Going Dutch

So we had to leave Blanquilla as everyone does....you just can't buy beer there...in fact, you can't buy anything there!! It was a sort of paradise island though and I loved the experience!!
Next islands in the chain as we head west could have been Los Rocos...but we decided to tough it out as time was running short and stayed at sea for 36 hours (it was lumpy and grey!) to reach Bonaire before dark. Bonaire is the first in the ABC chain. A nice picturesque little island but unfortunately overrun every day at this time of year by enormous cruise ships. This means that the main town, Kralendijk is totally geared up for the tourists and it's virtually impossible to buy things for boats although the supermarkets were very nicely stocked with goodies! I would have taken photos but my little camera decided to pack up and so I will have to rely on Jim (Delicado) for pictures at some point later. Pam and Jim were just coming into Bonaire as we were leaving ...by sheer coincidence. We have now caught up with each other and intend to "buddy sail" for some while. It won't be a lonely Christmas in some Godforsaken place after all, thank goodness!

The next island in the chain is Curacao and we arrived here a few days ago. We have been anchored in Spanish Water along with all sorts of other boats, some of whom are also heading west. It's a lovely safe place to be and the weather is wonderful, apart from the occasional squall (up to 43knots once). Much breezier and therefore cooler than Trini...I even need a sheet over me at night!!! It's mostly desert and scrubby but still quite pretty, colourful houses and a lovely old colonial Dutch influence in the capitol city, Willemstad. We have got to know this city very well while we've been here as the standard checking in and then out process required by all visiting vessels has taken three days to complete, ie customs, immigration and permission to anchor meaning separate visits to each building located in different parts of the town; all of this happening partly over a public holiday. We ended up having to stay for lunch each day. Awful!! In fact, we've had a lovely time here with lots of delightful dutch people and fellow yachties. And it is sooooo cheap too; by far the cheapest place we've been so far. We now have enough good food on board to last until well into the New Year, including some good Christmas fare!

But all good things must come to an end and we are set to leave here for Aruba tomorrow morning. The weather at this time of year can be very bad so we have to take advantage of a few good days to continue west. I'll be glad to move into another time zone as we are still in Eastern Caribbean time (+4hours) making the mornings too dark.....I don't care about lighter evenings. I just hate getting up in the dark!

The next post will be from who knows where. Somewhere in Colombia is favourite at the moment....... I have a new camera but haven't got to grips with it yet. Hope to include photos next time.

Westward Ho!

We left Grenada at the appointed hour just as the sun was rising and set sail (one actually, just the yankee)for Blanquilla about 150 miles more or less due west and therefore about a 30 hour trip. Just for once, we had no problems at all with the boat apart from there being so little wind that we had to motor most of the way! We didn't turn on the navigation lights at night as a precaution although we were outside the purple alert Venezuelan pirate zone of activity(just!)but had to turn them on a couple of times anyway because of close encounters with tankers.


Mid -morning, Wednesday found us off Blanquilla, a asfe offshore Venezuelan island about 25 miles square, flat, rising just 50 feet out of the water. It is a true desert island mostly of coral, inhabited by birds but with a couple of hermits living on the beach in true Robinson Crusoe style and a small Venezuelan naval base nearby occupied by about 30 personnel. They came out to see us and escorted us ashore, jabbering away in unintelligible spanish. At the time, I wished I had tried for longer than a week to learn the language but I had stopped because I found it soooooo boring. Sorry to those who love the language ...I found it just too much to have to say "no speak spanish, no understand" etc although I'm sure it's far richer once you get into it? As we shall be in spanish speaking waters for some time now, I have promised myself to try again.

So, a true desert coral island. My thoughts so far? It's very grey, scrubby and dull even in bright sunshine! Most of the shore is rough old coral with consequently very few safe landing places for the dinghy though the sand where it does exist is soft snd white and the sea is an almost unbelievable azure. (photos soon when I can get access to my own computer). The flora is mostly scratchy shrubs and cacti and the fauna mostly caracara so far. I can't identify the shorebirds until I find a good book of South American birds! I can't see any palm trees from where we are anchored although there may be one or two further along the coast. Incidentally when we tried to anchor first in another bay around the corner which wasn't sheltered enough, we pulled up a sizeable lump of coral! Luckily, the wave motions washed it off. It's now starting to rain again so I shall retreat below...more later.

