January 2010 Archives

Yesterday, Friday, we accomplished all the priority tasks we had planned for Grenada. We had to sacrifice a few of the minor tasks in order to accommodate our schedule. But, with a lot of hard work, help from the other cruisers here, and frequent trips to shore with the dinghy, we got it done! So, we're ready for departure.

We're kind of sad to be leaving our new friends already. But, unfortunately, we have to get going or we will miss one of the best dive sites in the Caribbean - Bonaire. We hope to be able to spend at least 3-4 days there. We're hoping to leave either today or tomorrow - depending on the winds/weather.

After getting things cleaned up in the boat mid-evening, I took the dinghy over to talk to the other cruisers about our plans. Ended up at s/v Grace, and the crew from Ascension were visiting there. Grace is also headed west and we may end up at the same island in a few days. We had a really nice chat again about cruising experiences, teaching kids on boats, plastic in the oceans, pollution around the world, and even Patrick O'Bryan books (author of "Master and Commander"). It was amazing listening to Ascension - who have traveled around the world - describe with passion the travesty of pollution they have seen, and the disregard of the local people for the consequences of dumping trash and plastic into the sea. They also described beautiful atolls in the Pacific with trash all over the beaches - these are islands with no people on them!

Below is a summary of some of what we got accomplished yesterday:

We finished re-installing our jib sail. I spent the early morning soaking the jib sheet lines in a bucket of softner to remove salt and stiffness. Karen and I installed a new furling line in the morning, because the old one had some chafe. Thanks again to some help from Gord on Ascension, and help from Karen, we got the new sail up, and I went up the mast to properly affix the special steel halyard we have for our jib and adjust the furling system stopper at the top. We weren't done with all that until about 4 PM because of other parallel tasks.

I picked up a new engine starter battery because the old one was starting to not hold a full charge (and it was suspect because of a problem with our battery system when we first bought Tahina). Although, I had to go back to the store and exchange the new battery because it turned out we needed bolt connectors instead of posts. And it turned out the new one had 1/16th inch larger bolts. But, that wasn't a problem since I bought new butterfly nuts. The local bus didn't hesitate to pick me up with my battery in a rolling crate. I had to pay double-fee for a drop at the boatyard, but that meant it cost me about $2 US. A lot cheaper than a taxi.

We also finally got the custom security bars we had made for our two ventilation hatches. These bars are intended to give us more comfort at night in areas where crime is sometimes reported. The two hatches are quite large and accessible, so making it impossible for someone to just crawl through is a prudent move. We got the idea from another catamaran we met.

Karen got some last minute grocery items to make sure we're ready for a few days with limited grocery supplies. One thing I wanted to mention is that when we went to pay the rigger for the sail work, our credit card got declined. This has been happening to us at least once a month. And, apparently its getting to be an all too common occurrence with boaters traveling down here. I had called and informed the credit card company of our travel plans months ago, and they said they had made a note on our account. But, it keeps happenning. Fortunately, the business owner happened to use Skype, so I was able to make a call to get it cleared up. But, they took nearly 15 minutes to do it and made the business owner late for a lunch appointment. What a pain!

Finally, I wanted to mention that the customs guy I met when clearing out late yesterday is the nicest customs agent I've met in the Caribbean. I mentioned it to the other cruisers, and they all agreed he's the nicest man. So, if you want a positive customs experience, hopefully you'll get this guy if you try Prickly Bay's customs office.

We began our journey in mid-November with our departure from North Carolina, and a seven-day sail to St. Martin. We started moving south towards Grenada within a week with stops along some of our favorite islands of the Caribbean island chain. As we approached the holidays in St. Lucia, we had seen many charter boats, but few cruisers - people who live on their boats and travel extensively. One thing that increased their visibility was the arrival of the ARC - Atlantic Rally for Cruisers: about 300 boats left to cross the Atlantic from Europe and arrived in St. Lucia - mostly arriving in the middle of December. We started seeing several boats flying the banner of the ARC meaning they had made the crossing. But, we weren't meeting many of the cruisers.

