Puerto Rico - Cabo Rojo

Anchor to Anchor - Green Beach, Vieques to Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico

26 hours - 105 miles

La 17.55.8'N Lo 67.12.1'W

On March 14th, 2010 we completed our passage west along Puerto Rico's south coast. Light southeast winds allowed us to barely clear 4 knots.

We dropped anchor behind the Cabo Rojo lighthouse which sits on Puerto Rico's southwest corner, projecting it's light out to the Caribbean Sea to the south and the Mona Passage to the west.

A quick row to shore revealed a spectacular white sand beach tucked away on the south side of the lighthouse along with a mangrove restoration area.

We rested overnight, the only boat in the bay, then headed the 6 miles north to join several others tucked in on Puerto Rico's west coast at Boqueron.

Spanish Virgin Islands

Anchor to Anchor - Ensenada Honda, Culebra to Green Beach, Vieques

5 hours - 26 miles

La 18.06.6'N Lo 65.34.6'W

We anchored in 7 feet of calm turquoise water off the palm lined beach on the west coast of Vieques.

Through the night we were treated to an unbelievable jungle chorus of song.

In the morning we swam into shore, walked the deserted beach and collected the most beautiful shells. The sea urchin shells ranged in size and colour - white, yellow, green and even mauve/coral striped.

While on this gorgeous beach, all alone, as we gaze out at Sea Star floating languidly in a small palm lined cove of clear turquoise water, we are reminded that this is the entity of "the dream".

A Hop, S-K-I-P and a JUMP

Plan B

As we grew restless awaiting a weather window to enable us to make our originally planned passage from Culebra to Mayaguana we formulated Plan B whereby we would make our way westward. This would lessen the distance of our passage from the Caribbean Sea to the Bahamas waters (southwest north Atlantic) while passing time as we await the weather window.

We made a short day "hop" (26 miles) south-west to the Spanish Virgin Island, Vieques. Our next move was to "skip" westward along Puerto Rico's south coast (105 miles). Our final move was a "jump" of 327 miles, our longest passage ever, from Boqueron (Pueto Rico's west coast) to Big Sand Cay on the south end of the Turks and Caicos.

Agonizing over the Weather

For quite some time we have given thought to our route north from the Caribbean Sea to the Bahamas. By choice we would make one offshore passage from Culebra to Mayaguana (Bahamas), 500 miles, by-passing the Turks and Caicos.

While in Culebra we agonized over the weather. To make Mayaguana we need 4 days of good conditions but unfortunately the cold fronts keep coming off of the U.S. every 3 days, foiling our plan.

Adding extra aggravation to our situation is that our planned passage would take us through 3 different weather forecasting areas thereby requiring us to mesh them together time wise.

Each morning we positioned ourselves beside our static ridden single side band radio and diligently taped, took notes and attempted to decipher the N.O.A.A. reports: Offshore Waters Forecasts for the Tropical North Atlantic and Caribbean Sea, the Southwest North Atlantic south of 3l degrees north, west of 65 degrees west, including the Bahamas; the eastern Caribbean east of 75 degrees west to the Leeward and Windward Islands; and the Eastern Caribbean from 7 degrees north to 22 degrees north, from 55 degrees west to 65 degrees west.

As well, we listened intently to Chris Parker's 4 broadcasts (Bellamy), Herb (Southbound 2), George (KP2G) Caribbean Cocktail Net and Eric (Trinidad).

After literally hours of daily aggravation we would head into shore with our laptop to double-check our information on-line as well as checking other sources - Ugrib, Wind Guru, and local sources.

Once we amassed the vast amount of daily information, ascertained the sections that all sources agreed upon, we considered how it fit our personal situation.

While in Culebra a viable weather window passed as we anticipated a cold front to cross only to have it stall over the Dominican Republic.

We find ourselves wishing we had some of the knowledgeable CPS folks here to help us reach a decision.

Finally, since the cold fronts kept coming with their rain, thunderstorms, high winds and wave swells, we abandoned our plan for Mayaguana and instead decided to make our way further west in the protected waters along Puerto Rico's south coast to the Mona Passage.

