Guadeloupe, March 2015.
The past year my sailing was limited to the windward and leeward islands, did receive a lot of visitors and those island are very easy for the people coming from Europe.
There are two things that I would like to bring forwards.
- During my stay in Grenada the boat started dragging one night, luckily there was nobody behind me and no damage was done, but when I tried to lift my anchor all my lights when off in the boat. I lifted my anchor by hand and moved the boat. Later when looking for the problem I did find out that there was a bat contact on the negative of my main battery, this battery bank was there for more than 3 years and all was working well till that evening. So my advice is control your connections regularly. The result of this matter was that two of the Raymarine equipments broke down as well as my small autopilot how where in use during that evening.
- The other point was that I needed a medical intervention to repair my hernia. The hernia I did myself during cooking. A speedboat passed by and the cooking pans slipped from the cooker, tried to stopped them and burned my hands, felt backwards to the chard table, some pain in my site and a nice hernia. Did visit the surgeon in St George, but could not do the operation in time so that I could pick up my next visitor in Martinique for November, but advised not longer to sail till after the operation. By December my visitors was gone and I was in Guadeloupe, did visit again the surgeon on December 28 but he could do the operation not before March 13.
Did do all the necessary visits before the operation date, like blood test and anesthetist . All when very well except that for each appointment I had to go two times as there was each time a reason to have it postponed. But finally I was admitted in the hospital and the operation was performed without any problem.
The way the hospitals are operating here is different than in Europe, for example the family looks after the patient. I was installed in a room with 4 beds, two young men and a older man that was waiting for a CT scan on Monday. The whole the family was with these young people, till 9 in the evening. There are no pillows in the bed, so the family brings the pillows, there is no drink with the lunch or dinner, so the family brings the bottles of water. Luckily there was a nice older nurse who helped me and did find me a bottle of water. When I was leaving the hospital, the nursed where so confused that nobody will pick me up, so they organized a hospital taxi that broth me to the marina.
Conclusion, was very happy that I had my operation here, the medical staff is very competed but the administration had some problems, appointments that where moved without information, a lot of problems to have the bill paid. A very nice thing where the very nice young nursed who looked after me. The doctor asked me to recover till mid April before sailing.
Now that I am completely recovered it is time to use the bit of time of this sailing season that remains. My friend will be here mid April and then we leave for Dominica and Martinique. There my friend will return to Belgium and I will continue to Grenada where my friend will visit me again for a month , after 3 months I will then continue my journey to the ABC’s where my friend will join me, and stay on the boat. We would like to have our new year in Aruba and then we must return to Belgium for business. On are return we will continue to the West.
Now that all the repairs and replacements have been done and my medical problem is been looked after I am pleased that I can continue my sailing adventure.
Pleased to be on the way again and this time with my friend and partner.