American Adventure

15 November 2017
14 October 2017
10 May 2017
01 April 2017 | Isle Forchue
01 April 2017 | Isle Forchue
11 March 2017
27 February 2017 | Les Saintes, Guadeloupe
19 February 2017 | Dominica
09 February 2017 | Saint Pierre
02 February 2017
29 January 2017 | Grand Anse d'Arlets
27 January 2017 | Sainte Anne
13 January 2017 | Le Marin Martinique
05 January 2017 | Lassalle France

Titsville or bust

15 November 2017
Well it has been a very busy few weeks. The deal on the purchase of the new boat was concluded without too much blood, sweat and tears. John and Chris were a lovely couple who liked drinking wine almost as much as us and we all got along very well. We had some lovely meals. Paying for the boat was a nightmare in the current times when it seems to be assumed that everyone making a foreign transfer is paying for bomb construction elements. And yet they don’t seem to get the ones who actually are. We got there in the end.

Innisfree, named after a rather lovely poem by Yeats, has been out of the water in a hot climate for three years. This is good in some respects as the hull will be lovely and dry and clean, but bad in others as a lot of electrical and plumbing fittings had failed. So an awful lot of work for Colin and for John before he headed back up to Canada. Then when she was finally ready to sail the wind started blowing steady and strong after weeks of no wind at all. The boat is in a pig of a position against pilings and we are struggling to find a good moment to get her off. We had a go this morning which we abandoned due to fear of damaging the boat in the attempt. So we are still waiting. The scenery is good and the wildlife amazing. Manatees lie in the water drinking from the dripping taps, a dolphin or two can often be seen frolicking in the marina and there is a huge variety of birdlife. The latter is not so good because they shit everywhere and I have to follow around with mop and bucket.

So we are champing at the bit to be off. We have to be in Martinique to pick Alexander up for Christmas by 18th December and we have a very long way to go. About 1700 nautical miles in fact, and given that yachts go between 5 and 9 miles an hour and not always in the right direction, is a very long way indeed. It is going to be tiring but on the plus side I will drink less and lose a ridiculous amount of weight so I can binge for the rest of the season. Not a healthy attitude but….

We have profited from the time here and the use of a hire car to do victualling. A good red Cabernet Sauvignon and an oaky white Chardonnay cost 3 dollars a bottle and our storage spaces are well weighed down with it. They have a wonderful shop called the Dollar Tree where, rather unsurprisingly, everything costs a dollar. You can buy a litre of quality shampoo and conditioner for about 86p and many more things besides. So we have gone a bit mad there as well. The satin pillowcases for a dollar each were a temptation too. And the suntan cream, and the body lotion and the coconut milk for cocktails, and the crab bisque and……….. Then there is Walmart. Good for all sorts of stuff. So one laptop, two kayaks, and a 32 inch smart TV later the bank balance is a little lower. Happily so is the flotation level of the boat. The inter coastal highway, which Colin being Colin calls the intercourse highway out of Titsville, has bridges. And our mast is, as we say in France, a peu juste. So the extra weight is good. Mind you if we don’t get out soon the wine will have been depleted and the mast will be that little bit higher.

So hopefully next stop Bahamas. I wish I was as excited about this as I ought to be. It sounds so exotic. However it is horribly shallow there and we have a deep draught so we will have the opposite problem from the mast height at the bridges. I’ll let you all know how it goes.

Have a good day you all from Titsville Florida.

Here we go again...

14 October 2017
Well ok I didn't really finish the last season of blogging. I did say that the new yacht sale had fallen through and we were speeding our way back to Martinique. In actual fact we went all the way to Grenada which is much further south. We had hooked up with a German company that offers sailing trips to German tourists. We did want to offer them our super new boat but what the hell we sailed good old Doreen down there and met with the lovely Sabine and her colleague who just loved Doreen and put her on their list. N?ot only is the scheme extremely lucrative but I feel that it will be rather fun to have some guests aboard now and then.

However Colin was still pining for his new boat so we carried on looking once we got home and put an offer in for a boat on Tortola, paid the deposit and were looking forward to sailing her this season. Unfortunately poor Vandalay was wiped out by hurricane Irma. She fell on her side and was pierced to her entrails by the stands she was stored on. So the back to the drawing board.

Now we have found another boat to buy. BUT she is in Florida as all the boats for sale south of there have been wiped out either by Irma or Maria. So we have a very very long trip down from there to take the new boat back to Martinique, put on what we want from Doreen, and head of to our first booking in the Grenadines on 27th December. And we have Alexander to be picked up somewhere for his Christmas holidays. Just a tad stressful.