8,000 mile mark Westward through the Virgins Anchor to Anchor - St. Thomas (U.S. Virgin Island) to Culebra (Spanish Virgin Island) - 20 miles - 3 hours La 18.18.5'N Lo 65.18.0'W Today, as we passed "sail rock" between two virgin islands, our log clicked over the 8,000 nautical mile mark, (since we pushed off from the dock in Penetanguishene, July 4, 2006). That's a lot of water under the keel! What better place to celebrate this milestone than beautiful, unspoiled Culebra, our favourite island. When we checked in with Customs they issued us a U.S. cruising permit ($19.U.S.), good for one year. While anchored at Culebra we enjoyed an afternoon of snorkelling along the "wall" off the west coast, and did extensive provisioning in anticipation of our passages to the Bahamas. We also enjoyed dinner ashore at Mamacitas restaurant though we had to practically move the eels and tarpoon fish aside to tie our dinghy to the dock.

The 30th Annual Heineken Regatta - St. Martin - Passages West Anchor to Anchor - Simpson Bay, St. Martin to Lindbergh Bay, St. Thomas (U.S.Virgin Island) - 25 hours - 115 miles La 18.19.9'N Lo 64.58.0'W We joined a group of 2 mega yachts and a dozen or so others at the 9 a.m. out-going Simpson Bay bridge opening and made our way out of the lagoon on Friday, March 5th. We knew the 30th Annual Heineken Regatta was in full swing but what a surprise it was to us to find literally hundreds of boats racing within view of the bay. The question that came to our mind was where did they all come from? They certainly didn't come out of the lagoon. Did they all spend the night anchored out in the swell in Simpson Bay? If so, it must have been a bumper to bumper parking lot out there. We enjoyed an up-close view of the action as we slipped between the races to open water. In light (under 10 knot) SE-S winds under full main and genoa, we set out on a course of 291 degrees magnetic for Culebra. During our progress in daylight hours we had a rather large, very low flying plane pass over us twice. The drone of it's engine could be heard in the distance for most of the day. We speculated that a grid search was underway to possibly locate whales as the humpback annual migration passed through these waters yearly at this time. We sailed on through the night in flat seas enjoying the fireworks of bio-luminesence in our wake matched by a spectacular sky above, gently averaging 4 knots. At 7 a.m. we had the U.S. Virgin Island, St. John, off our starboard beam and a very threatening squall line off our bow. With Culebra still 25 miles ahead and the weather channel issuing a flood warning due to heavy rainfall over the next 36 hours, we decided to take shelter in Lindbergh Bay, St. Thomas, and "wait out the storm". This turned out to be a wise decision. While snugly on anchor we endured many hours of teeming rain and 30+ knot winds.

Lazin' In The Lagoon - St. Martin We lay on anchor 13 days in St. Martin's Simpson Bay lagoon awaiting delivery of a warranty replacement windlass from Lewmar. While biding our time we enjoyed area activities and social outings with fellow cruisers. One couple, Renee and Cheryl (Gypsy Blues - Canada), that we first met in the Erie canal (Sept. '06), we found to be both gainfully employed here in St. Martin while living aboard Gypsy Blues. Renee jokingly tells us "he is being paid to get a discount on boat parts" as he is working at the Island Water World Chanderly while Cheryl is honing her skills in a canvas loft. Coupled with our friends on Phoenix III (Canada) that we found both working at the Whisper Cove Marina in Grenada, we note cruisers seeping into cruising related employment opportunities on the islands. Our time in St. Martin was spent enjoying Heineken regatta excitement and activities; watching the planes land and take-off at the end of the runway (again!! we just can't seem to stop!); watching the yacht traffic pass by during bridge openings at the Yacht Club; shopping in the stores and market in Marigot (on the French side); attending social get-togethers with fellow cruisers; sharing in the free pizza party that Cheryl won (Gypsy Blues); strolling the beach on Simpson Bay; cheering on the Canadian Olympic men's hockey team and proudly flying our flag afterwards; ogling the mega/maxi yachts docked here and we even managed to fit in some maintenance time on Sea Star.

