Spanish Virgins Continued

The architecture in Dewey has both a Spanish and Caribbean flavour.

Rob rowed up the canal to the gas station with the diesel jugs.

Michael the local barber helped me out by giving the captain a good hair cut. He also gave me a trim even though they only do "caballeros" and not "damas." Today is is Friday April 20th and we are on a mooring in Rendezvous Bay in St. John in the United States Virgin Islands. St. John is about three quarter's natural park thanks to The Rockefellers who bought St. John in 1954 and donated the island to the park. Their only stipulation was that they were allowed to build a very fancy hotel retreat on the island. The hotel is still here along with the houses of the rich and famous; however the remainder of the island is national park.

On Sunday Katherine, John's partner is flying into St. Thomas and John is sailing the three miles over to pick her up and then staying in a marina. On Monday we hope that Katerina and Celebrian will move on to the British Virgin Islands. From there we have our last overnight passage across the Anegada Passage to St. Martin. We need good weather for that passage so we are planning to wait in the BVI. The BVI is supposed to be one of the best cruising areas in the Caribbean; however we may get tired of the charter boats.

S is for Spanish Virgins

Our first anchorage at Luis Pena in the Spanish Virgin Islands.

After the first night at the small island of Luis Pena we moved over to the western coast of Culebra. Culebra is the larger island with the settlement of Dewey.

Dewey is a very quaint and colourful town.

The sign says it all....open some days...closed others.

The Spanish Virgins, like Puerto Rico are very hilly. There are many roads much steeper than this but this one gives you the idea.

We hiked the two and one half miles to Flamenco Beach. It is now a park and it was interesting to watch all the Puerto Ricans at play at the beach. Many come across from Fajardo, PR just for the day at the beach.

These Puerto Ricans gave us a lift back to town from the beach. The driver who was a marshall in the Puerto Rican army wanted a picture of the cruising Canadians. More news and pictures to follow.

This is how this is how the other half live. We rented a car from Enterprise whose office was in the Conquistador Hotel.

We waited for the ferry back to Culebra in a little bar. Notice the big box...a brand new shiny toilet...at least we didn't have to fly this box down?!? The Spanish Virgin Islands were discovered by christopher columbus in 1493 and they lie between the US virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. They are totally dependent on tourism yet they are not "touristy" and busy. Dewey is the only town and it is ever so quaint. The islands are a very popular place to come for diving. We snorkelled at our anchorage yesterday and it was quite lovely. The coral is healthy and growing and the water was clean and clear. The Spanish Virgins have lovely anchorages, and pristine beaches and we only wish we had lots of time to spend here; however we will do what we can in the time that we are here. We are pinned down for a few days with a cold front so we may have a chance to do some exploring. We went into town this afternoon and learned a few things from a local cruiser who runs the Dewey Library. Last night the cold front came through with very strong winds and squalls. John almost didn't join us for dinner as the winds and rain were picking up by dinner time. By the time he left in his dinghy for Katerina the wind was quite fierce; however this is a great anchorage and well protected. Today is Sunday April 15th and we have been invited to a potluck on Blue Kai which is a huge catermaran. We met them back when we first arrived in Puerto Rico. John and Kathy have travelled with several of the boats that are here in the harbour and everyone is getting together on the largest boat. Today is Wednesday April 18th and tomorrow we are leaving for the US Virgin Islands.....St. John which is a national park.

