leewards

LEEWARD ISLANDS

Saint Martin (February 2008 - March 2008) - We left Lameshure Bay at noon during the last week of February. The wind had
been ten to fifteen for the last day and a half and the seas had dropped from seven to eight feet to four to six. After that, the forecast
called for windy and squally conditions for a couple of weeks. It was either now or continue to wait.

We decided to give it a go. If conditions were too uncomfortable we could always turn around. We would be going directly to windward,
directly into seas and directly into the Antilles current of about a knot. We plotted a course where we would tack back and fourth
pointing low enough to keep wind in our main and staysail. Our speed over ground was between five and six knots. From Lameshure
Bay, we had a hundred nautical miles to cover and we arrived at dawn the next day.

The ride was a bit bouncy, but tolerable. It was rough enough to keep us from sleeping very well but we each got a couple of hours.
We dodged a few squalls during the night, but arrived more or less on schedule and dropped anchor in Simpson Bay, Saint Martin just
as the sun was coming up.

Saint Martin is governed on one side by the French and on the other by the Dutch. Most people go either to Marigot Bay on the
French side or Simpson Bay on the Dutch side to await bridge openings through narrow channels leading to the same Simpson Bay
Lagoon completely surrounded by land. Good thing. The anchorage in Simpson Bay was the most rolly we had encountered. It was so
bad that during the two hours we had to wait for the first bridge opening we were getting seasick. We rarely get seasick, but yet we
were talking about being queasy at anchor. We were happy to get inside. Once inside we found a spot to drop anchor and took a well
deserved nap

We had quite a few things to accomplish while here. We needed to get mail from the states to finish and file our tax return. Thanks to
Mike for helping us do that. We also needed a package of a few spare parts from Ted at Island Yachting Centre (IP dealer). Then
there were a few boat things to take care of. One in particular was a couple of repairs on our generator (leaking fresh water pump and
mystery control panel shutdowns).

It turned out that we had plenty of time. The weather continued to suck and would continue to do so for a couple of weeks. We were
not going out in ten foot seas. No thanks. We'll wait. And besides, we still had our generator problems to deal with.

Saint Martin has lots of stores for basically anything you need. It's the kind of place you need to find occasionally, but don't want to
spend a lot of time in. The lagoon is ugly and nasty. There are articles in the local paper about the dangerous levels of fecal matter in
the water. We want out, but are stuck here until the weather breaks and the generator is fixed.

One interesting small world story happened here. We stayed at Anchorage Marina in Baltimore last summer. We became friends with
Sean, the dockmaster. He would tell stories of crewing on the racing boat, Donnybrook, sailing out of Annapolis. Well, it just so
happened that one of the worlds most prestigious races is the Heineken Regatta to be held in Saint Martin during the first week of
March. After we were in the lagoon a few days, Donnybrook comes through the bridge and anchors near us. We found out that Sean
would be here a couple of days later for the race. Donnybrook is a world-class racing boat and it will be interesting to see how she does.