It's now later and we have moved away from the "Robinson Crusoe" bay around the coast to the south and west and here it is just as I hoped the Caribbean would be...the first time I have sat on a beautiful deserted beach with white sand, shells and a palm tree or two. No signs of civilisation anywhere apart from a couple of ruins and a shrine.....Perfect!! Around here we have just the birds and some tiny lizards for company although we have heard some wild donkeys braying somewhere.
The rock which seems to make up the island beneath the coral is granite, not dissimilar to L'eree's rock, the main visual difference being the cacti which are growing in the cracks and boulders of coral scattered around. I shall be boring and try to Google Blanquilla's geology at some point. In the meantime,I intend to enjoy the cooling breezes and the luxuriously warm water just a few more times before we have to leave......

Finally, it's Greetings from Grenada!

We have finally left Trinidad after nearly 6 months of heat and humidity albeit with 5 weeks back home in July/August and 5 weeks of adventure and misfortune in Tobago and Guyana in Sept/Oct!
Moonshiner is now briefly at anchor in Prickly Bay, Grenada after a lumpy 13hour and sleepless overnight trip from Chaguaramas. Everything onboard now works………
We plan to leave early on Monday for the 30 hour sail to Blanquilla. (Look it up on Google Earth?) It’s supposed to be a lovely place but we won’t be staying there long unfortunately as we would like to be in Colombia by Christmas and that is quite a long way away
After Blanquilla come the Islas Los Rocas which is a Venezuelan national park. If we‘re lucky, we can stay there without paying (almost $100 for this boat if the Park Rangers spot us!) and then sail on to the ABC islands, Bonaire being the closest.
In Aruba, I intend to sample once again the legendary cocktail “Ariba Aruba” which I last tasted in 1976 as a cadet aboard the good ship “Esso Scotia”….my vague memories tell me that it was rather potent, that I managed to down three of them while on a run ashore and that I missed my cargo watch as a result but didn’t get into trouble because I had been in the company of the ship’s captain and the harbourmaster!! This time, I shall be more mindful of what I’m doing because I should like to see some of the island this time, slightly more clearly….. My memories of Curacao are still less clear as I didn’t even get beyond the dock gates of the oil terminal there, choosing instead to stop at the Seamen’s Mission where the beer was plentiful and cheap. Well, I was young and foolish then and the world was my oyster, as they say. This time, I may actually manage to take photos………

The leaving of Trinidad.

It's not over 'til the fat lady sings....well, she's not exactly fat, just well rounded (!)and she's not exactly well er at the moment and I'm not sure if she can actually sing (maybe people are just being polite!) but it will be over soon anyway......the Trinidad saga I mean. This is because the "final thing" is nearing completion and it should be back on the boat on Monday so we are now making preparations to go!!!

The generator is the final and the biggest thing and it has taken over three weeks to sort it out but, fingers crossed, it's sitting on a bench, no longer in half a million pieces...... and running. It just needs to be nestled back into place in the lazarette and connected up correctly to various bits. This will be no mean feat as we have to be alongside the dock rather than bows on as we are at the moment but it can be done!

We have to get fuel to fill the main and the reserve tanks as well as filling 14 x 20ltr containers because most of the fuel was removed when the tank was cleaned. This will be quite some task....the best and cheapest fuel dock is about a mile away by dinghy. This means at least seven trips there and back as we can only take four containers at a time in the dinghy. A possible alternative is to talk nicely to the tanker drivers just across the way who come down to refuel the fishing boats..... The yachties here are very good at finding the cheapest way of getting things done on their boats but this method of refuelling apparently hasn't been discovered yet. The little station previously mentioned sells diesel etc to the pirogues and at about a quarter of the price that one would pay in the marinas. So diesel and petrol cost about 16p per litre! Well worth the effort.

I went into Port of Spain yesterday with Pam (Delicado) and Chris (Canadian, Little Meg). We had a wonderful time doing "girlie" things which meant mostly looking in material shops. You would not believe just how many of these there are...a whole street of them and,inside,they are VAST....miles and miles of the most amazing fabrics. They were also incredibly busy: people here still make most of their own clothes, soft furnishings etc. We also spent some time in the shops dedicated to "carnival" which as you may know is huge, held annually in February and which seems to take a whole year to prepare for. These shops were a mecca for anyone who likes making things. I just wish I'd had my camera to show how colourful the place was.

I contented myself with buying some spandex (very cheap) to have a go at making bathers etc and to buying the most brightly coloured dress/skirt I could find (as shown above!). I love the amazing colours you see everywhere here. I shall miss that but we are more than overdue to move on. I shall miss the friends we have made here too although we hope to catch up with many of them further along the route. Some have left already. Pete (Troutbridge) left for Grenada nearly two weeks ago now but he is still there, waiting for us I believe!