R is for Rock and Roll and Rainforest Too

This is a map showing our journey up until Salinas, Puerto Rico. I will be updating the map as I post blogs. I came across this amusing article on the scale of rolling at anchor. Many of you have heard our stories of taking sea sick medicine while anchored so you will appreciate this scale. I have modified it to Celebrian's experiences. 1. Rock a Bye Baby-Gentle movement that is comfortable and might even rock you to sleep; however we put the fine wine goblets away and use our tumblers. 2. Pesky-Periodic rolls that cause unmanned objects to unexpectantly fall onto the cabin sole. A pesky roll can wake you up at night, but usually won't keep you awake. Pesky rolls cause things on deck to make unusual noises that sometimes keep the crew awake. 3. Annoying- Dishes start clinking. Objects roll off un-fiddled spaces. You tend to lurch and walk into walls. Annoying rolls will wake you and might require minor changes to sleeping arrangements. The person on the outside of the berth often feels like they are going to tumble out onto the sole. Using the head becomes difficult because you can't let go. 4. Really Bad- The inside of the boat becomes noisy with stuff rattling and clinking. Unsecured objects become missiles. Sleeping arrangements must be re-arranged from fore and aft to athwartships, or across the berth necessitating one of us sleeping in the pullman berth and one of us sleeping cross ways in the salon. Misery and whining is permitted. 5 The Death Roll/ Also known as The Big Sand Roll -We will take any kind of motion but the dreaded death roll which is akin to a cork screw followed by a rolling that is resonant and intermittent. Just when you think it has stopped it starts up again. It is almost impossible to cook and usually the crew doesn't feel very hungry. If you can not escape just take drugs and go to sleep. Perhaps the best advice comes from an ancient mariner who said," If you feel sea sick....sit under a tree."

It was nice to take some time for a paddle in Salinas Harbour. We watched the pelicans dive for fish so gracefully for such big birds.

Today is Friday April 13th and we are anchored in Luis Pena, a small island next to Culebra in the Spanish Virgin Islands. The Spanish Virgin islands are part of Puerto Rico and a day sail away from both the United States and British Virgin Islands. Of course you still have to wait for the right weather but at least we don't have to do any over night sails for awhile.

Back in Salinas we rented a car with John and had a great day shopping and touring. Puerto Rico is very mountainous and has the only rain forest in North America. The rain forest was wonderful and we wished we had had time to do some hiking. It was a whole different world up in the rain forest...average temperature of 18C (66F) and lots of rain and lush vegetation including bamboo. The houses were perched on sheer drops in places and must have presented some building challenges. We finished our day with a shop at a supermercado that had fruits and vegetables....it had been a great day.

The next morning we left at 6am for Las Patillas. We travel in the early morning or at night where possible to get the lee from the island of Puerto Rico. We spent the afternoon doing a little paddling and relaxing in our reef protected anchorage. We were up at 3:30 am for our trip to Vieques in the Spanish Virgins. When we were at Vieques we realized that the wind was favourable and that we could continue on to Culebra. We arrived at Luis Pena near Culebra by the middle of the afternoon and had time for a nice snorkel in the anchorage. The coral is much healthier here and the water much cleaner than along the coast of Puerto Rico. These islands are about 10 miles off the eastern coast of PR. John came for an early dinner as everyone was ready for an early night to bed. From Luis Pena we motored the couple of miles across to an anchorage off of Culebra's western shore and awoke in the night to number 4 on the Rock and Roll scale. After listening to Chris Parker's weather forecast we dropped the mooring ball and headed south to Ensendad Honda, a large protected harbour off the small and quaint town of Dewey. Rob managed to make breakfast this morning but we had coffee grains from one end of the galley to the other courtesy of number 4 rock and roll.

Q is for Q Flag (Quarantine)

Who would have believed that sailing the Mona Passage could be a pleasure?

Our first stop in Puerto Rico at Juanica.

Our crossing of the Mona Passage went very well....in fact I even got to read my book while on watch. It is such a dangerous passage so it was great to be safely over to Puerto Rico. We stopped in Juanica hoping to check in but were told that we had to continue to Ponce. After a night at Gilligan's Island it was off to Ponce. Both Katerina and Celebrian filled up with diesel and took a slip to wait for customs. When you arrive from a foreign country you have to put up a yellow Q flag to say that you need to check in the new country. Once you have checked in you can put up a courtesy flag for the new country.

After customs and immigration came to the boat we were told that we had to go down to the main office in Ponce to pick up our passports and boat registration. All in all it took us almost seven hours to do this process and left little time for anything else. We wanted to visit Santiago's Bulk Store that Bruce Van Sant had talked about in his book so after the custom's office visit we walked to Santiago's and loaded up with some bulk food and drink items. It was sort of like a Costco but without the fresh food and membership needed. The store closed at 5:30 so our shopping was done at a blistering pace and we returned by taxi to the marina. John and Kathy came for dinner and we made plans to see John in a few days. Kathy was flying home the next day for a couple of weeks and John is hoping to single hand to wherever we can get safely.

The anchorage at Isla Caja de Muertos.

