End Of The Season

Our last report had us enjoying Cassada Bay, Carriacou during an anomalous west wind and north-west swells.  We had enjoyed the beautiful scenery and calm, flat nights, but not so for our companions Steve and Maria on their 52’ Island Packet, Savannah Sky.  They said they still rolled somewhat, and that something strange had shaken their boat in the middle of the night.  On the first morning there, they up-anchored and headed to Port Louis Marina in St. George’s Harbour.

 

Cat Tales alone in picturesque Cassada Bay, Carriacou

Cat Tales spent two more days and nights, taking in the beauty and doing some snorkelling.  We also took the opportunity to mix up some gelcoat and touch up all the nicks the topsides had acquired recently.  This chore heralded the start of the end of the season and the start of the work – not that we were free of repair challenges all season. 

 

We headed back to Tyrell when the wind returned out of the normal quadrant and began the end-of-season oil changes.  It wasn’t all work, however, as we enjoyed lunch fish tacos at Las Iguanas and came in with other boaters, including Skip of s/v Peacekeeper, for their pizza specials one night.    Skip had made a 24 hour jump from Guadeloupe.  He was attempting to move the boat from Puerto Rico to Trinidad after technical issues forced a very late start to his sailing season.  Dawn and I also hiked over to Paradise Beach, where we had beer and a great lunch while staring out over the fabulous scene of Sandy Island and Union Island and the amazing shades of water.

 

Independence Day Decorations, Carriacou

Finally, an IPA in Paradise…Paradise Beach, Carriacou

Ultimately, we sailed alongside Peacekeeper down to the mooring balls outside St. George’s Harbour.  It was a great sail, with a little north in the wind allowing us to take the inside route to Isle de Ronde to miss the Kick-em Jenny volcanic exclusion zone.  Cat Tales tacked way out after that, and the wind allowed us to sail the complete course to within a mile of the mooring buoys.  Sadly, as we started the engines and lowered sails, a piece of the sail track slipped, and we lost a number of bearings from the batten cars.

 

Skip (s/v Peacekeeper) aboard Cat Tales, Tyrell Bay, Carriacou after a 24 hour sail from Guadeloupe

We enjoyed some time with Skip, Steve and Maria, including a walk to Umbrellas, a fun beach restaurant on Paradise Beach.  After two days tied to the mooring ball, Dawn and I sailed under jib to Prickly Bay, to continue our chores and prepare the boat for haulout.  We got a little ahead of our normal schedule by dealing with the sails and a few other chores.  When Skip also came around, we did the obligatory walk to the craft brewery for supper. 

 

We were hauled out on the second morning in Prickly, and immediately things were removed from our control.  Cat Tales was placed in a corner, and water/sand blasting was started on the boat.  We could do very little, often just visiting during lunch or at the end of the day to pack things up.  As there was a weekend in the middle of the work, I was able to do some work on the saildrives and the rudders to both protect previous work and coatings I had carried out and to push to project along.  The rest of the work of decommissioning went smoothly, and we flew home feeling like we had it under control. 

 

We have had some cool days and nights back in Canada, but for the most part, spring and summer are early.  The winter was mild and there has been little rain – meaning river-running in a canoe is cancelled this year.  Otherwise, no surprises.

 

We hope you all have a fun and memorable summer.

 

TECHNICAL

 

We are still enamoured with the new autohelm equipment we installed after our 1996 electronics failed.  It added a few features to the chart plotter, and also the control head provides information gleaned from the rest of the electronics.  We now have the wind instrument and sailing direction information all on one little display, leaving the chart plotter to display the chart at a better scale. 

