It is Monday February 5th, and we are back in Chatham Bay, Union
\nIsland. We are happy to finally get out of Clifton Harbor
\nafter a couple of trying days. We had hoped to get all of our
\npassage preparations done on Saturday and leave at 6 am Sunday.
\n Saturday was not long enough a day for us. We spent too much
\ntime catching up on email at Erika’s Internet Cafe and then did
\nnot finish our food shopping until 5 pm. When we headed back to
\nthe boat in the dinghy, the wind was up in the mid-20 knot range
\nand it seemed like a bad time to haul the outboard engine and
\ndinghy onto the deck. We had a long list of things to do before
\ndeparture and there was no way we could get them done that
\nevening. So we decided to stay one more day and plan on a
\nMonday departure.<\/p>\n
Saturday night brought one squall after another beginning about
\n10:30 pm and ending about 8:45 am. When the wind howls and the
\nboat pitches, I feel the need to get out of bed and sit at the
\nhelm in case the anchor drags. I was particularly concerned
\nbecause we were anchored in back of a reef, and thus there was
\nno protection from the wind, and in front of another reef, and
\nthus if we dragged we would quickly be be hard aground and
\ngrinding on the rocks. The last squall was the worst that I had
\nseen in the Caribbean with winds approaching 40 knots and
\nlasting 45 minutes. Our anchor held and we did not move an
\ninch, but I was exhausted. I went off to bed in the forward
\nberth hoping for a few hours of sleep but an hour later I heard
\n Laura’s rapid footsteps above me and her shouting. I figured
\nthat she was telling a local vendor in a boat who was trying to
\nsell us stuff that we were not interested. A minute later she
\ncame into the forward berth and told me I need to see what was
\ngoing on outside. There was a 51 foot Contest sailboat (“Lara”)
\nflying the French flag that was obviously out of control
\ndirectly in front of us. The helmsman was using his engine and
\nbowthrusters to try and keep from crashing into “Sabbatical III”
\nand the neighboring catamaran, also at anchor. He swung within
\na few feet of each of our boats and his two crew run around
\nfrantically trying to figure out what to do.<\/p>\n
Laura saw the hold thing unfold. The boat came into the tightly
\npacked anchorage at high speed with an anchor already hanging in
\nthe water. Laura ran forward and yelled repeatedly at the
\nCaptain not to anchor in front of us or he would likely get
\nentangled with our anchor and chain rode. He simply shrugged
\nher off and dropped his anchor while still moving forward, a
\nmaneuver common among French vessels. As he pulled back from
\nhis anchor he nearly missed us and the neighboring catamaran.
\nHe then sheepishly realized that he was badly placed and begun
\nto haul up his anchor when his windlass ground to a halt. That
\nis when I came up on deck. He yelled out that his windlass was
\njammed. The occupants of all of the boats in the area came out
\nto see the show as he swung wildly around trying not to hit us
\nour our neighbor. A Union Islander came out to help and dove
\ndown 18 feet to the bottom on multiple occasions. I sat at the
\nhelm with the engine running just in case he pulled up my anchor
\nand we started to drift. After 90 minutes the French boat
\nretreived her anchor. I asked the Union Islander what the
\nproblem had been and he said that the French boat had caught my
\nanchor chain with her anchor. If we had not been on the boat,
\nand the French boat had pulled up our anchor, we would have come
\nto grief on the rocks.<\/p>\n
That misadventure, plus continuing high winds and squalls kept
\nus in Clifton another day. We went to bed exhausted at 7:30pm
\nand got up early this morning to finally get the dinghy up and
\nthe downwind poles set. We left Clifton before someone else
\nanchored on top of us and headed west to hoist our balloner and
\nthen furl it along with the genoa on the headstay. We
\nimmediately ran into a problem since we have a brand new
\nballooner halyard that was too big to fit into the slot at the
\nhead of the ballooner. So I sat on deck for 45 minutes as the
\nboat headed west, filing the slot until the halyard would just
\nfit. Once we got the two head sails up (and doing over 8 knots)
\nand then furled them,we were over 6 miles due west of Chatham
\nand so had to motor directly into the wind and chop to get back.
\n We are now peacefully anchored here in wide open Chatham Bay
\nand are mostly set for the 412 nautical mile passage to Bonaire.
\n We figure it will take us 54 to 62 hours. To be certain that
\nwe arrive in Bonaire when there is still light, we plan on
\nleaving here at 2 am AST in the morning (just 7 hours from now,
\nor 0600 Zulu). Our course is pretty direct — taking us just
\nnorth of Las Roques (Venezuelan islands) and around the southern
\nend of Bonaire and up to the moorings just off of the Habour
\nVillage Marina.<\/p>\n
M.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It is Monday February 5th, and we are back in Chatham Bay, Union Island. We are happy to finally get out of Clifton Harbor after a couple of trying days. We had hoped to get all of our passage preparations done on Saturday and leave at 6 am Sunday. Saturday was not long enough a … <\/p>\n