Things I wanted to google while on passage.

Do flying fish fly for fun or only when they are being chased ?

Are there whales in the Caribbean Sea ?

Rings around the moon, huge like the ring around Saturn and smaller brown tinged, does this predict weather?

Clouds that look like cotton wool balls what weather do they predict because they look like gorgeous big fluffy pillows?

What type of dolphin has slightly spotted underbelly and a white tip on his nose? 

Airfare prices to Australia, airfare prices to UK. ?

CHECKING IN INSTRUCTIONS FOR ENTERING GRENADA !!!

Does it rain much in Grenada ?

How do she wees work ?

You get so used to having the internet that it’s very frustrating when it’s not available, as we departed St Croix it was a mad scramble to send family and friends messages to let them know we were heading to Grenada and we would be out of contact for 4 days (we do have an iridium go that we use to get weather we can send emails to those who have downloaded the app but it’s incredibly slow)

I quickly edited and upload a new blog page just before the signal faded completely, as we sailed further offshore, I was happy to get this done before we land in a new country.

We hadn’t made a copy of the docking instructions for when we arrive, I know we have to fly the Q flag and proceed to marina but we are not sure if we need to radio our arrival to the marina staff or relevant authorities, and we don’t want to get it wrong and upset anyone, maybe our buddy boat Timmies Run will have the information.

We are doing the run to Grenada alongside Nath and Brian on Timmies Run it’s nice to have a buddy boat - as long as they are in our sights we can communicate via vhs radio, Brian called us a couple of times just to say hello, the 3rd time was on day 2, it was to let us know that the cloud formation ahead of us looked like it might produce a water spout, a mini whirlwind over the water, we kept a sharp lookout,  but that one didn’t develop into anything that we could see, yesterday we had had to change our course to avoid one that was forming directly in front of us on the horizon, they are common here at this time of year, one had been spotted just off the pier when we were anchored at Frederiksted, can they can get big enough to pick up a yacht ? - just another thing to stress about!!

Our departure morning was full on, we had gone out the night before for a few drinks with Fruit Bat, Gina Lee, Timmies Run and Breakaway it ended up being a big night so we were a bit fuzzy and slow off the mark. Bars and restaurants are finally opening up and we are leaving!! 

We had returned to “Fred” for a painkiller cocktail then on to a cool little bar that sold vegetarian food, cbd oils and weed paraphernalia, add a bit of reggae music some good friends and it’s party time.  Oh yes and don’t forget the KFC on the way home.

Craig not usually one for leaving things to the last minute (always) still had to scrape the barnacles and growth from the propeller and rudder it took him ages to muster the energy to don his wetsuit mask and flippers, it’s very pleasant in the water he just didn’t have the motivation.

As he was getting ready he put the GoPro on his head and then promptly forgot about it so it wasn’t until we were putting things away getting ready to leave that he remember he hadn’t seen it when he was getting out of the water......so he had to jump back in and look for it, luckily he remembered and thank goodness he found it sitting on the sand under the boat.

So after he had scraped the hull, visited everyone,  dropped off borrowed books, picked up copies of departure forms that Timmies had very kindly printed off for us, we are out of ink and haven’t been able to source more, been to shore to drop off the last bag of rubbish, then tried to get money out of the atm but it seemed to be offline so we are arriving in Grenada with US$26 I guess we won’t need much for the first 14 days then we can go to an atm and get out EC (eastern Caribbean dollars) we can always use our credit card if we have to. After all that we were almost ready but just as we were about to lift the dingy we discovered the lock holding the motor on - had seized, out comes the grinder, talk about OHS,  I couldn’t watch as Craig held the grinder to the lock, there were sparks flying everywhere not to mention the boat bobbing and rocking making the task ten times harder, eventually the lock split open and we could prise it apart, then using a long rope we winched the engine aboard.  We take the engine off the dingy for the longer rougher passages it lessens the weight /pressure on the davits that hold the dingy out of the water at the back of Adriana. 

We finally managed to up the anchor and leave at 12:45pm instead of the planned midday, not too bad considering.  

