Finally, the final chapter! ~grins~

Part 1 Here

Part 2 Here

Part 3 Here

Pics Here , Here and Here

Thu Jun 14th

Had pancakes for breakfast and decided to pull up anchor and head to the Tobago Cays again. I really want to snorkel around Baradel and see the turtles, since we were at the other side of the Cays last time, and it really was too windy & wavy to see much while snorkelling. So we pull up anchor and head over. We motored since the winds were so wonky around Mayreau. We get a ball very close to Baradel, but again have trouble getting both lines on the ball.

I get in the dinghy and pull it around to the hull and pull the line through and hand it back up to Jim so that he can tie it off. I am in the process of doing this when the Cays Park Rangers pull up to the front of the boat and tell us we can't leave it hooked up on one cleat like that - no s**t, Sherlock! It tells me what kind of boaters they sometimes see there! ~grins~ It really is a pain having to do things this way, but I can’t figure out a better way of doing it since the other lines are too big in diameter to go around the cleats twice (Once to tie off to the boat, and then to tie off the ball on each side).

As we’re getting settled, a bird flies right into the salon of our boat, and attacks the bread in its package before I can get him out of there – we spend the rest of the afternoon chasing two or three birds away from the hatches, and cleaning up bird crap from inside the boat – it’s everywhere, considering he was down below for only a short time – unless this was his 3rd or 4th visit while we were busy at the bow of the boat!

We buy some ice from Bob, and Sidney comes along to sell t-shirts & pareos - I always try to buy something from him – he’s such a nice guy. We spend awhile chatting and having a drink together, and then he’s off, to try and sell to someone else. It’s a lot less busy here this time around, and most of the vendors only seem to work every other day. We don’t see many of the usual suspects, but Romeo pops by with a big wave and a smile for us. It’s nice to be remembered. He drops by later to see if we want some fish, but we’re on our way home and still have lots to eat before we drop the boat off, so we decline.

We decide to snorkel over to Baradel and then walk the island. We see a LOT of turtles everywhere we look on the snorkel over, I have never seen so many! It was a great time, although we don’t see much else. We walk around the island, and who do we see taking a picture of themselves at the end of the spit but Tony & Melody from Utopia! Well, fancy seeing you on this stretch of sand! We knew they were on charter in the Grenadines, but weren’t sure if we’d see them. We meet Dionne from TTOL, and some of the other guests, and they invite us over to their boat for drinks later on.

We had some lunch, limed a bit and I think I even napped for awhile. Then, off to shower and we’re on our way over to Utopia. We drive right past their boat looking for it, as I don’t have my glasses and couldn’t see the name on the back, and I am looking at another cat that has a paddleboard loaded on the side of the boat. I think they wonder where the hell I am going – what great navigation skills I have! ~grins~

We finally get back to the right boat, and are welcomed aboard Utopia. We drop our booty off to Melody, and get a quick tour and meet their guests – 5 women. What a gorgeous boat – they’ve really got it done up nice. We sit around munching & drinking and chatting and having a good time. I had to laugh as both Tony & Jim were commenting on the fact that they finally have some male companionship, and immediately start discussing fishing, engines, and all kinds of ‘guy’ stuff! ~grins~

The girls have caught some wonderful mahi & tuna, and we are invited to stay for dinner. Melody (with Tony’s help with his mad bbq skillz), put on quite the spread – we had an amazing fish stew, and then bbq’d fish & veggies. It was a great meal, but way more than I could eat! I can’t imagine how much I would weigh if I ever chartered with them, although they have lots of energy and would likely get me hopping to keep up!

Things get a little fuzzy, but I remember the rum tasting and a slide show of the girls trip aboard Utopia so far, among other things – I have the tattoo to prove it! Suddenly it’s very late and we’re on our way back to the boat. I’m still a little tipsy, and proceed to dunk myself as I try to get out of the dinghy and get aboard our boat – that certainly sobered and woke me up! First time I have ever done that and hopefully the last!

Friday Jun 15th

Woke up a little hung over – rolled over and went back to bed – argh, don’t want to be under the weather for our slog up to Bequia today...Eventually returned to the land of the living, had some much needed coffee and bagels, watched Utopia head out for Canouan to drop off their guests, and then we also made way.

It was a beautiful morning, with winds forecast to be 18k going to 14k, so we were looking forward to a nice light wind sail. We put out the Jib only, and as we were heading to change course around Baliene Rocks, I saw some clouds moving very fast and joining a bunch of other clouds over the Cays. The clouds were moving SO fast, I have never seen a storm come up as fast as this one! Big fluffy white clouds turned into grey clouds and then into even bigger black clouds as they gathered force. Reefed in the jib and made the turn, and wham! We were hit with the storm – rain was practically falling sideways, pelting us like it was hail. I have never seen so much rain, and such big drops! The winds were very high, and with it the waves got bigger and bigger. So much for our nice light wind sail to Bequia! Nothing like a storm to get the blood pumping!

