“Oh the Times they are a Changing, ” a song made popular by Bob Dylan is all I can think about since my last blog. What started out as a wonderful sail and anchorage quickly turned into the opposite the next day.
Rounding the north end of Grenada on our 24 mile sail to Carriacou the wind and waves exploded. The predicted 15 knots of wind quickly changed to 25. Seas are crashing over the bow of Mile High Dream.
“Im going to have a wet bed tonight,” I say to Diane. “With waves like that the front berth is sure to get wet.”
“Is the hatch closed?”
“Yes but with these seas the water comes in through the anchor locker and soaks it from underneath.”
Diane looks in bewilderment at me. One of the design flaws on this boat rears its ugly head in heavy seas.
The Dolphins don’t seem to mind the big water. A large pods swims next to us and we soon leave them behind when something of more interest catches their attention.
We slog through for 6 hours until we finally reach Sandy Island, our destination for the night. The wind is still high and It will be difficult to catch a mooring ball.
“Reach over the side with the Mooring hooker and grab the line on top. Pull it up and get the dock line through the loop. It is going to be very difficult in this wind. The last time I was here it took three tries to finally catch the ball.”
“Ok, Ill give it a try.”
We miss on the first try and swing around for the second. Diane hooks the rope and tries to get the line high enough out of the water to run the dock line through it. I put the engine in reverse and nothing happens. I put it in forward and nothing. Diane has to let go of the line and we are drifting on a collision course with a big Catamaran. Scrambling to get to the head sail and get some sail out for some power, Mile High Dream smashes sideways into the bow of the catamaran. We untangle from the other boat and get enough sail up to move the boat away from the reef. As soon as possible we drop the anchor.
“Wow, that sucked. It is also going to windy tonight. Guess I won’t need to worry about sleeping in a wet bed. I’ll be sleeping on deck tonight.”
Going below, I find out the coupling to the propeller shaft has wobbled out and no longer holds the shaft in place.
“That was brand new last March,” I think to myself.
We make it through the night with some sleep and in the morning I pull off the coupling to find a replacement. No luck in that department so I email a mechanic in Grenada. He does some checking and cannot find one so he orders one in for me.
“Its a good thing we are a sailboat so we can sail back to Grenada.”
We stay four nights until the winds and seas calm down. One highlight was one fo the best lobster dinners I’ve ever had. Even with heavy rains we enjoyed it immensely.
The sail back to Grenada was beautiful. We are graced by two different whale sightings, and a very large turtle.
Mile High Dream is safe on a ball in Prickley bay after being helped by other cruisers to get securely attached to the ball.
Where is my Part? It’s Grenada Maybe time. The part is on the island but stuck in customs.
Island time, what can a sailor do? Just roll with the waves.