Oh. We tried to forget. There were lots of boats in the Lagoon. There was also lots of wind. The holding was okay in the Lagoon, but
it was muddy sand. A great recipe for dragging at anchor. We know what we are doing and knew we wouldn't drag but are continually
amazed at the number of people doing this cruising thing that don't. After being at anchor for three or four days, we had a particularly
windy and squally night. About midnight, the anchor chain starts rattling in a way that was different than just rattling because of getting
jerked around by wind and rain. I immediately knew something was seriously wrong. Leta and I run up on deck and to our amazement
(definitely not amusement) a boat was basically stuck on our anchor chain at the bow pulpit. Somehow the chain had caught the
dragging boat just right to keep it from doing serious damage. We knew immediately however, that our luck would be short lived
unless we acted quickly. The rain and wind was howling and the guy was still dragging The boat was now disengaged from our anchor
chain and moving down our starboard side. I somehow kept the boat from banging and scraping us while Leta fished out a couple of
fenders just in time to cushion a particularly violent crash that I could not have fended off. Then, about three quarters of the way down
our starboard side the boat stops dragging abruptly and we knew immediately that the dragging anchor had snagged our anchor chain
about a boat length in front of us. It was only then that the sleeping beauty below, woke up and came on deck. The guy immediately
starts his engine and somehow we fend off the boat as it makes its way back up the starboard side. Then of course, the boat spends the
next fifteen or twenty minutes trying to get unsnagged from our anchor chain and in the meantime manages to drag us around the
crowded anchorage. About a quickly as it began, he somehow gets unsnagged and disappears into the dark. We had miraculously not
sustained any damage, but the fun was not over. We had been drug dangerously close to a couple of other boats. At least the rain had
stopped, but the wind was still howling while we pulled up our anchor and re-anchored, somehow dodging the other boats in the dark.
Controlling a big, heavy, full-keeled boat is not easy with lots of wind in a confined space. We didn't sleep at all the rest of the night
We know we were very lucky. It could have ended very differently. This story is a perfect example of one of the reasons why we do
not like crowded anchorages. We are in perfect control of ourselves and our boat, but have no control of those around us. We still
can't believe we managed to get out without a scratch

Two weeks later the leaking fresh water pump on the generator was replaced and the mystery shutdowns as the generator was starting
was tentatively solved (it had started fifteen times in a row without fail). The wind and seas had decreased to reasonable levels so we
left on a Tuesday in mid-March.

Saint Barts (March 2008) - The first opening of the bridge to get out of Simpson Bay Lagoon was not until nine but Saint Barts was
only fifteen miles away. The seas were still around seven feet and the wind was about twenty, so those fifteen miles were a bit bumpy.
We arrived at our anchorage at Anse de Columbier around midday. Actually, it was a national park so there were moorings and, better
yet, they were free.

As soon as we were settled, Leta gets in the water to do some snorkeling and check on the hull cleaning that we got while in Simpson
Bay Lagoon. We had cleaned the bottom as best we could over the last few months by holding our breath, but we needed a diver that
could stay under for a couple of hours. We hired Shrimpy's (a restaurant and bar where a lot of cruisers hang out - they also offer a few
basic boat maintenance services). Bottom line was that the hull cleaning sucked. We have no idea what the diver was doing down
there for the two hours he spent. Lesson learned. Unless you know exactly the quality service you are getting, check it out before you
pay. We should have waited for cleaner water for the hull cleaning because there was no way in hell we were going into the cesspool
pool of Simpson Bay Lagoon to check the work.

Oh yea. The next morning while Leta was coaxing Bogey to pee on the swim platform, a nice big shark swims slowly by. She is
rethinking her new found snorkeling sport.

Saint Barts was very pretty and we could have stayed a few days but our weather window was only a few days long and we needed to
get to more secure surroundings. Unfortunately our camera battery was low so we have no pictures. We did not clear customs and flew
our Q flag the short time we were there.

Nevis (March 2008) - Next day we were off at daybreak to make the 50 or so miles to Nevis. The wind and swells were light which
was a good thing since Nevis is not protected very much from wind or waves. Nevis has installed mooring balls all along the lee shore
to make it easy on cruisers to stay there. We had been to Nevis before (Four Seasons Resort) and seen pretty much everything there
was to see on Nevis so we were off early the next day. We had again flown our Q flag.