The fisherman have a chapel near the top of a large hill. We left early the next morning for the seven mile trip out to Isla Caja de Muertos (Coffin Island) which is a state park. From a distance the island is supposed to resemble a coffin but in fact looks more like a shrouded body if you use your imagination. The island is run by several rangers and they only allow so many visitors per day which arrive on a ferry boat from Ponce. In this way they limit the human impact on the island. It was wonderful to see a beach that attracts green, loggerhead and leather back turtles to come ashore to lay their eggs. We walked up to the light house on the summit that was built in 1887 by the Spanish. Today it is run by a solar panel.

The view from the summit of Isla Caja de Muertos. You can see Celebrian if you look very closely.

The next day we paddled to the north end of the island to snorkel in the under water park; however we were very disappointed as the coral was not in very good shape. We were definitely spoiled snorkelling in The Bahamas. Today is April 7th and we will spend one more day here before heading the next 15 miles to Salinas on the coast. Salinas is supposed to be a great harbour for boat related shopping. I am also hopeful of a supermercado with fruit and vegetables as the ship's stores are running on empty. From there we are hoping to work our way to the eastern end of Puerto Rico and spend a little time in the area known as the Spanish Virgins....Vieques and Culebra which are both islands to the east of PR. From there we will sail to Jost Van Dyke in the British Virgin Islands. Today is Easter Monday but no sign of the Easter Bunny. I think that the weather is just too hot for the chocolate eggs?! It is easy to lose track of days let alone holidays. we had hoped to do some shopping today but then realized that many businesses would be closed for the holiday. John arrived on Katerina this morning and we are going to go out for dinner with him and plan our next moves. Kathy will fly to wherever we get to by the time she returns. The weather may slows us down a little but we are now thinking that we can get to Culebra in the Spanish Virgins by this weekend. We will have to leave very early in the mornings but at least we won't have to do any over nights as we are concerned about John on his own.

The harbour at Salinas is quite large and has at least 50 boats anchored and on moorings. Many of them are local and many look like they have been here for awhile. sometimes people reach a place and decide it is comfortable and they just don't want to go further. we chose to anchor out along the channel where we hoped to get more of a breeze and have a little more privacy. The area is well protected by mangroves and a great area for manatees. We even saw one stick his head up out of the water to take a look. There are signs for boaters to slow down all over the harbour and channel to protect the manatees from getting hit by props. For the most part the boating community seems to be obeying the signs.

The little museum at Isla Cajas de Muertos has a good display of turtle shells.

We paddled around the Isla de Muertos and found nesting sea birds on the cliffs.

P Is for Poquito de Espagnol

We have made it to Boca Chica in the Dominican Republic. It is a Dominican resort town and very busy and I am trying to speak a "poquito de espagnol".

We left Isle a Vache, Haiti on Saturday march 24th bound for Boca Chica in the Dominican Republic. We were hoping to sail straight through; however we met with head winds that slowed us down so much that at one point we heaved to and Rob rested while I stood watch. We knew that we were leaving a little early for the winds to be down but we were hoping to get through the DR and on to Puerto Rico in a weather window predicted for later in the week. As I have previously written it is never wise to leave before Chris Parker gives his blessing. Heaving to means putting the boat in a position with the sails backed and the boat drifts very slowly. It doesn't do away with the motion but it gives the crew a chance to catch their breath. We knew that we were leaving a little early for the winds to be down but we were hoping to get through the DR and on to Puerto Rico in a weather window predicted for later in the week. As I have previously written it is never wise to leave before Chris Parker gives his blessing. After two days and a night we were at Bayia de Aguillas(Bay of Eagles) in the Dominican Republic. We knew that we could stop here if needed and so we spent the night. It would have been a marvelous place to stay for a few days because the beach looked glorious and we were the only boat save for some DR fishermen but we are anxious to get to Puerto Rico and across the Mona Passage. Once we are there we know that the remainder of the journey to Grenada is day trips with the odd overnight passage. Our plans are to leave Celebrian in Grenada over the hurricane season and fly home much the same way we did when she was left in The Bahamas. Over the next few winters we will explore the eastern Caribbean and continue to put her on the hard in Grenada.

