Back and Forth (Literally and Figuratively) on the South Coast of Roatan
16 February 2014 | Port Royal, Roatan, Honduras
Beth / windblown
What a mixed up day. We dropped our mooring ball at 0745, raised the mainsail and headed out Lime Cay Cut (such a nice one with honest to goodness markers in the reef). Our intention was to head east to Guanaja because the forecast was for NE winds that weren’t too strong – about 10 - 15kt.
The whitecaps told the tale. Yes there was some N in the wind, but it was blowing 15 -17 and then up to 20 - 22. And we were bashing around again, close hauled into that wind. So we looked at each other and said, “Nope. Not interested in 4 -5 hours of this.”
And so we turned around and headed west while we thought out what we might do instead. We needed an ATM, fresh food supplies, some fuel for the dinghy, and more time on our telephone. It quit during the last call a week ago. But we had been in French Cay Harbour for 2 weeks already and it was 9 miles east and we were experiencing a little bit of a “been there/done that” feeling, and we really didn’t want to go back that far, so … maybe we’d go to Calabash Bight and then get a cab from Oakridge to town. But it was so pleasant going west, surely it couldn’t be that bad anymore if we turned around again. But of course it was.
We then thought, “Maybe we should just tough it out and go to Guanaja.” So we did it for an hour, and the salt spray coated our glasses, and the waves splashed up over the whole foredeck and the engine was roaring. And then we looked at each other and said, “Nope. Not interested in this.
So we turned around again. And we thought, how about if we wait till tomorrow and see what that brings? We patched up our broken boat hook with chopstick splints and metres of duct tape (Jim says it is a Sino/Canadian solution), turned off the engine and had a gentle and lovely sail back to Lime Cay Cut. We moseyed on up to that very same mooring ball, picked it up perfectly and settled down for one more leisurely day in Port Royal.
We’ve been indecisive before, and we really were today … but maybe we’ll just say we went out for a daysail!