 

Our Raymarine a75 chartplotter is having a serious darkening and distortion of the polarizing film.  As it is a touchscreen, nobody will “touch” it for repair.  I looked at the Raymarine lineup, and all chartplotters or Multifunction Displays (MFD) they have are a few inches thicker, making them too fat to stick in the steering station.  As a result, I have taken delivery of a refurbished a75, and will take it to the boat in November.  Hope it works…

 

The bearings that escaped from the mast rail are 6 mm Torlon balls.  To facilitate the repair of the rail, we removed all the batten cars and all of the Torlon balls.  A close inspection of all the bearings brought us to the conclusion that the damaged balls and the missing balls came to a total short of 40, and we are sourcing them now.  We asked for some ideas for repair of the rail from the sailmaker, Turbulence; and in short order the repairs were done.  The bottom of the rail includes a short piece meant to assist in loading the bearings and launching the cars up the rail one at a time.  It is held on with a rod up the rest of the rail and a bolt at the bottom.  The bolt hole was a mess, so a new helicoil was placed in it to hold a new bolt and it works fine.  The rest of the rail we concluded was causing the problem.  It was poorly fastened and could weigh on the little loading strip and bolt.  The technician installed 4 bolts equidistant from top to bottom in the rail, making it seriously secure.

 

The batten cars with their bearings in place, are placed on this loading strip to allow them to be slid onto the mast rail.

The sandblasting took 3 complete workdays, and I put on some eye and nose protection and worked at the same time and after-hours gently removing coatings from the rudders and saildrives, minimizing damage to the special protective layers below.   Then the boat was moved to our usual spot for repairs. Two to four men were constantly working for two more days repairing the gelcoat with epoxy and filler, then applying Sea Hawk’s Tough Stuff two-part marine epoxy primer.  I let them do the same to the rudders, while I coated the saildrives with zinc chromate and an outboard paint.

Sand Blasting with water was a noisy, terrifying, dirty experience

Pitting of the gelcoat, after sandblasting

Workmen repairing, fairing and sanding after the sandblasting

While the workmen dealt with the bottoms, I mixed up batches of gelcoat, layered up the hole where the Hobie had attacked us and touched up past repairs and scratches.  I was able to tidy up the bows just as the men arrived to them to apply their coatings.

 

The hull and rudders received a full coating of West Epoxy, followed by a coat of Tough Stuff 2 part epoxy…four more coatings to follow!!

We had determined, with the assistance of the experienced yard managers that the lower rudder bearing housings were seriously worn, and we’re working on that problem over the summer as well.

 

We are still hoping to find a way to repair our 55 ampere internally regulated Hitachi alternator, and we also have to work on the big salon windows that sprayed water inside when we pretended to be a submarine off Diamond Rock.

 

 

St. Pierre, Martinique to Carriacou, Grenada

 After our whirlwind tour of Dominica and the Saintes, we had returned to the south of Martinique and anchored in Marin on the first day of March.  We picked up supplies, boat parts, and another great lunch with friends in le Sextant, before leaving in the morning for Rodney Bay, St. Lucia.  Our Sextant companions were Bill and Joanna of Cloud Street, and Kristen of Silk Pajamas, and it was our last visit of the season with them.

When we landed at Rodney Bay that morning, we again had a full day.  We cleared in and out of Customs and Immigration, purchased 4 jerry jugs of diesel, and booked in a fun lunch with almost every friend in Rodney.  We were intent on catching a strange northeast wind for a ride down to Bequia in the morning.

We were moving before 4 a.m. and had a lovely and anomalous broad reach the full length of St. Lucia. However, at the end of the island, things changed.  The wind was so far behind us, that we could use the main or the jib but not both, and the current coming through from between the islands made for a very confused sea.  Ten miles before we could get behind St. Vincent, the starboard alternator regulator stopped working, the voltage shot up to 15.5V, and caused the autohelm to pack it in, and we hand-steered through foul seas all the way to Bequia, a period of about 7 hours, with one hand needed to hang on and another on the wheel.  We arrived in Bequia just before dark – the latest we’ve ever arrived there.  

The sail from St. Lucia to Bequia!  All downwind, for a change!

