The Mona Passage

The Mona Passage

Thursday 27th - Friday 28th Feb 2025

Our journey across the Mona Passage from Boqueron, Puerto Rico to Samana, Dominican Republic went fine. We had been monitoring the weather forecast for the past week and what we experienced was pretty much exactly what was forecast. We raised our main sail before pulling up the anchor, mostly to provide some extra dampening of any roll, but also because we were hoping the winds would pick up from < 5 knots to something sailable later in the afternoon. We left at about 8.15 am and arrived at Puerto Bahia marina, just to the west of Samana, at 9.30 am the following day, having covered ~ 145 nm. We gently motor-sailed the first 8 hours, then sailed overnight and started motor-sailing again shortly after sunrise because the winds had gone light again and were directly down wind. On Thursday morning the seas were dead flat, but the overnight period was quite rolly, but not too terrible. What was exciting was the wildlife that we saw. Within the first 15 minutes we saw two dolphins (always lovely to see) and shortly thereafter we saw the first of four whales that we encountered on route. The first whale gave us a full breach, as did the final one off the coast of the DR. We also saw several birds … masked and brown boobies, a white tailed tropic bird and a pair of bridled terns. 

The passage was a positive experience, but I cannot say the same for the docking. I really made a pig’s ear of the maneuver. We were told that it would be a stern-to / port side tie up, and as we entered the channel in the marina there would be plenty of room to turn the boat around before backing in. We entered the marina and lined up for the backing in, but every time I tried to go backwards in a straight line the prop-wash from the propeller pulls us sideways. I would then pivot the boat in forward gear to realign us, but once I engaged reverse we again went sideways to the slip. After multiple attempts we had drifted close to the boat in the adjacent slip and ended up getting his anchor stuck in lifelines and bent two stanchions. What a cluster-fuck! In retrospect we should have come into the channel already in reverse with some headway to allow steerage, then the pull of the prop-wash to the port side would have helped us rather than hindered. My only excuse is that I was already very tired! We finally got tied up in the slip and here was no damage to the other boat. In the afternoon I was able to partially straighten the bent stanchions and they will work perfectly well for the rest of this trip. My ego took a bit of a hit … but I should get over that!

We will stay one week at this marina and hope to rest up and also rent a car for a few days to explore the DR a little. Dave Anderson arrives on Tuesday.

Mike

19 11.672 N, 69 21.307 W

Sunset in Boqueron the night before our departure

This photo isn't going to win any prizes, but you can at least see that it is a whale (humpback we think)

Bridled terns resting on a fishing float (probably a life bird ... we'd be more certain if we kept better records!)

We saw several squalls but were able to avoid all of them

Sailing into the sunset. We later added the reefed genoa to our sail set up.

Behind the wheel as the sun goes down into clouds ... chart plotter above the compass, autopilot controller to the right

Long exposure view from Cotinga, taken after sunset

Ditto

The sun rising as we approach Samana