BVI via St Lucia – Part deux!

Saturday, the 15th day of October was a beautiful day to be sailing in the Caribbean. Once out of the harbor at Rodney Bay an excited crew raised the white sails of S/V No Regrets. With the mountains of St Lucia growing ever smaller in the distance it wasn’t long before we hit some fresh air in the St Lucia Channel. We would spend most of the afternoon and early evening enjoying a consistent 15 knots out of the East to just south of east. The seas were probably 4-5 foot and it was some beautifully comfortable sailing weather I tell ya!




The channel separates Martinique and St Lucia by a mere 25 miles. Some people have asked why we didn’t stop in Martinique or Dominica? Well, unfortunately we did have a schedule requiring us to have a crew member at the Beef Island airport on Sunday the 23rd, so we would have to bypass many wonderful spots along the way to ensure we'd make it in time, however we still had time to relax and smell the roses at other great spots.




Everyone was wide awake and happy to sit in the cockpit on our first night, but we had to start the watch schedule sometime! We decided on 4 hour watches with teams of 2, Team#1 me and Donna, Team#2 Matt and Dan and Team#3 Stephanie and Conner………Just kidding about team#3 they were allowed to come and go as they pleased! Watch times were 6pm-10pm, 10pm-2am, 2am-6am and we rotated start times on each passage. The daytime hours had plenty of crew around so no watch schedules were necessary.

Donna and I had the first 6pm-10pm watch. I really enjoyed watching Donna experience her first nighttime passage, everything is different at night. After a couple hours of darkness I needed to go below for a few minutes and asked “are you good by yourself?” she answered with a confident “yep!” I remember the first night watch when I was left alone, pretty awesome feeling, I took my time below.




By chance we timed this trip perfectly, there would be a huge full moon right at the start of our voyage! The whole crew was up top to enjoy a beautiful sunset with a simultaneous moon rise, very cool!






It was nice that our course had us close enough to some of the islands that Dan’s wifi booster thingy kept us connected. Yes, I said thingy because I’m technologically challenged! You want to know the truth….Matt and Dan are I.T. Geeks… “cool” I.T. Geeks though!..... and I was happy they had us connected so we could keep family and friends updated on our progress!! Those I-phones and I-pads really put off a lot of white light in the cockpit though, but with the blazing full moon it didn’t really matter, our visibility was incredible the first night.









Reluctantly we passed the baton to Team#2 around 10pm, the sailing was perfect all night. Dan said he didn’t sleep and Matt got just a little rest. We did not have to hot bunk since S/V No Regrets is set up with 3 cabins and 3 heads, nice! Donna and I slept a little but eventually started tossing turning. Just before the 2am shift change I heard a loud thud and realized we were healing over pretty good. I poked my head up top and was told the winds were picking up and swirling with Dominica off our beam. I put my gear on, including PFD with harness to assume our watch. Once at the helm I adjusted our course slightly to make a more comfortable ride then realized the winds were gusting around 25 knots. Looking around I noticed our full moon was hiding behind the clouds, air temps were cooler so I delayed Team#2’s nap time and asked them to put in a reef for us. Once the boat settled a little refreshing rain did come, but that didn’t last too long. Earlier when we went to bed the skies were clear and the moon was so big and bright, funny how a little squall can sneak up on you and create a moment of excitement. Once the weather had passed the winds would drop to 10-15 knots and all was well. Donna and I kicked back and watched the mountains of Dominica slowly glide by covered in a blanket of intermittent light provided by the moon, cool.







As morning neared and the horizon began to glow yellow it became frustratingly clear that WINGURU'S predictions were unfortunately accurate. They predicted seas to settle gradually to 2-3 feet as we moved up the chain, that's nice right?, well that calmness came with single digit wind right on our tail, DANGIT!! S/V No Regrets was just coming out of charter, therefore she is not outfitted with a whisker pole or different sails such as spinnaker or storm sails. Even if we had those things I would be reluctant to use them at night with our shorthanded crews, we'll make do! Time to motor-sail and enjoy the sunrise and moon set! Donna captured an awesome shot on her cell, she researched these beams and found they are the elusive "anticrepuscular rays" which are solar rays that appear to converge on the anti-solar point......whatever!....it was pretty cool !

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Apparently "anticrepusclar rays" draw in dolphin because we were entertained by a couple playful pods during our morning. I think dolphin playing in the bow wake when you are in the middle of nowhere is perhaps the coolest thing ever!

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After 14 hours or so we were happy to see Guadaloupe coming into view. I have always been intrigued about the small group of islands just south of Guadaloupe called Les Saintes and Marie Gallante, it was bitter sweet to enjoy their view and have to just float on by without stopping in. Our plan was to grab a slip at Marina de Riviere Sens in Basse Terre, Guadaloupe. With Conner on board we wanted to hook up to shore power for a little a/c. Honestly, the rest of the crew were also looking forward to a hot shower, good meal and a/c to sleep in!

