We checked out of Mayaguana in the Bahamas. We had met a young German couple traveling in a 28 ft sailboat in Mayaguana. Michael and Nicole of S/V Stardust had bought their boat on the Hudson River in New York and were sailing it to St Thomas where they were putting it on a freighter and shipping it back to Europe. We traveled with them for a while. They are the ages of our own kids and they were fun to be around. It appeared that we had a good weather window so we decided to take advantage of it. We left for the Dominican Republic. They say that you can smell the DR before you see it. It is a lush, green country. After being in the dry, sparse, Bahamas, the Dominican Republic is a welcome change. We left in the morning and arrived at Luperón, DR the next morning. Now we start playing the winds and the island affect. We had read all of Van Sant's books and what he was saying was starting to make sense. The winds blow hard from late morning until after sun down when the storms start and the islands start cooling down. Our passages from now on will start late evening or early morning with the intent of arriving at our next destination before the winds kick up again.
We took a tour of the DR and enjoyed the local landscapes as well as the people. Ah yes, and we did speak Spanish. John's Spanish is getting better every day. We visited the amber museum in Puerto Plata as well as the very active farmers markets.
The summer weather patterns are starting and we get another beautiful window. We decided to leave the DR and make our way to Puerto Rico. We are traveling with two other boats: Allan and Pat on S/V Nauti Nauti and Michael and Nicole on S/V Stardust. This was a 248 mile trip with the Mona passage in the second part. This can be a real problem due to the depth of the Puerto Rican Trench ( second deepest in the world)and the winds. We were lucky and had calm seas and light winds during the entire crossing. It took us about 40 hours total. We cleared customs at Mayaguez and then traveled to Boquerón. Boquerón is a party town for college kids, quaint with lots of bars. We left Boquerón with the destination of Ponce where we will be provisioning and buying supplies for the rest of our trip south. We plan to leave Ponce on May 11th. Our next stops will be Culebra and the Virgin Islands.