Upon arrival into Bequia, we met with Garry and Linda for a birthday lunch for Garry.  Mac’s Pizza never fails to please.  What a nice coincidence that his birthday was that very day! 

Dawn on the hike to the old fort in Bequia.  Our boat is somewhere in the bay behind her.

I (Laurie) hurt my back attempting to sort out the alternator problem, but we did some short hikes while it sorted itself out.  I was soon working on the autohelm as well, and got it replaced just as Leo and Jo-Anne arrived for a 7-day visit.

As we determined that the shortness of the visit and the state of the seas ruled out a cruise with these distinguished guests, we shared them with our other friends during walks and lunches.  We also took them for three swims to our favourite little snorkelling spot between Princess Margaret and Lower Bay beaches.  All in all, we’d say they adapted to the life on Cat Tales rather well.    Way too soon, they were gone.

Leo and Jo-Anne cleaning up at the end of the day in salt water followed by a fresh water rinse.

We stayed a few more days in Bequia, hiking with a crowd of old and new friends to Ma Peg’s Rock and then Hope Bay; returning both times to fill the table of the PortHole restaurant, our favourite watering hole for a crowd.

Anina (s/v Prism) showing off the view from the top of the mountain.  She was just finishing her long stint with dengue fever, a mosquito borne ailment, which laid her up for about 7 days! 

Garry and Steve with the tiny Bequia airport in the background on the east side.

Laurie and Linda still smiling as they neared the top of Ma Peggy!

On the 26^th, we sailed to Chatham Bay for a supper at Vanessa and Seckie’s beach restaurant, and then joined Savannah Sky as they were sailing by to go to Tyrell Bay in Carriacou.  Yesterday we motored around to Cassada Bay to avoid reversing winds in Tyrell.  As lovely as it is, Savannah Sky left, and we are all alone in a giant, island-ringed anchorage.

 

TECHNICAL

It has been a busy time in the repair department lately.  Our AIS receives data but will not transmit our location nor data.  We took it into Jacques at Diginav, Marin; but he had little time to work on it and had his own electronic issue that hindered his AIS repair equipment.  We took it back and are just sailing incognito.  A fuel leak had grown on the port engine, and I was quite sure it was the Yanmar filter gasket.  I purchased new ones and replaced both the gasket and the filter.  A week later it seemed worse – then on the trip to Chatham Bay, I inspected the engine and determined that fuel was spraying from a mesh-coated hose from the filter to the high-pressure pump.  Just yesterday, after seeking significant advice over the phone from the Yanmar shop in Grenada, I took the hose off, cut the crimps and hose from the banjo fittings with a Ryobi rotary tool, fitted a 3/8” fuel hose over the barbs with hose clamps and new copper washers, reassembled, tested, and began cleaning the mess in and around the bilge.  Hot, dirty work!

A tense time onboard Cat Tales as Laurie tackled this job which would either fix the problem, or make it worse.  Luckily, it’s fixed and we now have both engines working…for now!

The replacement of the autohelm system back in Bequia was difficult work, but we had fantastic luck.  Steve of Savannah Sky had purchased all parts to replace his autopilot system if it failed on his previous boat (Aspen) during his solo sail to Easter Island.  He didn’t use it, and luckily for us, the kit does not fit the new boat.  It was available for sale to me, and after 3 days, I had it installed and fully troubleshooted.  As it connected to the Raymarine backbone wiring system, it actually provided the complete electronics package on the boat with significant new features.  What fun! ;-)

After the autopilot was installed, it didn’t boot up properly.  Once that issue was behind us, the next day more trouble.  Steve and Laurie chased some wires and found a loose electrical power connection.  Once that issue was solved, everything was working ticketey boo!

Autopilot computer

One thing on the agenda at this time is finding a reliable repairman for the alternator in Grenada.