Guadeloupe to St. Martin - out for a Sunday Drive La 18.03.0'N Lo 63.05.9'W Anchor to Anchor - Deshaies, Guadeloupe to Simpson Bay Lagoon, St. Martin - 138 miles - 26 hours We lifted anchor in Deshaies, Guadeloupe at l000 hours, February 20, 2010 and set sail in superb conditions - wind E-NE, averaging 12 knots, swell E-SE. At 1610 hours, while making excellent time, we had the north end of Montserrat abeam. Visible off our port bow were the islands of "The Kingdom of" Redonda, Nevis and St. Kitt's, abeam of us starboard was Antigua and off our stern Guadeloupe. By the time we had St. Kitt's (St Christopher) abeam our port we lost the wind and after "bobbing" and hoping for 3 hours for it to pick up again we fired up the diesel. By the time we reached our destination of St. Martin we had been motoring on our Sunday drive for 10 hours. As we were abeam of Statia (Sint Eustatius) the impending front finally found us and we endured heavy rainfall on two occasions on our approach to St. Martin. Tired and wet, we tried to nap in Simpson Bay beside the airport runway as we awaited the 1730 bridge opening to access the shelter of the lagoon. At 1800 hours we dropped anchor beside the "witches tit" amidst a crowd of other boats already assembled. During the past 10 days we have sailed over 300 miles and stopped at 4 different islands along the way, all of them French - Martinique, Iles Des Saintes, Guadeloupe and St. Martin. We truly do enjoy the French culture.

Guadeloupe - Deshaies La 16.18.3'N Lo 61.48.5'W Anchor to Anchor - The Saintes to Deshaies, Guadeloupe - 36 miles - 7 hours As suggested by Robin (Ngoma) we took the opportunity of resting over-night, on our way north to St. Martin, in Deshaies located on Guadeloupe's north-west corner. Once inside the field of fish-nets surrounding the harbour we had a good view of Montserrat's active volcano 30 miles off in the distance. We thought we might be able to see a glow in the darkness but non was visible however we did find Sea Star covered in black soot in the morning. While enjoying a pleasant breakfast in town one of the many dive operators located in this bay obviously undid the clevis holding the chain to our dinghy and moved her out of sight. We returned to find our chain still securely locked to the dock but no dinghy at the end of it. A few anxious minutes later we found her tied in another part of the dock. All was well. Whew.

The Saintes - A French playground La - 15.52.01'N Lo 61.35.15'W Anchor to Anchor - Le Marine, Martinique to Terre D'en Haut - Iles Des Saintes 128 miles - 22 hours We left Martinique as it was in the midst of Carnival. As we slipped north along the coast the beat of the music could be clearly heard off shore. We had a lumpy but very fast ride north in a southeast 15-20 knot breeze, as we surfed along on a southeast swell. At dawn, as we reached Dominica's north coast, we encountered squalls, 25 knot winds with a large swell on our starboard side coming in from the south east. Fortunately we didn't have far to travel before we joined the crowd of yachts anchored in the lee of the Saintes. Since the carnival celebration was going on as well here the customs office was closed and it would be four days later, as we were attempting to clear out, that we would finally get cleared in. While at the Saintes we joined the crowd of French tourists at play. Each morning the ferries would make their way in the 7 miles from Guadeloupe. The few roads there are in the Saintes are too narrow for cars. This prompts a brisk scooter rental business. The daily crowd would spend their day shopping, swimming, sun-bathing, kite-boarding, wind surfing, sailing hobie cats, kayaking, dining in the fine restaurants, snorkeling, exploring the forts or just "bombing" around on the scooters from site to site. At the end of the day the ferries would return them all back to Guadeloupe and those of us left on the Saintes would heave a collective sigh of relief. While here an expenditure of 8 Euros allowed us excellent wi-fi access from on board. As we sat out on anchor under the stars we talked on skype and emailed well into the night.

Ngoma in Martinique Le Marin, Martinique La 14.27.98'N Lo 060.52.63'W Anchor to Anchor - Admiralty Bay, Bequia to Le Marin, Martinique - 24 hours - 109 miles We stopped in Martinique with the hopes of connecting up with our good friends, Robin and Sandra on Ngoma. As we neared shore we were absolutely thrilled when they answered our first call on the vhf radio. While we enjoyed Robin and Sandra's company for 4 days, we explored Marin, the yachting capital of Martinique and relished in the French ambiance. We were in awe as we visited the Jesuit church, built in l766. With interest we watched as the local yole boats sailed about the harbour. To balance the boat, as wind fills the sail, crew members must slide their weight along poles that extend out the side of the boat - a real balancing act, for sure. Not to be outdone by the yole boat sailors were the hang-gliders who daily rode (in tandem) the thermal currents on the hill beside us. It was hard to wave good-bye to our dear friends Robin and Sandra on Ngoma. Our time together with them has expanded our perspective on life. We were constantly fascinated to hear of their journey - where life has taken them, their family, their diving excursions and of course, their home in Zimbabwe. Robin and Sandra will forever be a part of us.