I really must tell a Nevis story from our previous visit a few years ago. We stayed a week and played golf everyday. We also took a
horseback riding tour of the island (it's not a big island). The entire time we were there we kept hearing that Nevis was one of the few
Caribbean islands with monkeys. They were Green monkeys. Not that they were green but that was their name. Anyway, after almost
a week we had not seen hide nor hair of a monkey. Leta loves nature things and really wanted to see one. During our last round of
golf, we were making our way from the green of one hole to the tee of another, winding our way through a ravine that was definitely
jungle stuff. This particular cart path took about ten minutes to get between holes. Well. Ellis needed to pee and stopped the cart
about halfway through the jungle stuff (hey there was no one around for miles) and proceeded to do his manly thing. Just as soon as he
started his act the trees literally came alive with howling and hooting Green monkeys. The monkeys were racing through the canopy
and some of them got on the ground and ran toward us in a threatening manner. At one point we actually thought the monkeys might
attack us. There must have been twenty or thirty of the buggers. Then, just as quickly as it had started, it stopped with the monkeys
disappearing into the trees. I guess the monkeys did not take kindly to some other primate marking their territory. At least Leta got
to see her monkeys.

Montserrat (March 2008) - Montserrat had never really been on our itinerary. But our next stop was Guadeloupe about 70 miles
away and we could not make the trip during daylight hours. Montserrat had a fair weather anchorage on its northwest corner (away
from the active volcano on its southern tip), about 40 miles away. Wind was supposed to be twelve knots at 45 degrees and waves 4 to
5. Another blown forecast. The wind was twenty at about 15 degrees and the waves were 6 to 7 foot short choppy ones. It was one of
the roughest days we have spent in a while. We finally get to Little Bay by mid-afternoon a little shell shocked. The anchorage was
small but reasonably secure (for fairly light weather). We flew our Q flag again but only after talking to the port authority on VHF to
make sure it was okay. Little Bay is really the only anchorage left on Montserrat since about two thirds of the island is off limits and
we would be within a couple of hundred yards of customs. We did not intend to go ashore so customs was fine with us flying our Q flag.
French Islands really don't care if you clear in or not but U.K. territories (like Montserrat) sometimes are a bit insistent upon proper
protocol. We left early the next morning. We'll have to say that Montserrat was breathtakingly beautiful, including the stark volcanic
portion of the island.

Guadeloupe (March 2008) - The trip to Guadeloupe was about 40 miles and turned out to be a great sail. We were sailing between
seven and eight knots for hours and arrived at Deshaies (pronounced day-hay) by early afternoon anchoring in 40 feet of water.
Sailing. What a novel idea. The anchorage was picture perfect with a quaint little European style town. We tried to clear in but
customs was closed for a few days (I told you the French are sort of low key about customs). We would have stayed more than the two
days we stayed had the weather cooperated. Mild trades were forecast for quite some time, but the largest north swell for 30 or 40
years (we're talking 15 to 20 feet) was on its way in a few days caused by distant storms in the North Atlantic. There are not many
anchorages in the southwest North Atlantic or the Caribbean that can handle even small north swells. Most would be literal death
traps in this kind of swell. So we needed protection.

We were headed for the south side of Guadeloupe, specifically Pointe-a-Pitre. Pointe-a-Pitre is a well protected harbor and is the
largest city on Guadeloupe. To break up the long sail south, then east, then back north we stopped at Anse a la Barque. There was
room for only a boat or two but it worked perfectly for us in 50 feet of water.

Next morning, the slog around the south tip of Guadeloupe was pretty rough but we arrived unscathed after a good sail during the last
three hours. The swell was on its way and would last a while so Pointe-a-Pitre would be home for some time.

There was plenty of room to anchor in the harbor, which went flat calm during the night, and the town was nice for provisioning. The
only provisioning problem was that you couldn't really tell what you were buying (unless there was a picture on the package) if you
don't know French and we don't. Most countries have descriptions in at least two languages (English being one). France believes there
is only one language. Go figure. The town also had all sorts of services if you needed them.

We needed one service for sure. After the generator started fine for several days, it manifested its old habit of stopping in mid-start
every once and a while. Fred Marine came to the rescue. Long story short, we finally decided the battery did not have enough starting
amps (it was too small). After suspecting the vent loop, the exhaust elbow, the starter, the control panel, ground faults and more, we
changed the battery to a bigger starting battery and the generator has worked like a champ since. Mastry would never admit that the
thing may have been designed with a battery too small. All of the Yanmar dealers that had worked on it had been led astray by the
control panel (saying something else than low starting power was to blame), Mastry and the battery itself. We even had the battery
load tested and it tested fine - it just didn't have enough amps to do the job properly. We now have a nice fat starting battery. We've
been testing it for days and so far the generator starts first time every time like it should. I won't declare it fixed for a few more days
of starting, but it looks like we finally have it.