Although a less technical problem, we have been suffering this season from two attacks of weevils.  In both cases, they came from lasagna noodles.  The first time, they escaped and caused concern and hard work on Dawn’s agenda.  The second time, they were contained in a hard plastic case, and only caused a menu modification.

 

Martinique to Guadeloupe and back!

Well, it has been a month, and time to let this journal know some things.  We are presently back in Ste. Anne, Martinique.  We have returned mostly to pick up parts and have an electronic thingy looked at.

 

Dominica to St. Pierre, Martinique

We were in Trois Islets a month ago, primarily following Steve and Maria on Savannah Sky as they were both looking for new anchorages at the same time as they were attempting to keep the boat from rocking in the wind and waves.  We both found Trois Islets rather uncomfortable, and the water was just plain brown.  They left for flatter water, while we once again tramped the streets in search of new things, and bokit sandwiches.  Finding neither, we upped anchor to spend a couple of nights at Anse Mitan.  Steve and Maria showed up for a day and we had a wonderful beach lunch.  When they left to get a new technical matter repaired, we put the jib up and went to St. Pierre.

 

From St. Pierre, we made a loop of Portsmouth, Dominica, and Les Saintes, Guadeloupe, then back to St. Pierre over a period of 16 days.  The time included 5 trips to customs, visits with the PAYS group of marine service providers who are also a lot of old friends, hiking and lunching on Terre de Haut with the people of Charlotte D, CloudStreet, Aspen1, and Prism; all of which was terribly enjoyable.  As Aspen 1 were the newbies to the island, we all enjoyed showing the sites and sharing our wisdom.  Not enjoyable was the weather, and especially the sailing.  While in Portsmouth, the wind turned light and shifted to the west, and western swells actually emptied the anchorage.  Two boats: a 70’ freighter and a fairly new cruising boat, ended up on the beach.  All others, predominantly members of the Salty Dawgs who were there for a major event, scattered before the event was over.  The weather continued to be poor for some of the time we were on mooring balls in Les Saintes.  A few more boats were thrown onto the shores along the islands.

 

We saw several boats that washed ashore the night of the west winds and swells!

Nor was the sailing very good, as we pretty much motored the whole route.  Like other passages this year, we would reef for the forecast, then find not enough breeze to move the boat above 3 knots.  

 

Lunch in Les Saintes with sv Cloudstreet and sv Charlotte D.

A resident of the restaurant dropped in to see if anyone had any tidbits leftover from lunch!

Lunch in Les Saintes with sv Cloudstreet, Charlotte D., Prism, and Aspen1.

We regrouped at St. Pierre on the 17^th of February and sailed to Anse a l’Ane, on the south shores of Fort de France Bay.  There we had 3 nights that were quite lovely, a couple of nice lunches ashore, and found a hike we had never been on before.  Traveling west along the shore, up and down the beautiful, shaded, green and irregular coast, we found two secluded beaches and a major archaeological site at a secluded place called Anse Bellay.  Predominantly a large 18^thcentury slave burial site, it also provided the archaeologists with evidence of the habitation of 13^th century Kalinagos and the habitation of 8^th century Arawaks.  The bones were originally removed for study, but after the locals made it a political football, they were returned with ceremony and a proper plaque to display both history and respect.

A lovely, partly shady, meandering trail.  

 

Supposedly part of the original cemetery.  We were delighted to learn and read all the details on the plaques here, thanks to Google Translate!

A lovely hour long hike involving some good ups and downs!

Deep fried ballyhoo and fries!  Such delicate white fish with no bones.  A treat, but not necessarily nutritious!

Leaving Anse a l’Ane on Tuesday, 20^th of February, we were determined to sail upwind to Ste. Anne and Marin.  That was a bit of a disaster.  Although properly reefed, we encountered a dry squall, high and sharp waves around Diamond Rock and Pointe du Diamond.  The forward crossmember crashed into waves way below their tops, dislodging everything not nailed down.  The water constantly cascaded up the boat and found all our undiscovered leaks.  When after 30 minutes of this we arrived at the other side of the disturbance, the wind calmed down and for about an hour, we found the sailing we were after.  Then it was gone, and we motored even longer, all the way to Marin.  

