Reflections … 6th
July 2018
I want to dedicate this blog entry to Gloria. Without her
none of this would have been possible. Sailing has become a more nerve-wracking
experience for Gloria since breaking her hip / femur on the dock in 2014 and
she shows amazing courage and determination just to get on the boat. Coping
with larger winds and seas than we typically experience was a challenge and she
handled it brilliantly. I know that losing both of her parents in January affected
her deeply and there was a period when she really just wanted to be at home.
But she stuck with it and I will always be grateful that she did. In writing
our blog we probably have a tendency to emphasize the exciting or challenging moments
over the mundane, it simply makes a better story, but there were plenty of
times when things were just ticking along quietly. Overall we had a fabulous
trip and on reflection I think we’ll even look back on the difficult moments as
contributing to the overall experience. (Mike)
Before we go further there are a number of people we want to
thank for helping make this adventure possible. In particular, we want to thank
Rod, Dave, Brian and Sandy for crewing on one or more of the long offshore
passages – East Greenwich to Norfolk, Norfolk to Tortola, Bahamas to North
Carolina. We owe you big time! Rod was also instrumental in helping to get the
boat ready, not to mention all his sailing coaching over the years. We also want
to thank all of our families and friends for their help and support – your
encouragement was really important! Finally, a special shout-out to all those people
who commented on our blog … you know who you are! Thanks
What were the best
parts?
·
We really
enjoyed having our friends and family visit.
o
Tasha’s visit over Christmas and New Year.
Whilst she has spent time with us on Cotinga in a marina (2012-3) she had never
actually sailed with us before. We had a fabulous visit with no seasickness!
o
We really enjoyed spending time with Dave,
Kathy, Julie and Lizzie; Simon; Stew and Paige; Bridget; Rod
·
So many
beautiful places – in total we visited 12 different countries (BVI, USVI,
St Barts, St Kitts + Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines,
Martinique, Dominica, Guadeloupe, Antigua, Turks and Caicos, Bahamas). Our top
favorites were Martinique, Guadeloupe and Antigua, but there wasn’t anywhere we
didn’t like or wouldn’t want to go back to.
·
Beautiful
water – particularly Grenadines, Antigua and the Bahamas
·
Snorkeling
and swimming – we did some fabulous snorkeling in lots of places. Some of
the reefs look in poor condition and they are under huge environmental
pressures. It’s fantastic just to be able to jump off the boat and swim in
crystal clear anchorages. Mike particularly enjoyed skinny-dipping after his
swim-suit was stolen off the rail!
·
Tropical
forests and gardens – the scenery on many of the islands was beautiful. We
thought Martinique had the best rain-forest and St Lucia and Guadeloupe the
best botanical gardens.
·
Whale,
dolphin and bird spotting – we only saw one whale close up in Caribbean and
a couple more up near Long Island near the start of the trip, but we saw loads
of dolphins which is always a joy. At some points (not everywhere) we saw a lot
of seabirds and we also enjoyed the tropical birds of the island. The lizards
were cool as well!
·
Grocery
shopping in the French Islands – on the whole we would say that the food
was not the highlight of the islands (although we always eat well!), however,
the range and quality of groceries on the French Islands is definitely a level
above others. Does anyone know where you can buy passionfruit?
·
Great
sailing – whilst there were certainly some difficult passages we also did
some very fine sailing. Most notably … island hopping north from St Lucia, the
Mona passage / north coast DR to Turks and Caicos, Eleuthera to the Abacos,
Bahamas to North Carolina (except the last night!)
·
Photo
opportunities – Mike loved the chance to focus on photography. Overall he
took ~12,000 photos over nine months. He’s looking forward to doing more with
them in the year ahead.
·
Meeting
new people – We met so many lovely people during the trip and made friends
that we hope we will see again. One of the best things about the ARC1500 rally
was getting to know the other participants and then meeting up with them again
in the islands. The sailing community is very friendly and it’s easy to strike
up conversations and friendships. It’s really common to keep bumping into
people, which is great.
·
Living on
the boat – it’s a different lifestyle from “dirt living” but it’s fun
living on the boat. You certainly appreciate hot showers with lots of water and
air conditioned rooms ashore, but we are going to miss living aboard.
·
Sense of
accomplishment – In the end we think we sailed about 6,000 nautical miles.
(If we had learned to use the trip log system earlier we would have had a
precise measure). This works out to be an average of about 25 nm per day –
that’s a lot of travel for a sailboat when you consider we average about 6 nm
per hour (see comments below)! We used all of our sails (main, genoa, staysail,
genaker) except the storms sails
(storm job and tri-sail). We sailed whenever possible, but used the engine
whenever needed to maintain progress. We mostly anchored, but used mooring
where recommended (e.g. to protect reefs) and marinas when that was the best
option or we wanted a break. We stayed safe! Overall we feel really good about
completing this journey.