We set our waypoints into the chartplotter, we are heading straight to Granada no stopping at any of the Windward islands, Anguilla, St Kitts & Nevis, Antigua, Montserrat, Guadeloupe, Dominica, Martinique or St Lucia.

Their borders are all closed, if things had been as before covid 19 we probably would have island hopped all the way down spending time exploring a few of the islands but instead we are doing it in one shot 490 nautical miles, 800kms 4 days and nights at sea, our longest offshore passage so far, Nova Scotia to Gloucester was 3 days and 3 nights out in the North Atlantic at least this trip is warm, the water temperature is in the 30’s c it’s the Caribbean Sea and I only pulled out the blanket to hold off the dampness in the middle of the night, we were still in shorts and T-shirts.  This will be our 7th country we are excited to get moving again.

Overall we had a great sail, only using the engine when we were departing, then a couple of times to maneuver out of the way of squalls including avoiding a water spout, and once to outrun a strange fishing boat, then on arrival to get into the harbour and dock so we hardly used any diesel yay.

We had one breakdown - the first night we noticed the red navigation light wasn’t working so when it was nice and calm late in the afternoon on day two, Craig had a look, at first we thought the bulb had blown but no it wasn’t the bulb, there was still a dull glow, turns out someone had  done a dodgy quick fix and the wires were all rusty and deteriorated held together with black tape, once he knew what the problem was Craig was able to replace the wiring, enough to get us through the next two nights, we will add this to his quarantine project list.

While we were going slow and Craig was lying prostrate on the bow with his head in the chain locker fixing the navigation light we were visited by a pod of Pan Tropical Spotted Dolphins, it looked like there were around 30 of them, lots of little ones, they swished past so fast under the bow, jumping out the water to check us out, at one stage there were 4 of them rising out of the water in perfect unison.  It was a sight to behold they played around us for a good 20-30 minutes, I was enthralled, Craig was too but he had to keep working to get the light fixed before the sun went down.

Most of the time over the 3 days the boat was really heeled over, this makes preparing food difficult and dangerous especially if it’s hot food. 

We had tabouleh and falafels wraps, I’d grated carrots and prepped a heap of salad stuff, radishes, cucumber etc so our lunches were easy.  Craig had made a beef stew for our first night it was full of potatoes so only needed heating, we had a spaghetti bolognaise in the freezer that we ate for the 2nd and 3rd nights it was relatively easy to boil up some noodles we didn’t mind eating the same thing twice.

The seas are lumpy so the ride is bumpy and you really don’t feel that hungry we had lots fruit and some not so healthy snacks that we munched on especially during the night/early morning to help keep us awake.

By day 3 we were feeling a bit yuck and smelly, lucky us, we have an outdoor hand held shower at the back of the cockpit so we were able to take a refreshing shower, that certainly made us feel better but that feeling like your hungover is always there due to lack of sleep, we did well taking it in turns but poor Craig I always seem to have to wake him up.  The first time was on early morning on day 2 I could see a boat on the horizon we were heading towards it and it seemed to be coming towards us, it was not on AIS, it looked like a fishing boat with a white roof, I must add that Timmies Run is the only vessel we had seen out there at this point!! Anyway this fishing boat seemed to release a smaller outboard, we were at least 75 nautical miles offshore passing between Guadeloupe and the Dominica, the fishing boat looked so uncomfortable, they were rocking and rolling in the big seas, like it didn’t belong out there, I woke Craig up just in case they were pirates, we hadn’t heard of anyone being attacked but we were not taking any chances, we started the engine and did a right turn and sped away from them, I spent the next half hour watching the horizon through the binoculars checking they were not following us, we were further offshore than Timmies at the time. Who knows maybe it was just a fishing boat but we weren’t taking any chances.

If eventually we are able to get into Trinidad for the sail from Granada we will use a coastguard service that accompanies groups of boats offering protection from pirates. And in these strange times where jobs have dried up and men can’t feed their families there will be a lot of desperate people out there. 