Ellis also has a loose crown and needs a dentist. There's supposed to be a good one very close to us. We'll see how that goes

Well. The north swell came and went, peaking at over 17 feet. That's a lifetime event. The wave interval was over 15 seconds making
the swell long and slow. A swell with such a long interval would not necessarily cause serious problems at sea, but all that energy
created by distant gale and storm force winds wreaks havoc (loss of boat and life sort of stuff) with any anchorage or coast exposed to
the north (and a lot of leeward anchorages are exposed to the north). As a result, most all tourist operations (tour boats, diving, fishing,
etc.) came to a halt in Guadeloupe for several days.

It's never the wind, it's the waves; unless you are talking something close to hurricane force winds. The wind you can deal with. The
resulting waves can sometimes kick your arse.

One would think the subject of waves, given today's up to the minute weather availability with state of the art weather forecast models,
would be a simple matter to deal with. It's just science. Well, there is the science, but making sense out of the science is sometimes
difficult.

The science is fairly straight forward. The Beaufort Wind Scale was developed a long time ago and if you have a Force 5 wind (which is
17 to 21 knots) you will get waves of six to eight feet. You also know that the waves from the Beaufort Scale are "wind chop". And
with a little practice you know that wind chop generally has a wave interval of five to six seconds (really close). There is also science
that will tell you what that wind chop will become after many miles travelled and time elapsed. I'm not sure the definition of a swell (I'm
sure there is one), but we look at it as an old wave with much of it's energy below the surface with a long interval, say 10 to fifteen
seconds between them.

To add to that information, we know a ten foot swell with a ten or twelve second interval is easy to deal with as long as it's coming from
the same direction as the local wind chop. In this instance, our only real concern is the effect of the wind chop on our boat, not the
swell. But what if you get a ten foot north swell with a wind direction from the east at Force 4 (11 to 16 knots). You get your swell and
then you get wind chop of 4 to 5 feet both coming from different directions instead of on top of each other. Bottom line is that you get
confused seas that will bang you silly, especially if that wind chop creeps up to 6 to 8 feet. Not fun.

The last thing we consider is island effects (waves and wind will curve around islands) and bottom topography. The bottom will curve
waves just like islands and shallow banks (even hundred foot banks) and will knock waves down or, in some cases, turn your nice slow
swell into short, choppy waves. In some places like the Gulf of Mexico it is so shallow for hundreds of miles that your wind chop never
really gets a chance to turn into swells. There's just not enough depth for the wave energy to spread out. Some of the roughest water
we have encountered has been between Appalachicola and Tampa where we were 40 or 50 miles off the coast but only in a hundred feet
of water. That's a little different than when only two or three hundred yards off Mayaguana, Bahamas we were in several thousand
feet of water.

We bring all this together after considering the direction we want to go relative to the wind and waves (as modified) and then decide
whether we go or stay.

The best example of a decision aid that I have seen is described in "The Gentleman's Guide to Passages South" by Bruce Van Sant. It
is based on the force of the wind relative to your point of sail. As an example, he says that if your point of sail is 30 degrees or higher
into the wind you only leave port when the wind is Force 2 or less. Likewise, if your point of sail is a beam reach or higher into the wind
only leave port in Force 4 or less. His chart has you never leaving port in over Force 6 (that's 22 to 27 knots and unmodified waves of
9 to 13 feet), and only in Force 6, if the wind is 120 degrees or more from your point of sail. We think it's a great little tool for getting
your head right with wind and waves. Of course, his chart only uses wind and waves from the Beaufort Scale not modified by the things
discussed above.

