MsChievous

Our long-awaited voyage to the tropics began after Susie recovered from her new-found severe peanut allergy and our up-close view of (quite good) emergency care in Bermuda. (Needless to say, we’re not touching any nuts until we know more about what exactly she’s allergic to!) The forecaster said all was go, so we sailed out through Town Cut on Sunday morning, heading due south. The wind was lighter than expected (12 kn) and we had a lot of residual northerly swell from the front that had come through, so we did a lot of rolling – and motorsailing. Susie had planned ahead with several dinners frozen away, so thankfully not much time had to be spent down below in the galley. After two days, the wind turned to nothing. We were happy to have the rollers from astern diminish, but the chug-chug of the engine is not what we were hoping to be listening to. Finally, after Day 4, we were approaching the latitude at which the trade winds from the east kick in - but such was not the case this year. Instead we got 20-25 kn on the nose from the south – along with 6-10 foot waves. Ugh. We reduced sail to limit thrashing about, which was fine, but unfortunately that meant we couldn’t point very close to the wind. After spending a day getting only 30 miles closer to our destination, we used a few salty terms, turned the engine back on and pointed the boat to Tortola. (What we didn’t realize was how much water we were taking through the forward hatch allowing us the opportunity to wash everything in the forward berth once we got to the BVI, including the mattresses!) We finally spotted Tortola about 9 pm on Friday night and entered West End about 1 am Saturday. We had made it – but then the fun really began.

The British would probably categorize our next half hour as a “proper cock-up”. The harbor is quite full, and deep for anchoring, so we tried to pick up a mooring. We almost had it in hand – when the fuse on the circuit for the windlass and bowthruster blew. So much for that attempt. We then circled around to make another attempt – when the fuel tank gave us its last. (We knew it was close but inspection an hour before looked promising.) We had no options but to drop our secondary anchor where we were before we paid an unwelcome visit to a neighbor’s boat. Despite the hour, prodigious friendly suggestions were offered from some Italians on a nearby boat, but their state of inebriation or level of competence precluded their actually rendering any assistance. We quickly poured our last 10 gallons into the fuel tank from jerry cans, relocated ourselves and then fell into bed about 3 am.

Oh, and not yet mentioned is the failure of one end of the dinghy davit lift during the passage (due to wear on the line from the seas) and the loss of the last of our fresh water due to the water heater moving and jerking out the inlet connection. Oh yes, we have a spare jug of emergency water – except that this had sprung a leak and was empty. We were down to beer, wire, soda and some (real) water in the fridg for our last day of the passage.

Anyway, the next morning the boat looked like you can imagine, but first we had to do the health, customs and immigration dance. Luckily, Susie found a smoothie vendor on the customs dock – nothing has ever tasted so good! We then refueled and moved around to Nanny Cay Marina for a few days to begin “re-combobulation”. That, plus accommodating ourselves to the heat took three days, but the pool and the restaurants helped! And – we’re finally in paradise!!

However, even paradise has its hazards. While in the pool one afternoon, I felt a sharp stinging in my palm. Looking down, I found a bee stinging my hand underwater! Apparently it had landed on my hand while it was above the surface, and I happened to submerge it before he flew off. He apparently wasn’t certified in SCUBA! (Thankfully, I’m not allergic to bee stings!)

In all – 943 nautical miles, which for reference is greater than the distance from NY to Minneapolis by air, and slightly more than Seattle to the Mexican border. Whew!

Off to explore the islands!