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Another 15 miles under the keel and we see the entrance to the marina. Matt had tried to make reservations/communicate with this marina via email but was not successful, so we anchored outside of the break walls and Matt dinged in to see what he could find. He returned relatively quickly and said he had a slip! Matt asked Donna and I to take the dinghy back into the marina to help dock....he paused and said we would be med-mooring, his first time I believe! This was the perfect place to try this, dock was empty! and actually we didn't have to set the anchor because they had mooring balls for the bow.


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Ok, we are safely tied to the dock, good job Matt! Now the fun begins.....DOES ANYBODY SPEAK ENGLISH?? Dan would have to be our interpreter because he took one year of French in High School, freshman year I think? I believe it was around 1100 or so when we docked and it was nice to step off the boat after the 18 hour passage. Matt and Dan returned to the boat with a gentleman who spoke very little English, he's the marina manager I think? He was slightly animated and with his gestures it was obvious that our U.S. shore power cables would not work on his Euro docks. Ok, so what options do we have? the gentleman holds up the index finger of both hands and says wait! and walks away. After a while he returns with a small converter/transformer and we were able to fire up one of the a/c units, better than nothing right? The gentleman made it clear that we could not let the transformer get wet, so we needed to cover it somehow? unfortunately we had jerry cans of fuel secured in the aft storage locker.........pop! dang fuse blew? do we have a spare? nope! Back to the office and they did have one spare. During all of this trouble shooting, which took a couple hours, we noticed that the aged transformer wire gauge was very small and gnarly, so small that the cord generated decent warmth with the a/c turned on, we didn't "feel comfortable" leaving it unattended! We went back to the office to see what other options we had and it was locked, ok it's almost 2pm lets grab lunch and check back. We checked the office several times and they hadn't returned. It was now 3:30pm so we needed to make a decision, quickly I might add, because the sun was setting. Do we risk fire? uh no! do we stay on the dock without a/c? there's no air moving and it will be brutal to sleep here! OK, we agree to venture on....where? well the marina has a substantial amount of cash as a deposit for the transformer and 2 nights booked on the credit card.....DANGIT!! WHERE IS THAT GUY????? Funny thing is that Donna was able to keep her cool during all this by standing in the markets freezer section!

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It was now 4pm and we gave up on "the man", after taking advantage of the nice marina showers! We would untie from the dock and take the transformer with us, a hostage of sorts, with good intentions of circling back in the morning to recover our cash and adjust our credit card bill. Dan pulled out his handy Doyle Guide while others looked at charts in search of a comfortable anchorage where we might catch a breeze, we weren't broken...our spirits were still high! Wherever we go it has to be within 2-1/2 hours so we can anchor before the sun set! Did we head north? Did we head south? Did we simply anchor outside of the break walls in that little protected spot we saw? Care to guess??

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TO BE CONTINUED.................

Wow!
All that in one day.
"I took my time below",
You're a good man

Awesome!!!

This is awesome - I feel like I'm reading a great novel! Can't wait for more!

Great trip report! Looking forward to more. Thanks Beerman.

Great report Rick! I was there and I'm waiting for the rest

It was soooo f'ing hot in that Marina!!

What Rick kindly left out is that not too long into the trip, I started to feel a bit seasick. Only felt seasick one other time and it was combination of lack of sleep, dehydration and a little rum from the free drink the moorings gave. This time, it was pure dehydration - even though I drank a LOT of water, all the running around we did during the day (in what I think is the hottest weather we've experienced in all our trips) I was dripping with sweat all day.. Fortunately with more hydration and some sea sickness meds, I felt fine and never had the feeling return the whole trip!

The Dolphins we're awesome - Here's a video of them.

https://youtu.be/LPtxweh4BUw

And on a slightly related note - Conner just had his 2nd Birthday today!

Ever have the chance again DO NOT miss "The Saintes" !!!!

Happy Birthday Conner from me and Donna!! I swore he was 2 on our trip! He was honestly a joy to sail with! Just the other day Donna showed me a video of him relentlessly tickling my feet while I tried to nap, ha!!

I highly recommend a visit to Les Saintes ...had a very memorable time there aboard " Jeannius"..what gorgeous islands , with friendly folks and amazing French cuisine..

Matt, great video of the dolphins! Did you shoot that with a phone or GoPro? My husband gave me a GoPro for christmas and I'm dying to use it while we're on our charter trip!

...and ..loving these stories..thanks..

Love the story!

Matt, I get mal de mer. Bonine makes a big difference, as does some electrolytes added to my water. The RO water we get most places seems to strip the electrolytes from me. I've used Nuun (don't like the bitter stevia flavor), Emergen-C Electro Mix and SOS electrolytes. They all work.

Cheers, RickG

I shot it with a phone - have a gopro, just didn't have it ready.

Thanks Rick. I think Donna gave me bonine. Worked fine and I just re-hydrated and was fine the rest of the time without anything else.

Great read and wanting MORE! LOVED the dolphins!

Looking forward to the next chapter!

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