What were the worst or
most troubling parts?
·
Thunderstorms
– wind and rain at sea or at anchor can be frightening, but at least you
feel you have some control. Thunderstorms are terrifying and you have no
control. We had some huge T-storms whilst at anchor in the latter part of the
trip, but thankfully nothing too serious whilst sailing.
·
Diesel fuel
issues - We had lots of problems
with contaminated fuel tanks despite having tried to clean them out prior to
departure. We must have used 8 fuel separators and ~5 fuel filters during the
course of the trip and sucked out gallons of sludge from the bottom of the
tanks and blew out “clots” that were clogging the lines. All of this arises
from water in the fuel and bacterial growth. Somehow we need to clean /
disinfect our tanks, but it’s difficult because baffles prevent access to some
areas.
·
Toilet
issues – This seems to be a
perennial problem on sailboats. There were times when our overboard pump for
the holding tank would not prime properly and needed to be primed manually … a
messy job always done out at sea, typically when it’s bumpy! Our forward head
also developed a leak that we could not fix despite having all sorts of spares.
We ended up not being able to use it for the last month and will replace the
whole unit.
·
Camera /
Laptop / binocular issues – the marine environment is brutal. The zoom ring
on Mike’s 70-200mm lens seized and it started to fog. The lens is now in for
repair. Both of our computers developed issues and our binoculars also had
fogging issues.
·
Big-wind
sailing to windward – Sailing off the wind when it’s blowing hard is fine,
but trying to make progress to windward in strong winds is hard work. The
passage from St Vincent to St Lucia (which Simon loved!) was particularly
trying. “Gentlemen don’t sail to windward”
·
Wealth
disparity—Many of the islands we visited had been devastated by the
hurricanes of the last season. The
locals on those islands were struggling.
We were more willing to participate in tours/taxi trips on those islands
with the aim of helping the local economy.
In a broader sense though, many islands are very poor and the local
people are struggling with lack of employment, poor housing and charges for
sending children to school. It’s quite
overwhelming to see the scale of the problem.
Often, we were approached by young children who were asking for money
for school-books. This seemed so
unlikely to us. Later, another sailor
told us that it was indeed a problem on St. Lucia - the family needed to pay
for the books the student used. I think
this demonstrates the way we arrive in the islands, understand little or
nothing of the local conditions and judge what we see in an unfavorable
light. The problems of wealth disparity
are more starkly visible in these beautiful islands dotted with gated resorts,
while the locals live in huts made of “the corrugated”.
What worked well –
what broke down?
·
The route
– It was a good choice to take the ARC 1500 rally . There were three
options for heading south … offshore from Norfolk, offshore from Florida /
Bahamas, or island hopping in short weather windows or at night. We now believe the
third option would be really hard work and we wouldn’t have made it anywhere
near as far south as we did in the timeframe allowed.
·
The crew –
Rod, Dave, Brian and Sandy were awesome!
·
Auto-pilot,
navigational electronics, water-maker, communications – all worked well.
·
Radar,
Fuel supply, forward head, 12v fans, engine raw water impellor, lap-tops and
camera lens – caused us problems. Replacing the radar dome in Tortola was
the most expensive repair. We await estimates for repair of the 70-200mm lens.
What would we do
differently?
·
It was a
long way! We underestimated just how far it is to go down and back to the
Caribbean. It would be better to spread the journey out over two years, going
south in year 1 and laying the boat up in Grenada for the hurricane season, then
returning during year 2. This is what most people we met were doing, however, we
would not have had the opportunity to go back to work at Framingham State
University if we had taken this approach.
·
Communication
– there seems to be decent cell phone coverage (3G) in most places we went to,
but there has to be a cheaper way of doing this than paying daily roaming fees
to Verizon!
·
Comfort in
the cockpit—We have one small shade that unrolls to partially cover the
cockpit but something more would have been welcome. We are even seriously considering a bimini! ($$$) In a similar way, it now seems to us that cockpit cushions would be a great
idea.(more $$$ !)
So that brings us to the end of this particular adventure.
In the autumn we are going back to work at Framingham State University. Where
will our next sailing adventure be? Mike has a hankering to take the boat to
Europe. Returning to the Caribbean would be great. Dave has long been a proponent of sailing the North-West passage (we’ll see about that one!). At this stage we have
no idea.
Thanks for reading the blog.
Gloria and Mike
out.