The second time was the morning of day 3 he had been asleep for only about an hour when I noticed we were heading into a big black squall, so up he got, steering us towards a break in the clouds where the sky was a tiny bit clearer, we seemed to skirt the worst of it, we pulled in the foresail our mainsail was already reefed in (not out the full way) but we had it set ready to pull in further if the winds got too strong. Our optimum wind speed is 12-15 knots I watched as the instruments went up and up the highest I saw was 27 knots but we sped along with winds consistently at 24-26 for half an hour or so, then they abated back to 15-16 and the sun came out, not long after that the wind dropped down to around 10 knots and the seas flattened, that’s when we had our lovely showers.

Timmies radioed us to say Brian had caught a Mahi-mahi then he caught a second one, Craig was rather jealous as he wasn’t having much luck.  We do see hundreds of flying fish, at first they look like birds flapping their wings taking off from sitting on the water then you realize that they are actually silver fish, it seems the sea if full of them there are so many then you realize there has to be other fish they just don’t come to the surface.  

In Magens Bay we were entertained daily by schools of palm sized silver fish jumping out of the water, the water was super clear there and if they were close to the boat you could see the big ball of them all swimming and turning as one large entity, not just one type but some tiny ones with a streak of luminous blue were also schooling around the boat, it was beautiful to watch.

We had had our line out and Craig was so excited when we caught a huge big one, all was going well, he let out the angle of the main sail so we were not pointed so tight into the wind, that slowed us down, we were just smooching along at a couple of knots, Craig was reeling the mahi-mahi in very gently and much more calmly than previous fish, wind wind, rest, pull up, wind wind, rest, pull up, we could see him what a whopper, beautiful yellows flashing below the surface, when suddenly whizzz off he went the swivel holding the wire line to the fishing line gave way and off swam the mahi-mahi, steel line, lure and all.  Seriously it’d be cheaper just to buy fish when we want to eat it !!!

Buying 2 sportaseats while we were in the USA was a bit of a game changer we now had decent padded seats to sit on and these seats are hinged so the back can stay upright giving good back support but as much as they are great and soft to sit on by halfway through day 2 my bum was sore, it felt like I was getting bedsores from sitting so much, I asked Craig and yes his bum was sore too, we can stand up but there’s not much your able to do when she’s heeled over on such an angle it’s dangerous to even change seats, maybe not life threatening dangerous but rib breaking, leg bruising, knee twisting dangerous.  Going downstairs to make food or even a cold drink or cup of tea is an ordeal, for me going to the toilet is a nightmare especially as I put it off for so long I’m usually climbing down the companionway using 2 hands and dancing around with my legs crossed. I wonder how those she wees work, maybe that’s what I need for the rough passages.

Craig ended up with a grazed bump on his forehead, he went forward at the same time as the boat wall came towards him, I bashed my cheek leaving me with a black eye under the same circumstances and I think I’ve got some bruised back ribs that are still painful a week later.  Adriana was heeled over, I was sitting on the high side using my foot to brace myself to keep on the seat, I was turned slightly to the side as my bum cheeks were aching, when suddenly my foot slipped I slid off the seat hitting my side (just above my waist) on the seat as I slid down, ouch it hurt. It’s not affecting my breathing so nothing is broken.

Eventually on the fourth morning just as dawn broke we could see land, we knew we were hours too early and planned to slow down but as we entered the lee of the land the wind dropped right down, we managed to keep going doing only a couple of knots we were hoping to stretch out our arrival time so we could go straight into the marina to check in but we were really way too early so on went the engine and we motored the last few miles dropping the anchor in the outer harbour and grabbing a few hours sleep before the marina opened at 8.30am.

The radio started up around 7am with other new arrivals asking for instructions about where to go and how to check in so we certainly were not alone.

After a quick shower we lifted the anchor and made our way into the inner harbour turning right through the red and green channel markers, as we approached the docks we could see there were men there ready to help us, we had been told to tie our fenders on the port side but the dock we were being ushered into was a starboard side tie up,  this always seems to happens to us, damn damn quick, we had to re do our fenders and lines Craig having to leave the wheel to come and help me.

Tying up was easy with the staffs help, we were instructed to fly our Grenada flag and our yellow Quarantine flag, it took Craig a second try to get the Grenada one the right way up, there is a tiny image of a nutmeg that has to be the right way up, Grenada is famous for supplying the world with cloves, nutmeg and ginger. 

