pic in March 2011, I titled it “Not going to this bar – with my luck that’s the day it finally sinks!” Next to it, a photo from today! Oops!
However, it didn’t sink, it conveniently burnt down!
Most other shops are closed apart from the usual tourist trap shops selling polished conch shells for $5 apiece. (I had told Jasmin there was money in this – he thinks I was joking when I told him that conch wall was worth about $200!) Georgie from Emma Nuestra has recommended the restaurant at the yacht club as the best place for supper so we head over to check it out, only to find, guess what? It’s closed, opens again on Wednesday! There’s a surprise! We were intending to set off around 4am (well, Mike was!) but the alarm didn’t go off and Mike overslept till 5. What is the world coming to?! Motor-sailed all the way to Ponce ´ where we await Customs and Immigration. We hadn’t bothered to clear into Puerto Rico at Boqueron so had dumped our rubbish there and stocked up. Customs and Immigration arrive, inspect our non-existent stores, tell us we mustn’t leave our garbage on Puerto Rico (Oops!), stamp our passports and tell us to report to the Customs House in town tomorrow to complete clearance. Seems a waste of time them coming on the boat then as we still have to get to them anyway!
Put up the Christmas decs. Mr G, being very Mr G “Why have you put those up now, they’ll all fall down and get in my way!” Ermm, because it’s Christmas?!
We go back to the fuel dock to refuel as it is Christmas tomorrow, but the lazy fat arse operating the pumps has wandered off and it takes me 40 minutes and 3 calls to the Yacht Club before he finally arrives. By now, 2 other local boats have arrived for fuel. But we seem to be demoted to second in the queue somehow! Hitch a ride into town to get our clearance in and clearance out documents as we plan to leave tomorrow. Eventually, nice couple from Brooklyn stop for us. More stupid forms filled in. As we wait, a young Frenchman arrives to clear out. He has hired a car from Las Salinas where he has left his 33ft boat which he is sailing singlehanded without autopilot to St Martin to meet up with his father who arrives there in 2 days. Best of luck! He offers us a lift to the mall and even says he will wait 90 minutes for us to shop. Sadly, it takes us longer than that by the time we find Walmart so we will have to catch up with him in St Martin to thank him for his help. Lovely to have proper food again, we were down to just 4 onions looking lonely in otherwise empty veg baskets!
Spanish Virgin Islands
Because he’s “special”! We have Christmas Day brunch of American pancakes, maple syrup and I get the bonus of crispy bacon. “I was going to have a Buck’s Fizz with mine, would you like one?” Oh no, I don’t think so, not with pancakes. Suit yourself. (He relents when he sees the level of champagne in the bottle going down rather fast!)
We pass a very quiet day, no presies, no turkey, but we do have wifi, so Skype and Facebook with everyone and we have crackers and Champagne so not too unhappy. We buy ourselves Elton John concert tickets for Christmas present for 31st March in Vegas. Mike stops drinking champers early (fine with me!) as he plans to leave and sail overnight tonight to avoid the strong wind on the nose which is forecast for the foreseeable future. Bizarre Christmas lunch of asparagus quiche and salad and pecan pie before we leave and motor sail along the south coast of Puerto Rico. The sea is lumpy and we are crashing down into holes in the sea which kills our speed. We tack and tack until we finally get into a rolly anchorage on Boxing Day. This anchorage seems to have plenty of cruisers, mostly Americans. Wahoo fajitas seems an appropriate Boxing Day supper!
USVIs Because Mike had been up all the night before last, he had disappeared off to bed and was safely snoring by 7 last night. Which meant that he was wide awake and raring to go by 3am this morning. So I awake to the engine going on and the electric anchor windlass. Oh, the joys! I join him around 7am having decamped to the aft cabin to avoid being flung out of the bed as we crash into waves! Good sail once the sun had taken the chill off the air and we tack to Frenchtown. We arrive at Water Island first and spend 90 minutes trying to park there and in another anchorage, before giving up and heading into town which has very few cruiser boats and is a lot less rolly! Spotted my first turtle of this season. 
No thanks! Bye bye!
BVIs
This one’s more my cup of tea or this, at a push!
Virgin Gorda, BVIs Lovely day sail. Went ashore to Saba Rock for Happy Hour – half price Rum Punches and Painkillers. Got a sales pitch from a Dutch couple who have written a book. Escaped! However, took their advice and decided to miss out on the New Year’s Eve party and set sail for St Martin as there are strong winds on the nose forecast for later this week and we don’t want them, do we?!
St Martin, New Year’s Eve We tacked through the night en route to St Martin in about 12kts pretty much on the nose. My first New Year’s Eve without alcohol for at least 50 years!
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