We're back from the BVI's and I have to say we had a blast! What else would you expect when you had 11 days off from work and enough time to spend with my sweetie, my bro and a good friend! The new toy (a Canon EOS D60) bought about 2 months before the trip in order to get used to it's features decided to malfunction a couple of days into our journey, so most of the zillions of photos we have are from my cell phone or other people's cameras. We still have plenty to enjoy, so I'm not too miffed-- other than wishing I could figure out why an expensive, brand new DSLR would not power up for the last 9 days of the trip (until we got back to the airport in St. Thomas, of course... when it mysteriously began working again). It's not like there's much to go wrong- make sure the battery has sufficient charge, close all doors and turn it on... nothing. For a while, I thought I must be hallucinating, but nobody on the boat could get it working either, including my brother, a professional pilot and a good friend, Jason, an electrical engineer-- these guys are no slouches when it comes to fiddling with electronics. Even the Canon repair facility couldn't find anything wrong with it, so I've got it back. I'm sure it'll be fine until some moment when I've got that once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to take a photo, and it'll blackout again!
Anyway- the trip was just awesome. I've always wondered what it would be like to sail a bigger boat and live on it, and what better opportunity than to do it on someone else's-- so we chartered a 40 foot sailboat,
Wombat. This Jeanneau Sun Odyssey comes with plenty of horse-power in the motor, and an inflatable Caribe dinghy with a 15 hp Yamaha outboard! My 3200 lb J24 only has 3! I now know not to trust all those pretty photos on
www.yachtworld.com, though! Don't get me wrong- the boat and most of it's systems worked well. I just know that if you are going to live on one for much longer than a couple of weeks, look at something a little more robust that has a few added details. Evidently, most of the charter boats in the caribbean are used by people who don't really sail that much, so they prep the boats accordingly. Ground tackle might be a little on the light side, since most people will opt to pick up a mooring ball. Sail inventory will include just one (1) mainsail and one (1) jib- and only a 100% jib at that.
On our way across the Sir Francis Drake Channel-
Our first anchorage on the south side of Peter Island-
When we got there, the weather was quite squally, so I understand. The wind was fairly consistent at 15-20 mph building quickly in the morning out of the east and staying there all day long until early evening. Perfect sailing weather, but they won't let you have a spinnaker. The teaser is that the boat is rigged for it- the halyard is neatly coiled and stowed on the mast, but there is no pole and no kite. What a bummer... that would have really come in handy for at least a few downwind stretches, especially the trip coming back from Anegada (or so we thought at the time), which I'm amazed that they let you sail that far in these boats with whatever option you select to secure yourself to the seabed. In our case, we had a 25 lb cqr anchor with a fixed shank and 200 feet of all-chain rode. There was a light-weight danforth on 200 feet of braided nylon in the starboard cockpit locker, which might have held better in Anegada's sandy, grassy anchorage. We know that now! The morning after arrival in Anegada, Dana, Lee (my bro) and I decided to dinghy ashore, and do a little exploring. I think it was around 8:30 or 9 am, and a squall blew in while we were walking back along the beach.
Here we are on our way back toward the boat. It was drizzling a bit and you could see the storm blowing in from the east. We figured all was well with the boat, but we scurried back toward a cafe/bakery and ducked into their back porch to get out of the rain. I asked if they had a vhf radio (which they did) and I tried raising Jason, who by now I figured was up and moving around. No answer. I decided we'd better get back over to the boat and see if anything was going on, and as we were heading back to the dinghy dock, we saw Jason doing something up on deck... It was a bit too far to tell exactly what he was doing, but whatever it was, he was doing quickly. We jetted back over (that little Caribe gets up on a plane in about 3 seconds when you open the throttle) and realized the boat had dragged anchor, hooked the mooring below us and was now positioned perpendicular to two large catamarans in the mooring field just downwind from us. Evidently, the boat started to drift back, and not having anyone else on board (it takes two to operate the windlass and power the boat forward) all he could do is call for help on the VHF, wait for someone to arrive, then hang on. He tried raising the anchor, but the windlass wouldn't power up. Two other people were on board when we got back with the dinghy. We quickly tied up, hopped on and brief introductions were made. One guy (now at the wheel with the motor engaged in reverse for some reason...) a nice elder English fellow, keeping the boat in place until I relieved him, while another guy ("Red", an American working for Sunsail Charters) was on the bow trying to figure out what to do about our anchor line that had wrapped around the keel when the boat pitched around 270 degrees clockwise while dragging, hooked the mooring and swung into the 47 ft Lagoon ahead of us now (and the reason the Brit fired up the motor, putting it in reverse to hold the boat in place). Red suggested we drop the anchor line completely before the chain damages the keel and go pick up a mooring below the two catamarans. We could come back later after the storm dies down and pick up the anchor and all 200 feet of chain, since we were in only 8 feet of water with decent visibility-- so that's what we did. Once we were free, we secured the boat to a mooring, then I grabbed my snorkel gear and we went searching for the chain and anchor. It didn't take long, but getting it off the bottom was a bit tricky. We ended up tying a fender to the chain, then went back to get the dinghy and hauled it all up. I assumed I'd have a little trouble when I got to the anchor end (figuring that the anchor would weigh at least 40 lbs), but that was easier to haul up than the chain! Being the first time I'd been using an anchor to secure a boat (before heading down below for a night's sleep) I now have a healthy appreciation for proper ground tackle, and this wasn't it. A brief post on
Sailnet revealed what I had suspected, but again- live and learn! I'm glad nobody was hurt in the process and no damage was done to either catamaran or the boat we were chartering. We later found out that three boats tied to some of the less secure moorings (yellow balls) had pulled free and were dragging around the bay. Some had nobody on board, so people nearby jumped on and secured them to the more stable moorings (red balls)... Pretty amazing how people help each other out in the middle of nowhere!