In talking to Tony from Utopia later, he estimated the winds to be about the mid to upper thirties, but they were ahead of us and I'm sure we got hit with higher winds than that.

We held course for the south-western tip of Canouan, and to give the boat credit, she held the course well. Heavy rains and lots of sustained winds for about 15 minutes – doing fluctuating 5 to 7 knots to keep on course. I wanted to keep closer to land in case we decided to bail out and hole up in Canouan.

As soon as we got to the point of Canouan, the rains let up and the winds dropped almost to nothing. Waves were still hitting us broadside, and we motor sailed past Canouan, hoping the winds would pick up again on the other side. Yup! Although the sun never came out and the clouds stuck around all day, we still managed a not too shabby 6.5 knots to Bequia. I couldn’t hold a comfortable sailing course as far east as I wanted, and not wanting Jim to be sick, we ended up about ½ mile west off the southern point of Admiralty Bay. All in all, not too bad - it was a long day of sailing, so we were happy to tuck back in by Princess Margaret beach, and jump into the water to do our daily anchor check and float around the boat. There was even less boat traffic here than the last time we were here less than 2 weeks ago.

We dinked into town and could hear all kinds of music coming from downtown, turns out it was the start of festival, so there was a live band in the centre of town. We decided to steer clear, glad that we had moored far from town, and headed to the Frangipani for dinner. I had the best coconut shrimp that I have ever had, the whole meal was awesome, although they were out of a few things on the menu - slow season so of course we understood. After a leisurely dinner, we headed back to the boat, where we could barely hear the music from town, although it was so still that it was a constant noise in the background, not the usual 'carry on the wind every once in awhile' noise that I usually hear.

Saturday, June 16th

Woke up to cloudy, rainy weather and absolutely no wind. It was hot and humid today...the first time we have not had wind since we got here! Must be almost time to go home! I was able to connect to the internet and upload some pictures, and then spent some time cleaning up the boat and washing down the decks, etc. We hung out and did a whole lot of nothing for most of the day. We decided to head into town for lunch, and went to Tommy’s for some Mexican. It was hot – not a breeze to be had, so I was very glad for the frozen margaritas! They advertised ½ priced appetizers, so after checking with the waitress, we ordered a bunch of different things and munched out. The food was very good. The waitress came over as we were finishing our meal and told us that the owner just came in, and the apps were only ½ price between 4 and 6, so we’d have to pay full price.

What?? Why did I check with you if you didn’t know, why didn’t you just say so? I hate being ripped off like I am some stupid tourist. More and more it is happening everywhere in the islands, and I really hate the feeling of being taken. But, it was our last day, and in the grand scheme of things, it didn’t really matter. I just wouldn’t go back if they treat people like this...and it doesn’t matter to them, since most people don’t come back anyway... ~sigh~ With the power of the internet reviews, you’d think businesses would care about their reputation – it’s so easy to get a bad one! Needless to say, I wasn’t impressed.

We went into town and bought one last bottle of wine to go with our last meal on the boat, and headed back out between the rainstorms. We decided to finally try the bbq tonight – after having been on the boat for almost two weeks and not even looking at it – unheard of for me, as I usually cook ALL my dinners aboard on the BBQ. Wait – never mind – the steaks we bought in Carricou didn’t make it – whew! What a stench! So, pasta for dinner it is, and the BBQ remained unused... there’s a first!

I tossed and turned most of the night, and by the middle of the night I was feeling pretty sick, sweating and shaking, and went up top to get some air – of which there was very little. Not sure if it was something I ate, or just being overtired, but after I finally was able to nap for awhile up top, I went down below and slept the rest of the night - likely from exhaustion, as Jim said I was still pretty restless and sweaty.

Sunday June 17th

Woke up early feeling much better and we headed out around 9ish to get back to St. Vincent. Brent had told us we didn’t have to rush back, but our contract said noon, so I didn’t want to mess around. We started out with a reefed main and jib, and ended up leaving it in the whole way, as we were doing 5.5 to 6 knots as we headed across to St. Vincent. We followed the reverse course as before, heading almost to mid island of Bequia before heading up to St. Vincent. We were close hauled all the way across, making great time, and I held the helm the whole way – it was, after all, the last sail – no autopilot for me! About 1½ miles off of the buoys leading into Barefoot, the steering locked up. Oh oh! There was no warning, no bump, no pull, no nothing – just no steering control! Heart in the throat moment!