So we leave here on 24th October for Miami and, providing the boat passes survey and sea trial, the big adventure and the next episode of the blog will start there. Watch this space!

Homeward bound..

10 May 2017
So here I am making excuses again. But we really have been very busy. Sadly we have decided that this beautiful old lady is not a fit vessel for us as we only spend less than half the year on her. So we have decided to sell her and buy a newer boat. Colin is getting older and is tired of spending hours with his head in the engine compartment. I personally do not acknowledge the passing of the years and she sails really well so I love her. So once we got to St Martin, which is a major yachting centre, we started looking.We found a slightly larger boat and several decades newer than this and got a long way down the line, including putting 12600 dollars in escrow. Then we did the sea trial and I, the speed freak, was sorely disappointed. She didn't go as fast as Doreen despite new sails and a squeaky clean hull, so back to the drawing board. However despite the setback in the purchase we have been working hard to present Doreen well for sale when we leave her in mid May,
I have been concentrating on the teak which has got a bit grey over the years. Elbow grease, soap and a scrubbing brush, wet and dry paper, and a final minute of muriatic acid has worked wonders. I look so sexy in my pink marigolds while carrying out this meticulous operation. Not! Then there is the caulking. This is the rubbery black stuff that goes between the teak boards and keeps them waterproof. It is rubbery when dry but before then it is an oozing, viscous black mass with a mind of its own. It is also irritant so wiping ones sweating face with a black hand is a bad idea. Anyway these are the joys of boating and I think I have done a middling to average job. I'll leave you to judge from the picture.
We thoroughly enjoyed St Martin. After six weeks there working on the boat we were up 71 dollars, more than a hundred of glasses of crisp dry Chilean Pinot Grigio, and goodness knows how many delicious buffet meals up. Rouge et Noir Casino we salute you.
But reality beckoned and our flight home loomed. We flew back overnight in a churning rush to Basse Terre, the scene of the great rescue. Totally by chance we anchored on almost exactly the same spot. Maybe not by chance I suppose but rather that it is a good spot in a tricky anchorage. As I passed the spot where the yacht had broken away from its anchor I was interested to remark more than 150 feet of water. However this time, rather than howling north easterlies we had light winds from the south. Unnerved by the sight of rocks on our stern we were loath to go ashore and leave the boat untended. This was sad as Rhum Bologne is 16 euros for three litres.
From Basse Terre back to the beautiful Saintes. These do have to be my favourite islands in the whole chain. Only a couple of nights but enough time for the challenging walk into town and back. Then a long, very long, day sail back to Saint Pierre in Martinique. Back in our home ports country. We had been looking forward to going ashore here and doing the long hike up to the rum distillery where you can buy excellent ti punch rum for about 12 euros for two litres. However the southern winds were prevailing and with a lee shore on a narrow shelf a trip ashore was not to be. And, to be fair, we had more than enough rum aboard. So for the trip back to our home port of Le Marin, friends and familiar haunts….

A night on the town ... oh no the sea!

01 April 2017 | Isle Forchue
Me. Weather horribly windy
Well I have been most remiss with the blog posts. Serious lack of Internet and time. So I left you all as we were leaving les Saintes for Guadeloupe. The seas were pretty huge due to rough weather in the preceding days but the trip was uneventful. Basse Terre is the capital of Guadalupe or Gwada as the locals like to call it. As a town it has a lot more personality than many we have visited. There is no cruiser terminal here so there are real shops for real people. Women are selling fruit and vegetables at every corner. You have to watch them like hawks because they are real rip off merchants. You buy five tomatoes carefully chosen and the woman insists on putting them in your bag for you. When you get back to the boat you find you have three tomatoes, one of which is the overripe one you told her firmly three times that you did not want. Buyer beware! There were several cheap material shops and I bought grey and white stripy material to replace the saloon curtains and recover the cockpit scatter cushions. So the trusty sewing machine has been hard at work. The rhum in Gwada of choice is Bologne , a white rhum, and is very tasty. In the Ecomax, a wonderful supermarket chain which needs to exist everywhere, you can buy it in three litre boxes for about fifteen euros. I've always been a fan of wine in boxes although they don't ever last the six weeks it promises you in the blurb. However three litres of rum is something else entirely. We bought two!