 

We’ve now departed Marin and are anchored in Ste. Anne and are waiting for a call about our equipment.  Not so bad, really, we’ve had a lovely lunch at le Sextant with Johanna and Bill and a pizza ashore here with Kristin and Terry of Silk Pajamas.  Today, Anina and Charlie of Prism should arrive with their company from Rodney Bay.

 

TECHNICAL

 

I went ahead and switched back to 55 ampere alternators for both engines, now that I have two, and also fitted them better with sleeves for the bolt holes from the spare alternators.  It also took new belts to stop the constant wearing of belts, and things are better in that area.  

 

I had a fuel leak I couldn’t seem to stop on the port engine, and each time I ran it, a slow drip came from the Yanmar fuel filter.  I just got a new set of gaskets for those little filter cans and put one on.  It seems to have stopped it so far.  If it continues in any way, I’ll replace the soft copper washers on the banjo fittings and tighten them.

 

The cockpit table dropped a screw, and when I attempted to tighten the screws, I noticed many holes were stripped.  I epoxy-filled them, predrilled and reassembled.  That is likely the end of that problem.

 

Repairing the curly wire for the remote control for the anchor windlass.

Anse a l’ Ane to le Marin & Ste. Anne

The underside of the cockpit table and the pedestal connection.

Lastly, we’re waiting on the return of our 2015 Raymarine AIS 350 transceiver from Diginav, Marin.  We have never had a consistent signal out from it and other boats do not read our position very often.  Interestingly, the respected genius there, Jacques Fauquet, said he would not work on the screen of my Raymarine a75 chart plotter as it is difficult to repair and the unit is a piece of shit, his words.  Time to go shopping, I guess.  

On to Martinique

Well, hello from Trois Islets, Martinique.  Cat Tales followed Savannah Sky into this eastern edge of Fort de France Bay this morning/afternoon.  We have not been here since 2005 or so.

 

We had last written from Rodney Bay about 2 weeks ago.  Well, once we received our spare starter from Island Water World, AND bent it on to make sure it worked, we took the next opportunity to travel.  That was January 12^th.  We had a lovely but light sail over to Ste. Anne, Martinique.  Winds were forecasted to be 13-18 or so, and we reefed for it.  We had more than an hour of less than 10 knots apparent wind, meaning the true wind was often 5 or so knots.  Still, the wind direction favoured the east, and with two tacks, we got into St. Anne in about 5.5 hours.  Not a rocket ship, by any means.

 

After a tiny hike, we still felt we deserved a great lunch and refreshments at one of our favourite beach restaurants, Basilic

The beach hike along Ste. Anne.  Steve and Maria (Savannah Sky) and Rachael and Susan (Aspen)

Only turned the tracker on for the return trip, so you can X2 the distance.  Lovely, shady and relatively flat
walk.

We’ve had a wonderful evening with Joanna and Bill of Cloud Street, sharing Dawn’s pumpkin soup, and a ti’ punch night aboard Savanna Sky with Maria and Steve and with Rachael and Susan of Aspen.  We did the obligatory run into Marin for wine, beer, cheese, and groceries, a “chicken walk” for barbecue chicken and clementines, and finally the also obligatory hike to the southern beaches.  We had dinner one night on s/v Fathom This with George and June where we were introduced to another lovely couple from Switzerland.  The Swiss couple’s boat is an amazing aluminum catamaran about the size of Cat Tales, named “Kobold”.  It was constructed as a prototype over 30 years ago, and the owner, Heinz, has carried out extensive carpentry inside.  No others were ever constructed.