I could only move the wheel about 5 degrees either way, and was having trouble holding my course. I didn’t want to force the steering, in case I broke something (worse) than it already was, and I didn’t want to start the engines in case we had something wrapped around the rudder (and in turn, the prop), so we got out the manual tiller and we still couldn’t steer more than 5 degrees either way. Well, since we’re very close to Barefoot, I wasn’t going to go over the side to see what was happening... we might as well put it on their laps instead of mine - it's why we charter - chase boats! I called in to Mary and told her that we had lost steering, and that I didn’t want to start the engines since we weren’t sure if we had something wrapped around the prop or not and gave my position. She called back to say that we needed to be closer to shore before they could come out to us, so to keep on coming in, and they’d look for me. I told her that we were losing ground, and slowly heading west in the current, because I couldn’t steer to my heading. I repeated again that we had no steering, and I think this time she understood – I found out later that she had told the guys I had something wrapped in the prop but could still make my heading sailing – not sure how that came out of what I told her!

Anyway, we got out the life jackets, got the anchor ready to deploy, pulled out some lines and fenders for when Barefoot came aboard (not sure what they would be in), and pulled in the jib, sailing on the reefed main alone. We slowly inched closer to shore, but losing ground to the west, and we were almost to the other side of the Young Island cut when we saw Brent & another guy come out in a dinghy – no wonder they wanted us close to shore – I wouldn’t want to be 1½ miles off the coast of St. Vincent in a dinghy either in those waves & current!

Brent jumped aboard, and immediately tried to pull the steering harder than I would have. He was able to break it to a point where he could steer farther east, and then we talked about what happened – when he realized that I hadn’t tried the engine, instead of what he was told, he decided to start it and see what happened. It started up right away – whoa, no line wrapped, thank goodness! We motored in with the other guy in the dinghy following us. Brent decided to try to bring the boat right to the dock, instead of anchoring outside as we originally thought we were going to have to do, and I watched as the depth sounder went to 0 and we still didn’t hit the reef on the way in. <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/Yikes.gif" alt="" /> SO glad he was at the helm!

Wow, talk about an exciting way to end the trip! ~grins~ I realized that although I don’t have a heck of a lot of experience dealing with boat failure (there has always been someone else on board who knows more about boats than me), it wasn’t a dangerous situation we were in – I could always have turned away from shore using the sails instead of the steering, I could have gone over the side to see whether there was anything wrapped in the prop, etc., we could have arranged to drop anchor close to shore and get a look at the steering, etc. It’s a good feeling to know that Barefoot was so close, but I wasn’t overly concerned if this had happened down island or not. I kept my head, and so did Jim, and that’s a good feeling!

We moored stern to at the dock, with lots of help from the guys dockside, and immediately one of the guys dove the boat. No issues there, no lines wrapped, nothing appeared to be wrong. Brent was shaking his head at the game of “telephone” we played with Mary... it really was funny once we were safely back on shore...not so much while it was happening!

We finished packing up, grabbed some waters, I called my dad before turning in the phone to wish him a happy Father’s Day, and then we did our boat briefing with Brent. I always keep an ongoing list of things that could be improved or fixed on the boat, I think it only helps the charter company to make it a better experience for the next charterer. Since this boat had only been with them for six weeks before we had her, there were a few things, nothing major, and Brent was happy to have the list (I think!).

As an aside, we found out the next day that a bolt had broke in the steering, and then jammed in, and that’s why we couldn’t move the wheel or use the emergency tiller. I had no idea that the steering had broken, usually it spins with no resistance, so that’s why I thought it must have been a rudder problem.

Glad to know that it was nothing I did. Jim commented that it happened because I was having too good of a time sailing on my last leg of the trip!

Off the boat, and up to do the final paperwork at the office and check into our room. It’s a really nice set up, clean, nice layout, air conditioning, great bathroom & shower (there is a switch for the water heater, which we didn’t find out about until we had cold showers!) nice view over the harbour with a balcony that ran the length of the rooms. We appeared to be the only ones staying there.

We had lunch at Driftwoods – a great salad, samosas & pizza, as well as a couple of their yummy fruit smoothies that we discovered our first day at Barefoot. We laid around the room the whole afternoon, doing nothing but watching a Pawn Stars marathon on tv, drinking some of our leftover booze, and enjoying the a/c. We were going to eat at Driftwoods that night, but they were out of a few things, and nothing else turned us on, so we decided to walk down the road and see what we could find.

We ended up at the St. Vincent Yacht club (who knew?!) and had a great chicken curry, rice and salad for about $8. US each – more than we could ever eat in one sitting! It wasn’t a late night, we sat on the balcony and looked at the stars for awhile and it was difficult to sleep without the rocking of the boat.

Monday, June 18th

Woke up early, packed up our bags and headed down for breakfast. They were nice enough to be open early for us, since we had to head to the airport by 8:30, and they don’t usually open until 8ish. We were eating our breakfast by 8am, so that was a plus. It was, by far, our best breakfast in the islands – and not too expensive either! I will really miss Driftwoods, we had some really great service and food there! Both the hotel & the restaurant are great additions to the Barefoot experience that we didn't have last time we were there.

