Arundle and other Norwegian explorers suggest that an
adventure is something you have when you are not prepared. Whether or not that is true, we've had some
adventures of late.
Although we could have been quite happy if we had stayed in Bequia, the
reports from Denis, our weather adviser, and the other weather sources
suggested that we could indeed travel on Monday and Tuesday; so we did. With s/v Peace & Plenty (P&P), we
checked out of Customs and Immigration early Monday and prepared to make sail
north. Our first step was to lift two
anchors off the bottom, as the high winds had us deploying both heavy anchors
and all our chain. Since Dawn had
bruised her shoulder, it was my job to work the windlass - but the windlass
would not work. I troubleshooted it with
three trips to the hot, dirty little locker under the windlass; and once more,
the solenoid that makes the contacts for the biggest electric motor on the boat
was not working. So, I had to muscle up
230 feet of 10mm chain and two 45 lb anchors and sort them in the locker.
After that, the two boats had a lovely sail (with some
motoring as the volcano hid us from the wind) up to a beautiful bay called
Chateaubelaire, about 1.5 hours short of the north tip of the island. The young harbourmaster, George, came zooming
up to us in his little red kayak and guided us to a location along a very
beautiful shore and cliff, where we could spend the night. I attempted to tip George for both boats,
with 15 EC dollars, a wine cork to put in the kayak bung hole, and a repair kit
to stop the leak under his seat.
However, before I could make it clear that he was being rewarded in
full, he had zoomed over to welcome Brian and got $20 more and a beer. Indeed a nice day for him! Dawn and I also bought a half dozen
grapefruit from him for $10 more, and have since found they are seedy and
tasteless - but maybe they'll improve if we leave the remainder for a week or
so.
We all retired early, and attempted to sleep. Dawn and I had no problems there, but it was
reported that Peace & Plenty suffered some rolling, and Brian spent most of
the night in the cockpit. Monohulls are prone to rolling back and forth if swells are present. Multihulls seldom feel the roll. Regardless, we
were under way outside the bay by 6:15 am.
Doyle's Guide for the trip beyond St. Vincent says to reduce sail
significantly, showing only a sliver of jib, and then stick your nose out
beyond the volcano and increase sail as conditions allow. I was lulled by past easy conditions here,
and by a weather report that suggested winds at least below 20 knots. I noticed a squall at the tip of the island,
but thought it was just the typical cloud and rain often caused by the steep
3000 foot volcano. Still, we were well
reefed down, and supposedly safe for up to 30 knots. Well, we got 44 knots, and for over 45
minutes it didn't drop below 38 knots. I
put the double-reefed main all the way over, and the sheet out, and had only
1/3 of the jib out. I also went into the
wind as far as I could, trying to depower the main, as it was too windy to
attempt to reduce sail further. I should
have turned around and got behind the mountain and started over with less sail,
but I was unsure if the rig could have stood the changes while we turned. At any rate, P&P disappeared behind us,
and we just kind of held on. I did my
holding on outside in the pelting waves, and Dawn held on inside, quite
dry.
Amazingly, we came out of it without any problems, as far as
we can tell. A strange bit of black
plastic fell from the rigging, and I'll have to see where it might have originated
in the next few days. I suspect it is a
furling bushing, making a trip to a rigging shop in Martinique part of our
future.
We continued across to St. Lucia without further incident as
the wind slowly fell to below 20 knots.
We maintained our reduced sails and moved along at around 5.5 knots,
while P&P motor-sailed and made up the difference. After a minor gust that rolled off St.
Lucia's Pitons, the wind stayed low, and at times we also motor-sailed. Both boats were quite messed up from the wind
and the salt; and we were looking longingly at a squall in front of us that
seemed to be moving at the same speed as we were. The rinsing would have been appreciated by
both boats. A few times, we caught up to
some bits of rain, but never enough to cause the salt to run off the sails,
biminis, and decks. We did notice,
however, that there were rivers of fresh water interspersed with the salt
water, full of coconuts, litter, and even tree trunks. Brian called us by radio and suggested we
take another look at the island, about a mile away. The cliffs, in most places well over 100 feet
high, had ribbons of waterfalls. We
began to wonder if catching up to this particular squall was very clever.
We did catch some rain, and soon had more than we wanted, as
we approached Rodney Bay. Still, it
abated, we both anchored at about 3:30, and I took Brian into Customs and
Immigration. Not unexpectedly, it being
Christmas Eve, they shut the doors on us and told us to come back in the
morning. Brian and I realized we had
some spare time and visited John Fallon on StoppKnot on the dock, and assisted
him with the bottom third of a wonderful old bottle of dark Barbados rum.
We returned to the boat in a whipping rain and lightning
storm. For 6-8 hours, the lightning lit
up the bay brighter than daylight once or more per minute. One sailor noted that the garden solar lights
favoured by the sailors would shut off with every flash, then return on a
little brighter for the first instant.
Regardless, the crews on both boats slept rather well as the winds and
rain tested our anchors, spinning us over 120 degrees of arc. In all the time we have spent here, thunder and lightning are not part of weather here during the winter months. Apparently exceptions prevail.
Although we woke up refreshed, and even enjoyed Christmas
day with a leaden sky, we soon got news of the damage ashore. There is significant infrastructure
damage. Indeed, many people spent their
Christmas Eve in their places of work or in strangers' homes, as roads and
bridges were swept away. We are aware of
a few deaths, including a young police officer who was rescuing someone when a
wall let go. As it is, water supply
systems are not expected to be running for days, with intakes plugged and
possibly even swept away.
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| Laurie & John on the left and Brian and Lorna on the right arriving for Christmas dinner |
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| Check out Brian and Lorna's new dinghy! They had the navy chaps made in Bequia to match their new bimini. |
Lorna and Brian (Peace and Plenty) and John Fallon joined us on our boat for Christmas dinner last night. We cooked a butterball turkey breast we had picked up in Trinidad and kept frozen in our teeny freezer! Lots of fun with much reminiscing of past Christmases spent with John aboard his boat Stopp Knot.
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| On a hike in Bequia, Laurie found a prize on the trail. |
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| Don't get too excited, he wasn't entertained with it for long! |
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| When we get home, we never complain about the quality of the stores in Canada! |
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| Peace & Plenty showing off their new bimini and dodger. They can both stand up inside now and it feels like a new room has been added to their boat. The workmanship in Bequia was superb! |
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| There goes the neighborhood. This monster just anchored right beside us here in Rodney Bay, St. Lucia |
