Susan
June finds us
sailing down the chain of Caribbean islands. We are finally on the move!
Since our last update, there have been a lot of changes in our lives. In
late April we moved ourselves and our giant heap of boxes (almost a
thousand pounds of stuff that we had shipped here from Canada) aboard
the boat. Needless to say it took more than a few days to find a home
for it all but we finally made it and discovered that we still had
plenty of spaces to fill. Thank goodness we bought a big boat.
It felt great
to be living aboard our new home even though life on a dock isn’t our
favourite thing. One problem is that we still hadn’t finished all of
the carpentry work on the interior of the boat so we learned to live
with sawdust as a side dish to every meal. We love the boat. The design
of the saloon and galley that we worked out makes it a very comfy place
to live. We continued to work hard on the interior of the boat as well
as finally getting around to some of the mechanical, rigging and
electrical work that we wanted to do before leaving. Click here
to see the most recent renovation pictures.
We had hoped
to be leaving St. Maarten in mid-May before the official hurricane
season began on June 1st but you know how things go. The list
of jobs was long and we had been on the island so long that we knew
where to get everything done. We also had a good relationship with a
number of local businesses not to mention our carpenter, Bernhard. It
was hard to call a halt to the upgrades and endless boat shopping. Our
credit card glowed with the heat of extensive use in stores with the
word “marine” in the name. Not to mention the three trips in a
rental car one day to stock up with groceries. It took almost 3 days to
put it all away. Once again, it all disappeared into the cupboards with
some room to spare. It wasn’t our intention but my guess is we could
now survive for perhaps a year with all the provisions on the boat.
On June 1st
it was finally time to cut the ties (or at least untie the lines) as we
called a halt to the carpentry work and moved off the dock to a nearby
anchorage in Simpson Bay Lagoon. It was a wonderful feeling to be at
anchor again. There was much more privacy to be had with your closest
neighbours hundreds of feet away and it was soooo much cooler with the
wind always coming from the bow of the boat and getting scooped up by
the hatches. Not to mention the feeling of moving silently at anchor
with the wind.
Within a week
we had tackled the final list of jobs including testing the water maker
and generator and hiring some unlucky soul to clean 8 months of heavy
growth off the bottom of our boat. He joked that he’d destroyed an
entire reef down there. It was finally time to leave. Hurricane season
was officially underway and we were anxious to get some distance closer
to the edge of the zone.
During April
and May we had almost no time to spare for fun. We did get to know some
of our neighbours on the dock and enjoyed some great happy hour
conversations with these new friends. We look forward to meeting up with
some of them further South.
At the end of
the first week in June, we were finally ready to get going. The morning
that we passed under the open bridge to leave Simpson Bay Lagoon was a
red-letter day for us. Wayne referred to it as leaving ‘boat jail’.
I can’t say we’ll have the fondest memories of St. Maarten. It was a
place of heat and really hard work for us. Perhaps if we had just been
visiting for a week or two, we would have a different lasting
impression. Regardless, it is one of the best places in the Caribbean to
have boat work done so we were lucky to have purchased Daydream here.
Our first
stop upon leaving Simpson Bay was only 5 miles away in Great Bay where
the town of Philipsburg is. This is still on the island of St. Maarten
and gave us a chance to go for a test sail on our way there. Our true
shakedown cruise began the following morning when we set sail for the
island of St. Eustatius more commonly known as Statia. It is part of the
Netherlands Antilles and is about 30 miles away from St. Maarten. An
interesting thing about sailing here in the Caribbean is that the next
island/country is usually visible from your last port of call. We
enjoyed the day of sailing with favourable winds and were able to work
out a few more kinks and learn even more about our new boat. The most
important being that she is FAST compared to our last boat. On a close
reach with reduced sail, we saw speeds on the GPS of over 7.5 knots.
This makes her a rocket in our eyes. We’re loving the cutter rig and
are so happy that we added a roller furler to the staysail because we
are, after all, lazy at heart. I also love the electric roller furling
on the yankee (see note on laziness above). Wayne won’t admit to
liking it yet although I think he secretly does. The brand new, full
battened main sail is an absolute wonder to sail with too. The boat
definitely has a much more solid feel especially going upwind. Not that
we’ve had any downwind sailing yet to compare with. Upwind she sails
close to the wind and fairly flat and very stable. It feels much more in
control in wind over 20 knots on the nose. Our hydraulic autopilot is
also a champ and so much quieter below decks than our noisy old Autohelm.
We can’t wait to get some photos from the dinghy of the boat going
upwind with full main, yankee and staysail up.