A highlight of Basse Terre was the great rescue. It was very windy there in the anchorage due to a funnelling effect caused by great chunks having been carved out if the protective mountain by the gravel works. Also the water is very deep close to and you have to get quite close to the land in order to anchor safely. A charter yacht had been there for several days anchored in very deep water and seeming abandoned. Every time we went past it Colin would express his disbelief that anyone had anchored in such deep water. Ideally one would have five times the depth in length of chain. Boats only carry chain for anchoring in shallow water and the depth where they were would have probably not have given them double the scope. Still it hung on in there. Then came the day with forty knot gusts of wind. Just before dark sitting having sundowners in the cockpit we had a suspicion she was moving or dragging as we nautical types like to say. We got the binoculars and even as we were watching she started moving backwards at speed. So it was a frantic rush into the dinghy and out to rescue her. Colin took his trusty head torch as it would be full dark within minutes. Luckily she had an anchor light on her. The yacht was locked and the engine couldn't be started. So Colin had to break in through a small hatch. Lucky for them that he is a man of slight build. Finally the engine was started and the navigation lights on by which time she was well out at sea so it was a long trip back to anchor her safely. Without this action the boat would almost certainly have been lost at sea. I got on the radio to the French equivalent of the coastguard to explain that we had "found" 350,000 euros worth of yacht.

From Basse Terre we did a long day and night sail the morning after the rescue. We started off with the intention of going to St Kitts and Nevis but the wind kept changing its mind and so therefore did we. We went the wrong side of Mustique just before dark and it was interesting to see the volcano still smoking away there and sad to see just the roof ridges of houses poking out from the volcanic ash. We toyed with Antigua but the wind veered again so we just kept on going watching the lights of islands we couldn't get to disappear behind us on both sides. It was a windy night and we stormed along eating up the miles we did three hours on each. Unfortunately first light showed that the mainsail had ripped again! Saint Barthélemy was the nearest island that we could comfortably reach so we headed there. Colin read the pilot book while we chugged along with half a mainsail and found that
you have to pay to anchor there which is not something we condone. So we went a little further on to Isle Forchue a delightful small deserted island with a horseshoe bay, turtles and seabirds. Quite lovely. It was now nearing midday and we had been sailing three hours in three hours off since six the previous morning. The three hours off is not terribly accurate. Colin is not so confident with his night sailing. He needs to see the sails. So he got himself into a couple of pickles which I had to get up and sort out, so we were tired! We had a rum, of course, and went to bed. Picture of bedroom attached! Oh how welcome...

We stayed at Isle Forchue in perfect calm for about four days while the wind howled and huge waves rushed past just outside the bay. We were well victualled so we ate well, I made cushions and curtains, Colin struggled with his engine and other broken things and in the evening we binge watched Ripper Street. Oh and we had six litres of rum! Not a bad life.

To be continued....


A night on the town ... oh no the sea!

01 April 2017 | Isle Forchue
Me. Weather horribly windy
Well I have been most remiss with the blog posts. Serious lack of Internet and time. So I left you all as we were leaving les Saintes for Guadeloupe. The seas were pretty huge due to rough weather in the preceding days but the trip was uneventful. Basse Terre is the capital of Guadalupe or Gwada as the locals like to call it. As a town it has a lot more personality than many we have visited. There is no cruiser terminal here so there are real shops for real people. Women are selling fruit and vegetables at every corner. You have to watch them like hawks because they are real rip off merchants. You buy five tomatoes carefully chosen and the woman insists on putting them in your bag for you. When you get back to the boat you find you have three tomatoes, one of which is the overripe one you told her firmly three times that you did not want. Buyer beware! There were several cheap material shops and I bought grey and white stripy material to replace the saloon curtains and recover the cockpit scatter cushions. So the trusty sewing machine has been hard at work. The rhum in Gwada of choice is Bologne , a white rhum, and is very tasty. In the Ecomax, a wonderful supermarket chain which needs to exist everywhere, you can buy it in three litre boxes for about fifteen euros. I've always been a fan of wine in boxes although they don't ever last the six weeks it promises you in the blurb. However three litres of rum is something else entirely. We bought two!

A highlight of Basse Terre was the great rescue. It was very windy there in the anchorage due to a funnelling effect caused by great chunks having been carved out if the protective mountain by the gravel works. Also the water is very deep close to and you have to get quite close to the land in order to anchor safely. A charter yacht had been there for several days anchored in very deep water and seeming abandoned. Every time we went past it Colin would express his disbelief that anyone had anchored in such deep water. Ideally one would have five times the depth in length of chain. Boats only carry chain for anchoring in shallow water and the depth where they were would have probably not have given them double the scope. Still it hung on in there. Then came the day with forty knot gusts of wind. Just before dark sitting having sundowners in the cockpit we had a suspicion she was moving or dragging as we nautical types like to say. We got the binoculars and even as we were watching she started moving backwards at speed. So it was a frantic rush into the dinghy and out to rescue her. Colin took his trusty head torch as it would be full dark within minutes. Luckily she had an anchor light on her. The yacht was locked and the engine couldn't be started. So Colin had to break in through a small hatch. Lucky for them that he is a man of slight build. Finally the engine was started and the navigation lights on by which time she was well out at sea so it was a long trip back to anchor her safely. Without this action the boat would almost certainly have been lost at sea. I got on the radio to the French equivalent of the coastguard to explain that we had “found” 350,000 euros worth of yacht.