Keishawn showed up to take us to the airport – it was great to see him again, but sad as well, since we were leaving. Check in with SVG Air was painless, and our flight was leaving ½ hour earlier than we booked, but we were on the milk run again, heading to Union, Canouan and then onto Barbados. The lounge at St Vincent has a Digicell power station to charge your electronics, and free wifi – impressive for such a small airport!

We had a full plane to Canouan, then we were all by ourselves with the pilot & co-pilot on the way to Union, (we felt like movie stars LOL) and then onto Barbados ½ full. An uneventful wait at Barbados for our flight on WestJet. The fight home was mostly uneventful, until the woman across the aisle from us started feeling faint, and the oxygen came out, the “is there a doctor or nurse on board” announcement came on, but the lady seemed to make a bit of a recovery, and we didn’t have to divert after all – it was interesting to watch what they have to do when there is a “medical emergency” on board. The stewardesses have to follow protocol no matter what, and were in constant contact with a medical team in Canada (the one stewardess was using the empty seat next to me during this episode). Upon landing in Toronto, the same couple had to wait onboard for Health Canada to interview them - just in case!

Reflections:

Barefoot and all their staff were great to deal with from start to finish. Everyone went out of their way to be welcoming and friendly, and couldn’t do enough for us. They handled the boat switch effortlessly, even though it wasn't their fault, Seth apologized profusely via email when he broke the news, but it was all good - stuff happens, right?

La Dolce Vita – 2003 43DS Jeanneau - The boat was more chopped up than we would have preferred with only two of us, but it was a great boat to sail, and I wouldn’t hesitate to get it again, although with a different cabin configuration. We sailed one in the BVI’s that seemed to have a lot more room down below without the twin berths. The only downside really was the lack of MP3 music when they had to switch out the stereo – there’s only so much Socca music I can listen to on the radio – what is it with Island DJ’s that constantly sing along to the music – when they really can’t sing?! LOL

The other bonus was not being recognized as a charter yacht – the boat was so new into charter that there was no “advertising” on it, and our dinghy actually had an old Sunsail logo on it! I’m not sure if we were treated differently by all the boat vendors etc. because of this, because almost every one of them asked if we were cruisers or charterers...

I never did get to meet Seth again, he always was away or otherwise occupied when we were around the base...not sure if he was worried about me being upset at the change in boat or not, but he needn’t have worried – it’s all good!

Kieshawn was the best, glad we listened to Twanger and requested his services from Barefoot. Like everyone, he went out of his way to make our experience in St. Vincent a great one – and we left there with another friend to go back to see.

Marva at Beachcomber restaurant in St. Vincent was a treasure, and a real pleasure to talk with.

The boat vendors seem more organized and less aggressive in the Tobago Cays & Mayreau, and more aggressive in Union than I remember from 2006.

The sailing in June is a lot easier than the sailing I experienced the first time I was there, in a December time frame – sailing south is easier than north, but still no big deal.

I wish I would have gone scuba diving – I always say I want to go, but never get the gumption to do it – especially because Jim doesn’t dive, it’s a lot harder to get motivated to scuba on a dive boat when you’re alone – I definitely want to rectify this when we head down to the BVI’s in January.

It’s really great to head somewhere and be remembered from the last time you were down. We ran into people we met on our trip with Captain Mark on Sanctuary in October, and people remembered meeting us...that’s a great feeling, more like being a friend than a tourist.

We really tried to treat this trip as if we were live aboard cruisers, doing two days in each anchorage, to get a real feel for what it is like – including doing the customs & immigration thing – after two weeks alone on the boat, 18 days away in total, we’re more committed to each other than ever, and committed to making it happen as soon as we can – while still enjoying trips to keep our skills up.

Meeting Tony & Melody and their guests on Utopia was a nice bonus – socializing with others came a good point in our trip – just as we were getting a little antsy about looking at the same face across the table every night. ~grins~ Just kidding! They are a very friendly couple, and have no problem sharing their knowledge. It was a pleasure to be aboard Utopia – I can totally understand why people love to charter with them – They are both awesome hosts, never letting the food or drink run out, and my, what a spread they put on! Jim is seriously considering a charter with them just to be able to do as little as he wants, and as much as I want especially with sailing. I’ve never wanted to do a crewed charter since I like doing my own thing, but am seriously reconsidering that decision now. (no, I am not getting paid to make this comment, I really mean it!)

Finally, thanks to everyone who gave advice, tips, tricks and comments as I made plans for this trip. It really was a great time, even with all the ups and downs we seemed to have. In the grand scheme of things, it was by far our best trip so far! Hopefully our next one will be even better!


Thanks for reading!

~fini~