You know it's time to move on if I am discussing the McKinley version of waveology.

After the north swell event we spent another two days waiting on Ellis' dental appointment. The loose crown was recemented and only
cost 45 euros (about $70 bucks or so) for a quality job.

That was a Tuesday. We were now ready to go, but the weather wasn't ready for us to go. Way too much wind and waves. Also,
another north swell event was coming (only ten or eleven feet this time) but was due to dissipate on Sunday when a marginal weather
window was supposed to open for a couple of days, at the end of which another north swell was coming (back to 15 feet or so). The next
anchorage to weather a north swell was in Martinique, two islands away. So if the weather window did in fact materialize, we had only
two days to get there. No margin for error.

Anyway, we had a few more days in Guadeloupe and decided to rent a car and hike in the rain forest. Of course, it rained on us the
entire time (it's probably why they call it a rain forest) and the trails were very muddy. By the time we had spent several hours hiking
various trails we had mud all over us. Luckily the trails were generally along rivers, so when we arrived back at the beginning of the
last trail we just waded in and cleaned everything up. The rain forest and jungle was very pretty and different from anything we had
ever seen. We're definitely not in Kansas anymore, Toto.

We had brought lunch with us and after devouring ham and egg sandwiches we decided to take the scenic route around most of the
island on the way back. The little villages were charming with quaint local restaurants and bars everywhere. Of course, each little
town had a magnificent view of the open ocean. Tough life.

The trip back was also interesting from a transportation point of view. All the cars were very small (and I mean small). There was
barely enough room in our rental for the two of us and our backpack in the rear seat. Not sure how anyone would sit back there.
Everyone drove very fast on the wet mountain roads in those little cars. Ellis kept pulling over so the cars behind us could pass instead
of riding our rear bumper. Of course, our slow driving could have something to do with the fact that we hadn't driven a car since Leta's
sister had graciously let us borrow her car while in Melbourne, Florida back in early November. We also had to buy about five gallons
of gas (20 litres) on the way back. Cost of about $60 US. Wow. No wonder the cars are small.

When Sunday arrived the wind was about twenty and waves were six to eight. The good news was that our point of sail would have us
on a beam reach, our marginal go conditions. Since the alternative was to stay in Pointe-a-Pitre another week or so, we took off.

Dominica (March 2008) - Our sail was rather brisk, but we had enough wind to keep us stable in the beam seas and we were zipping
along at better than seven knots. We had a few squalls to deal with, especially when we were almost to the northern tip of Dominica.
We had to turn downwind for a while and reef the head sail significantly until it passed. We reached protection behind the island at
about noon. All in all, a good sail. From there, we motor sailed to Roseau and arrived about four.

Roseau is not very protected with no real place to anchor (over 50 feet deep until you are almost on shore) so we called Pancho when
we got within VHF range to make sure he had a mooring ball for us. This was our first experience with boat boys and the Cruising
Guide said that Pancho and Roots were reputable and had mooring balls. We also heard another boat hail Pancho, so Pancho it was.
When we got within a mile or so we hailed Pancho again and he said that he would send the boys right out. About a half mile away, two
boat boys met us and led the way to our mooring ball and handed the painter to Leta. Real easy and nice. The guys welcomed us and
collected our fifteen bucks for the night. They also politely asked if we needed anything else and we declined. Then they were off and
that was it. We had heard that boat boys could be a real nuisance, but if you asked for one specifically (which we did) you wouldn't be
hounded by all sorts of boys offering every service you could possibly imagine (or not imagine). The next morning we were off before
daylight.

Dominica was very pretty and looked very undeveloped. Undeveloped meaning unspoiled and not very populated. Had we the time,
we would have stayed a couple of days and done some exploring. The entire island is basically a rain forest with a reported 365 named
rivers, many of which with waterfalls. But, bad weather was coming.

Next up. Martinique. The first of the Windward Islands.