From Basse Terre we did a long day and night sail the morning after the rescue. We started off with the intention of going to St Kitts and Nevis but the wind kept changing its mind and so therefore did we. We went the wrong side of Mustique just before dark and it was interesting to see the volcano still smoking away there and sad to see just the roof ridges of houses poking out from the volcanic ash. We toyed with Antigua but the wind veered again so we just kept on going watching the lights of islands we couldn't get to disappear behind us on both sides. It was a windy night and we stormed along eating up the miles we did three hours on each. Unfortunately first light showed that the mainsail had ripped again! Saint Barthélemy was the nearest island that we could comfortably reach so we headed there. Colin read the pilot book while we chugged along with half a mainsail and found that
you have to pay to anchor there which is not something we condone. So we went a little further on to Isle Forchue a delightful small deserted island with a horseshoe bay, turtles and seabirds. Quite lovely. It was now nearing midday and we had been sailing three hours in three hours off since six the previous morning. The three hours off is not terribly accurate. Colin is not so confident with his night sailing. He needs to see the sails. So he got himself into a couple of pickles which I had to get up and sort out, so we were tired! We had a rum, of course, and went to bed. Picture of bedroom attached! Oh how welcome...

We stayed at Isle Forchue in perfect calm for about four days while the wind howled and huge waves rushed past just outside the bay. We were well victualled so we ate well, I made cushions and curtains, Colin struggled with his engine and other broken things and in the evening we binge watched Ripper Street. Oh and we had six litres of rum! Not a bad life.

To be continued….


Long time no blog...

11 March 2017
Well the weather has been totally horrendous. Huge winds and seas and we have been tossed from pillar to post spending a night and a day at sea trying to find a small oasis of rest. Finally we found an anchorage just north of Saint Barts with bouys. This not before we had blown out our mainsail again. And the bruises from being thrown around whilst trying to deal with it all. I steered for about twenty hours out of thirty as the autopilot was not up to the task. I can tell you we flew past Antigua, Montserrat which was smoking still in a volcanic manner, St Kitts and Nevis before safe haven.

We had bruised bodies to rest while the wind howled around us and the turtles bobbed their heads up in the protected anchorage. A little recuperated I started to sew curtains and cushion covers with some lovely material I had bought in Guadeloupe. Thankfully we were well victualled so as ever we ate well.

Yesterday we broke for cover. The wind had died down but the seas were still huge so not a comfortable passage but good to be on the move again. And so we landed in St Martin/Saint Maarten depending on which end of the island you are on. A great campaign to get some Internet was immediately started only to find that Rohan Peter Soens Hughes had been born the day after we left on the great voyage. He's gorgeous of course as one could on,y anticipate with two such parents.

Today we have been exploring immediate St Martin. As a duty free island one thing that is immediately apparent is that the booze is really cheap. Twenty four dollars for two litres of Mount Gay rum is pretty amazing. Not that we have bought any yet. Well we were roaming the Main Street when a gorgeous girl wearing a bikini, high heels and plumes approached us and gave us a free ticket for a play. Colin was exceedingly dubious not being a gambling man but I said what the hell. He won 43 dollars with his ticket and we found that there was a free paella lunch, free chilled white wine and free Internet. On Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings they have free Chinese buffets, So we may live here for a week although I believe it may be closed on Sundays. I spent a little of the winnings on the roulette wheel but we are still well up and who knows if we stroll along again tomorrow a different lovely may give us a free play ticket.....


Vessel Name: Doreen
Vessel Make/Model: Beneteau 50
Hailing Port: Le Marin Martinique
Crew: Alison and Colin
About: A pair of ex Royal Navy officers doing what comes naturally. We spend half the year in France and half on the boat.
Extra: Doreen, previously La Belle Elene, has cruised the Carribbean chain from Venezuela in the south to Puerto Rico in the north over the last few years. This year we are heading further afield!
Doreen's Photos - sbd1tt69f