So this may be my last blog for a while as the current plan is to head straight for the offshore Venezuelan islands having sailed north and west in a big arc to avoid "pirate territory". These islands (Blanquilla and Los Rocos) are virtually uninhabited but are far enough away from the Venezuelan pirates and make convenient overnight stops on the route to the ABC islands. First stop there is Bonaire. I have never been there but have visited the other two, Aruba and Curacao, in 1976 when I was a tanker cadet. It'll be very interesting to go back there!!

Ramblings with the heat.

It's just too hot to do anything apart from stand by the galley fan or lounge around in the pool. Trouble is, the pool is at least 25 yards away and getting there is just too much effort when the temperature is 34 degrees yet again so here I shall stay until it cools down by about 4.30pm... I was going to make some little Christmas cakes using "Delia" but I have no glace cherries. Going to the shop to buy some would mean the most enormous effort, actually walking about half a mile. This is an absoloute impossibility so cakes will have to wait until I can get the airconditioned bus to the shopping mall next week....

The work on the boat is progressing which is a good sign. Many boats sit here for months with nothing being done at all. The yard workers are very good at stopping work for all sorts of reasons so they have to be gently nudged into continuing until the job is finished.

I have been helping to feed the dear little cat, Phantom who lives around here. She is well fed and quite contented! She only gets fed in the evenings though when it's dark otherwise the birds eat her food. Cats in some of the other boatyards get fed too but not all. The uncared for cats look very skinny. There are also lots of sad and sorry dogs roaming around all over the island. Someone needs to sort out a neutering progamme I think.

We are going a barbeque this evening, the third time in a week I believe but it's probably the simplest way to cook and maybe the cleanest too in the end? A group of regulars meet "under the trees" for sundowners and food at around 5.30. We are mostly english speaking, Aussies, Americans and Brits. We were invaded by some Germans last week but we eventually learned to get there first and claim our seats before they arrived! At last Monday's gathering, I did some earcandling on a willing volunteer, Bill the retired US lawyer. See the photos on Pepe's blog address..... http://blog.mailasail.com/beezneez/381 I hope this link will work. It saves me a lot of writing.

On that note, it's started to rain so that means closing the hatches and absoloutely steaming below decks unless you sit outside and get wet. Some choice!!

Still in Marina with water, power and shiny clean diesel!

I have been trying to upload a few photos which Jim from Delicado has very kindly given me but have been thwarted every time by gremlins and bugs in the system....the power goes off, the computer runs out of battery, my time online limit expires or something else happens.....but THIS time I think I may just have succeeded in getting one or two......
Meanwhile, we wait in the marina on the boat for the "final thing" which is the putting back together of the generator, currently in millions of pieces in a workshop.
Then we prepare to LEAVE...... we are all "Trinied" out!!!

The pictures I've managed to upload are of an enormous moth which landed on the boat, about 5 inches across and of me washing my hair in rainwater in Guyana. Eat your heart out Timotei girl!!

Update from hot and sticky Trini..

An update on the boat repairs so far!
There were five things that had to be fixed, namely the GPS battery, the echo sounder, the “dirty” fuel in the tank, the engine (and start battery) and last but not least, the generator. So far, we have had three out of five done. Today, the boat is in a marina for the first time since February so that the fuel can be “cleaned”. The fuel was “polished” back in July but there is apparently an awful lot of gunk in the tank which finds its way into the engine and clogs it up so that it then stops running and leaves us up a creek etc…
The generator is still in bits in a workshop and will be the last and most awkward job to get done, the most expensive too!

From my point of view, it’s nice to be able to step onto dry land whenever I want and there are showers etc ashore as well as a couple of reasonably priced eateries nearby. We will stay here over the weekend while the work is done then fill up the water tanks and go back out onto a buoy while we wait…..and probably wait, for the dreaded generator.
It’s the time for fellow cruisers to move on westwards one or two have actually managed to leave but most are still waiting for things to be fixed. There always seems to be a hitch somehow. Sometimes it’s the weather…it absolutely buckets down many afternoons bringing all work to a halt. Mostly though, it’s the Trini problem (actually it’s the same throughout the Caribbean I think) that the workers are just “waiting” for something, anything really. They are good at that!

The constant heat and humidity makes any effort uncomfortable so people move very slowly to keep cool. It is better at night now, well it IS November after all! The decorations are up around the shops and Christmas music can be heard. I don’t feel at all Christmassy though. It’ll be my first one in a warm climate and I’m sure it won’t feel right at all. No one will get cards this year!! I haven’t seen any on sale yet and the postage will be prohibitive so it’ll have to be emails or short phone calls instead.
I think most of the yachties are planning to be somewhere special for the 25th Dec; the San Blas islands seem favourite at the moment. Let’s just hope that we can join them in time. It is a thousand miles to get there with a few short stops en route….so if the work is done within about two weeks, we will have enough time….

Now I’m off to explore ashore!!