b.c.bound

After an hour retracing our inbound course we made it to deep water and were able to relax again. The wind filled to the point where we could fly the kite and dump the engine. Boy that sail has been a godsend and must have saved us hundreds on diesel bills. We ran out of wool in florida. Tried all over in key west and cuba to find some, but it seems nobody knits anymore! We use the wool to tie the spinnaker every 10 ft so we can hoist before it fills. Have been improvising with other material but the wool is the best. We hooked a really nice mahi mahi on the lure that annie Osborn had bought for us at the Newport boat show. it was leaping around 100 ft behind not happy at all. Sadly, the hook straightened out and the beauty returned to its second life. All thoughts of blackened fish for lunch were put away! Our next stop, cayo jutias, was quite close to the reef we were travelling along and we could see a lovely beach awaited. Another pretty easy cut through with good visibility and we were anchored in 9 ft, just off the white sand. We stayed here the next day, doing the usual beachcombing swimming and snorkelling. I took off in the dinghy to what looked like it may have been lobster heaven. An hour later after exploring some fine habitat, I had seen none! Nothing nada, zero, zip. We had been looking forward to catching lobsters in cuba, but they obviously did not hang in the places we had been used to finding them in the other parts of the Caribbean. Commies, I guess!
Left the following morning with a south west wind blowing! Were did that come from! Eventually had us down to a reefed main and jib doing 7 kts in the flat water. We managed to land a 'bullet' tuna after heaving to and a half hour fight. Boy what a powerful fish. Good eating as well by the way! Mmm.
Had to motor into 20kts to get inside and to our next stop which was behind a disappointing key covered in mangroves. Provided shelter for the night but we wasted no time there and were on our way early next morning. The inside passage was now fairly deep at around 20 ft so we decided to travel this route the rest of the way to to cabo san Antonio which is the western tip of cuba.
20 miles later we had picked our way into a 30 ft deep basin surrounded by five or six idea looking coral reefs which were bound to be teeming with lobsters! Wrong again. Not one. After an extensive survey of the entire area we were able to say, nice coral and fish, but.............
By the time we were back aboard the mother ship a big ugly cloud had appeared on the northern skyline and was coming our way! Decided that this was not the place to ride out a blow with coral heads nipping at our ankles. We found a better spot, tucked on the inside of the reef with a better 16 ft to anchor in. the cloud marched steadily towards us growing darker and more threatening as it came, eventually unleashing 25 kts of gusty wind and a torrent of rain. We were very happy we had made the effort to move! That was the first rain since Norfolk!
Light east wind greeted us the next morning so we motored until, yet again, the big blue sail took us back to the world of sail.
We had not planed on going into marina san Antonio until the following day, so headed into the lee of cayo lenas. As we passed by an anchored fishing boat we enquired if they had any langoster or camerone to trade.
Only makado. Mire, mire, as I pointed to my eyes. A tiny, flapping fish was held up for us to view. No, gracias.
Of we went to anchor in 9 ft. a Canadian couple came over in their rib to tell us that a strong norther was expected and if we wanted to get diesel and water we should do it now. We were chugging slowly towards the marina and I turned around to see the fishing boat hot on our tail, three men in the rigging waiving various bits of cloth and three in the skiff waiving lobsters in the air. All ten crew were shouting. We pulled over, the skiff arrived with 3 of the biggest lobsters we have ever seen! We loaded 10 rather disgusting diet pepsi's into there laps and they departed all sporting big smiles. They had gone into the mangroves, and either caught or had some of these whoppers stashed in pens.
At the dock we completed all the paperwork in record time, thanks to carlos, whose English is superb. We thought we would use the north wind to get around the corner and some more westerly distance but were told that we would have to come back into the dock in the morning to clear out. No amount of bribery,(we gave them one of the monsters) pleading or whining would convince them otherwise and by the time we had loaded 20 gals of fuel and filled the tanks with water it was dark. The boat was behaving reasonably at the concrete pier so we decided to risk it and stay the night.