 

Kobold, a prototype aluminum catamaran the size of Cat Tales

One funny occurrence was the loss of Dawn’s magnetic sun glass attachment for her progressive lens glasses.  They were knocked off her face while she was leaning over to lower the dinghy. The next day, I could not find them when diving, and we had resigned ourselves to the loss.  Well Steve wanted to get in on the search so we gave it another try yesterday.  While the two of us searched, I gave a quick search under the port hull.  Upon finding a 3-4 foot baracuda there, I didn’t look too closely.  After we had scoured the rest of the anchoring arc, I returned to find the shades exactly where the ‘Cuda had sat.

 

One thing I want to talk about, although it has come up before, is the amazingly interesting people you may meet here.  Yes, world travellers like our friends Steve and Maria, but more:  Jenny of Tanglewood is not only a car accident survivor, a cancer survivor, and the most upbeat person we know, but she is the granddaughter of Irving and Etsy Johnson, who traveled the globe in two great ships as charter captains.  Check it out here:   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irving_Johnson_(ship).  We also have learned just recently that Bill of Cloud Street is a survivor of the greatest US naval fire since WWII:  The Forrestal Disaster:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_USS_Forrestal_fire#:~:text=A%201966%20fire%20aboard%20USS,down%20system%20on%20all%20carriers.

 

Joanna and Bill (Cloud Street) and Jenny (Tanglewood). This is Jenny who Laurie speaks of in the above paragraph.

The last interesting find is George aboard the motor sailor Fathom This.  George was the builder of the original chart plotter.  He sold his design to Figawi, and the world changed forever.  Well George came over to Cat Tales two days ago, took apart our Standard Horizon radio, scraped off the totally blackened polarized film from the display, and stuck a new one on!  Amazing!

 

George and his helper Laurie changing the window film on our vhf…it lives!!

Today’s sail around the southwestern peninsula was easy, with most of the way done by just the jib.  However, it was a hard slog to get the 6 miles into Trois Islets through 20-25 knot breezes and waves.  I’ve smelled diesel in the port engine compartment and also noticed the belt is just about done.  I’ll have to investigate starboard in the morning.  Dawn thinks we may have a line on a bokit lunch, so I’d better start early.

 

‘Ti punch happy hour.  Take nasty French rum, add sugar syrup and lime until you can drink it!  Voila!

Plans are to move back out of here tomorrow afternoon, and maybe try Anse Mitan or Anse a L’Ane.  The next weather window looks like a week away, and we hope to be ready to jump islands from northern Martinique, St. Pierre heading for Dominica.  

 

TECHNICAL

 

I am happy to report that the rebuilt starter is working fabulously.  I was pessimistic when picking it up, as it was a 1.2 kilowatt motor, while the old ones are 1.0 kW.  It actually starts easier, without a hesitation.  The older one is now the spare!

While in Rodney Bay, St. Lucia, a Hobie Cat from a resort hit us and punctured the outer skin of our rear port hull.  We chatted with the officials from the Landings resort and they arranged for us to meet the gentleman who was sailing the Hobie that day.  The gentleman agreed to pay the asking fee and sent us the $$ into our account after he arrived back home in the UK.  He was extremely sorry.  We promised him a free sailing lesson if he was to come back to the Caribbean.  A temporary patch was done by reaching down from the deck and a better job will happen when we haul out in Grenada.

Temporary, but water tight.  More work to be done in April at haul out time.

 

Cat Tales has been having trouble with belts, and I am starting to blame the 80 ampere alternators.  Especially when we try to use the 80 amps, like when we try to use the cold plate in the refrigerator and make water at the same time. The belt heats up and throws material.  I’ve switched both engines back to the original 55 ampere alternators (hard to find these days, but I got one from Bill of Cloud Street, and really need to let him know how happy I am), and things are better.  The belts are something else.  I’ve always kept a stock of them on board, and now think part of the problem is them drying out in storage.

 

Well, we endeavour to persevere.