They asked us if we required water and pointed out where to drop off our garbage, there were actually a couple of Australian flagged yachts tied up too, Craig managed a quick chat, it’s so good to hear Australian accents again.  We were not going to bother filling up with water but one of the other boats had their hose already hooked up and offered us to use it, we read the meter before we started so we knew how much to pay for our share, it ended up costing US$6.00 as that’s was all the change we had. 

Boat by boat we had to go ashore (wearing our face masks) and see the nurses stationed in a white tent, they welcomed us to Grenada, gave us a card to show the coastguard if we were approached, written information about the covid testing, a quarantine certificate and we had our temperatures taken.  We have to go back in 14 days to have a covid test the one where they swab your nose and the back of your throat, that’s when we will take our passports and boat papers to properly check in to Granada.

It slowly dawned on us that life after quarantine is still going to be limited, the island has a curfew 7pm to 5am, walking on the beach only between 8am and 11am.

No socializing on each other’s boats at all, locals are not allowed to go to each other’s houses yet and definitely no Lyming.....

We found out via the cruisers net the locals call any socializing, gathering, drinking, partying, hanging out, sitting on the beach “lyming” and they don’t pronounce the g on the end “Lymin” and it’s been banned.  Hopefully things will ease as the days progress, at the moment there are no current covid cases, yesterday we watched a cruise ship come into port everyone is like wtf but it turns out they were just dropping off repatriating  a few locals who had been stranded onboard. 

Things might still be quite severely restricted here but I’m quietly happy we have departed USVI’s where they had opened up to allowing tourists from the USA onto the islands.

We counted 120 boats anchored in the quarantine area, there are flags from all around the world, including a large number of Aussies but also British, Canadian, French, Italian, South African, not so many American flagged boats and more monohulls that catamarans. The big expensive (million dollar) boat next to us is German flagged the couple onboard don’t wear clothes much Craig is always looking perplexed when the lady is sitting with her saggy boobs looking our way.

I never thought I would see a man snorkel in the nude !! 

There is a cruisers net each morning at 7.30am, that keeps us informed of what’s happening around us, local boats zooming too fast through the anchorage is a big problem especially while people are swimming around their boats for exercise.  

There are trivia nights and bingo, to raise money for local charities. local businesses advertise their services, we can’t wait to get quarantine over with so we can go and explore and eat the local specialities.  We have to be here or Trinidad for 5 months to let the hurricane season pass, they are predicting a busy storm season as the oceans (again) have higher than usual water temperatures.

We are in day 6 of 14 we managed to get a local SIM card at the marina when we checked in but it only has 15 gigabytes for the month so we are limiting our usage to try and make it last the whole month.

We have a hard drive full of movies and tv shows, The Handmaidens Tale has got us through the first 6 days, but it’s a bit dark and depressing and knowing the locals are watching the harbour to ensure we don’t break the quarantine rules it’s a bit spooky.

The view to shore is of steep densely treed mountains, I’ve read there are tropical rainforests but not sure if that’s what we are looking at, but the clouds sit heavy over the peaks casting them grey and mysterious looking.  it’s peak fruit season mangos, melons, avocados, so we might place an order at the end of the week via the approved suppliers list, there are a large number of big houses looking down on us but it’s very pretty, we have picked up a local tv station but we are a bit too far away so it’s fuzzy and drops out all the time, a bit too hard to watch.

We swim every day for exercise and to cool our core body temperature down, it rains often with us doing a mad scramble to shut the hatches, every time but sometimes the showers pass so quickly they are over before we have finished.

We are a little too far away to chat to any of our neighbors which is frustrating the boat behind us is called “Yottie” it’s Australian flagged from Sydney and we’d love to hear the young couple onboards story, hopefully we will meet up with them somewhere around the islands.

There are 3 main islands in the territory Grenada, Carriacou & Little Martinique, once we are out of Quarantine we will be able to explore them all.  As I’m writing this they have modified the beach restrictions to all day use yay things are easing up, things are changing everyday. 

We just have to be patient and sit out our quarantine.......