Today is Wednesday March 28th and we are on a mooring in Boca chica, DR. We arrived here after sailing 24 hours from Bayia de Aguillas. Our timing for this passage was perfect and we had a good motorsail on a relatively calm Caribbean Sea. We got to Marina Zar Par in time to check in with the authorities and get diesel at the dock. At one point I think there were five officials on board...immigration, customs, drug enforcement, security and so on. Thanks to Raul who owns the marina things went smoothly and quickly. My Spanish helps to smooth things too as the officials didn't speak much English. We were down 44 gallons of diesel so we were grateful that we were not jerry jugging this amount. Today we are going to a modern DR "supermercado" with a long list of provisions. It has been weeks since we have had lettuce so I am excited. The captain says that small things please me. I must say that you do appreciate things more after you have done without. We are only planning on being here a couple of days if we can continue to head east along the DR staging ourselves for the crossing to Puerto Rico. Unfortunately we couldn't hear Chris Parker on the SSB this morning as he was squelched out by Spanish conversations. We will hopefully have better luck tomorrow as getting the weather is critical for us right now in planning our next passage. Rob had quite the exciting trip to get propane. He thought that propane was nearby but as it happened he was taken by one of the yard workers(who doesn't speak English) on a hair raising ride on a moto concho (Honda90) several miles down a pot holed road to get the tank filled. Once filled the owner of the propane station would only accept pesos for payment and Rob had none. They locked our tank up as hostage while Rob went to a money changer. Unfortunately the change place was several miles in the other direction including crossing a four lane highway. After seeing his life pass before his eyes they returned to pick up the hostage tank, pay and return to the marina with the full tank wedged between the driver and Rob on the bike. I don't think that Rob will ever forget that propane fill. Life on a boat is so relaxing?!?! Boca Chica is a Dominican resort town ...colourful, vibrant,chaotic with loud music coming from every establishment. Unfortunately the marina mooring balls are not that far away and getting a good night's sleep is a challenge. We took a walk into the town yesterday....the pictures will give you an idea of the place.

I was enthralled by this woman's shoes and couldn't help taking a picture. The captain later informed me that she was a hooker?! The trip to the supermercado was tiring but entertaining. The marina provides a service to drive you there (about four miles) and Ole returns you in their shuttle. The ride back was a tribute to the fact that the worst and scariest drivers in the world are in the DR....speeds of 120kms swerving around people,dogs, chickens etc, bicycles, and the infamous motoconchos. We remember fondly our trip with Peter and Lynn to Santo Domingo three years ago and the incredible job Peter did driving us around.

The last two evenings we have been out meeting some other cruisers who are heading our way. So far we have had to travel on our own and we have missed our boat buddy First Edition. We were invited by several couples to join them at a local restaurant. We had a fun evening of swapping sailing tales and future plans and the food was very good. We had the dorado which is called mahi mahi in The Bahamas. Catherine and John are from Toronto and new to cruising but after a year in The Bahamas decided to head to the Caribbean. Jim and Dianna are from Puerto Rico and St. Croix. Monica and Gabe are a young couple from Toronto on their way to Panama. All of them are full time cruisers and Catherine, John, Jim and Dianna are our age and all recently married just like us.

Believe it or not this is a flying dinghy??? Lots of things for the "touristas" to do?! Last evening the marina had a free dinner for all the cruisers in the marina. They do this if there are at least 20 boats on moorings and in slips. It was a great meal of salad, rice with sausage, plaintains and deep fried yucca (which was delicious). It was also another opportunity to meet fellow cruisers and talk about Weather.....and crossing the infamous Mona Passage to Puerto Rico. Nothing stirs the blood of sailors more than thinking about crossing the Mona. It is a notoriously dangerous passage if not crossed in the right conditions. The second deepest ocean trench is the Puerto Rican trench which runs between Puerto Rico and the DR. This deep trench causes very large and unpredictable seas. It will be nice to confer with the other boats on their plans and cross as a mini flotilla. It is always good to have other boats out there with you just in case you have a problem. At the moment it looks like we may leave Boca Chica tomorrow (Saturday March 31st) to sail to Saona Island to stage for the crossing to Puerto Rico.

Today is Saturday March 31st and we are planning on doing a night sail to Saona Island leaving later today with the plan to cross the Mona on Monday and Tuesday. Yesterday we did some laundry, visited with Cathy and John on Katerina and went for a walk in the afternoon. They joined us on Celebrian for happy hour later in the afternoon.