The day before the storm; arrival at Anegada-
The following morning we made what was supposed to be a downwind/reaching leg back toward the main group in the BVI's (Jost Van Dyke was our destination), but a storm to the south of us blew in and turned it into an upwind beat. Oh well, we didn't have a spinnaker anyway... That was the last of the stormy weather and the rest of the trip was quite sunny. On the way to Jost Van Dyke, we stopped off at Sandy Cay, picked up a mooring ball and swam to the beach. This had to be one of the prettiest places we saw. There is no development on the island; it's all national park, and just a few visitors are allowed by permit.
A short little walk around the island- and I do mean short; I don't think it took more than about 10 minutes to walk all the way around.
After swimming back to the boat and eating a little lunch, we decided to head over to Jost Van Dyke and make plans for dinner. We picked up a mooring in Great Harbour on the south side and took the dinghy over to White Bay and visited the
Soggy Dollar. We had a few hours to kill before making dinner plans, so this looked like a simple diversion-- Dana declined, not being the bar-type, so over the three of us went. Basically, this is just a bar on the beach with a bunch of people milling around in waist deep water between a bunch of boats, holding some kind of beverage (the "painkiller" being the most popular). There really isn't anything else to do there other than to "see and be seen", so after having a drink and playing a few "throw the ring onto the tree nail" games, we headed back to the boat to think about some grocery shopping and dinner. Cooking on a boat is an interesting activity. Most of our dinners were a team effort (at least 3; I kinda took a back seat approach-- as usual), but having a grill on the stern rail definitely appealed to me... something about making fire and grilling dead animal carcass makes it more fun, especially on a sailboat!
The following morning we raised the main, unfurled the jib and sailed off the mooring toward a gap between St John's (USVI's) and Great Thatch into the Sir Francis Drake Channel for a long sail back to Tortola and return the boat to the marina in Roadtown Harbour.
We sort of underestimated the swell, which really wasn't all that bad, but it took close to 6 hours close-hauled, tacking back and forth in that narrow channel the whole way back. I think we were about the only boat that did that... most of the others we saw were motoring. We got back to Roadtown to fill up with gas, and we only used 9 gallons of diesel for the entire 10 days. Most of that was burned in our one hour twice daily ritual of firing up the motor to charge the batteries; something I didn't think would require such consistent use of the motor, but each morning when we awoke, the batteries were nearly drained at 11.5 volts remaining... another lesson learned about cruising sailboats-- fans, lights, wi-fi (yes, we had "dial-up" speed internet service), the stove with it's electric solenoid (can't have coffee without it!), the radio and all electric pumps on board for running water and the bilge pump all use some amount of juice. We spared turning on the refrigerator for only when the motor was running, and usually kept one or two bags of ice to keep things cold (Carib beer tastes about as good as Lucky Lager does at anything greater than 60 deg F, so that was a priority). We only ran the air-conditioner when plugged in at the marina in Roadtown, which was the night before we left and the night we got back in- a/c is nice! Trying to adapt to sleeping just using overhead hatches for ventilation when you're accustomed to an a/c unit being on is going to be something Dana and I will have to evolve to appreciate, but we're going to try... some day!
During our exit interview back at the marina, the staff asked how we liked the boat and what we wished we had on board. I described the anchor dragging a bit (although not since my posts and feedback on Sailnet) and a few other things we wished we had on board... I didn't mention the spinnaker and a pole, but it would have been nice to have a bigger, heavier anchor (like a 35 or 40 lb cqr with hinged shank) and a little extra line would have certainly come in handy. We fashioned a preventer for the boom on one of the few downwind runs we had using 3/4" dockline, which was the only spare line on the boat. Other than that, I'd do it again... just not on anything else but my own boat (and I won't outfit the interior with Ikea trim and vinyl upholstering).
As far as the area goes, I think we'll be back, but probably not to stay very long. There is not much wildlife left. I imagined the reefs would be more alive than what I saw, but most of the coral is dead, and the few fish in the area are common damsel fish, tangs and a few angels. I couldn't help but figure that if they had more available habitat (live reef) the fish population would be considerably healthier, but I'm just remembering what I've read elsewhere about the condition of our oceans and I'm not too surprised. The amount of development is striking. For some reason, I thought it would seem a bit more remote, but the only islands that appeared that way were small cays and the string of islands that run along the south of the Sir Francis Drake Channel.