Admittedly, we were traveling through the islands more quickly than normal for that time of year. And, the economic conditions have resulted in fewer cruisers plying these waters. But, our previous experiences had caused us to expect we would have met and made friends with more cruisers by the beginning of the new year. We met a couple of boats - like Northfork and Bamboo. And had some good times with them. But, not as many meetings as we expected. Maybe we just weren't sociable enough.

Well, we now are almost overwhelmed with a positive taste of the cruising community. Here in Prickly Bay, Grenada we have met up with at least a dozen boats. And, we really feel like we've finally joined the cruising community. Yesterday was a particularly moving day for us. We found out our furling hardware was completely ready to go first thing in the morning. By noon, we had taken Tahina back to the boatyard and loaded the re-assembled furler and forestay onto the deck. Thanks to help again from the cruising skippers on Djarrka and Ascension, we anchored in the small bay near the boatyard and re-installed the equipment. It was a great feeling having our boat back together (except for the sail which we should get back by mid-day today after its minor repair).

Later in the afternoon, a cruising boat with kids on board was expected to arrive. This boat, called Grace, has 3 kids on board and the owners are from Australia. Like most kid boats, they are very popular with the other cruisers. There was a happy hour scheduled at De Big Fish, the main bar/restaurant with the dinghy dock near the boat yard. So, a number of the cruisers decided to converge there. Karen and I offered to go help take Grace over with our larger dinghy - so they wouldn't have to take down their dinghy after their full day of sailing (they had come down from Bequia and left at 3:30 AM).

Karen and I had a wonderful time immersed amongst these friendly people. And, their helpfulness has been fantastic! Many of these cruisers have traveled thousands of miles together, or met in dozens of ports. Others may have only met once or twice. But, you would never know as it seems just once or twice is enough to form lifelong friendships. In fact, last night it felt very similar to being at a family gathering. The kids from Grace were bright, energetic, and friendly as could be. You should have seen the hugs they gave to the other boaters. Half the evening they were sitting in the laps of their parents or other cruisers. The other half they were running around playing inside and outside the restaurant.

It turns out Grace is headed west also. With about the same schedule as us (at least up to Tahiti). So, we will probably get the chance to spend more time with this family from Australia. Based on first impressions, we are really looking forward to it. And, at the mention of the Wii we have on board, we're likely to be quite popular with the kids.

After only a week here in Prickly Bay, we've made many new friends. Originally we hoped to finish as quickly as possible because of our deadline to meet up with friends who are flying into Aruba. Plus, leaving west from Grenada means we will be sailing in new waters and visiting islands we've never been to before. But, now we almost feel reluctant to depart because we will have to say "Au Revoir" to so many of our new cruising friends. Fortunately, with the arrival of Grace last night, we at least feel we'll have a part of this community coming along with us. And, we certainly will remain in touch with the others via the Internet.

The cruising community is a big part of the wonder and excitement of traveling the world by sailboat. It's really great to feel we are now truly a part of it. Here are some pictures of the last few days - mostly showing the removal and installation of our furling unit and forestay. But, also showing a few shots of the dinner on Tahina (with Djarrka and Ascension visiting), and of the cruisers get-together last night (it really looks like a family outing doesn't it?).

When we discovered on Tuesday we had more repairs to do, we were worried about our schedule for leaving late this week. Fortunately, yesterday we worked with the local rigging shop (called Turbulence at the Spice Island Marine Boat Yard), and they were able to help us off-load the headsail/forestay (we pulled Tahina up to the boatyard dock), and then quickly got the sail off. They hope to have the hardware part done by today (Thursday). The sail repair is a small job, but they can't do it until Friday because of other work in their schedule (there is a regatta starting this weekend, so lots of boats are having their sails repaired). The prices are mostly reasonable, the only sticker shock is the extrusion for the headsail track is pretty expensive. Fortunately, the labor hours will be low - in part due to the fact I'll be able to re-install the headsail with some help from my new cruising friends.

Speaking of which - we invited the crews from Ascension and Djarrka (who helped us on Tuesday with the sail) to come over for dinner. So, Karen and I spent the day cleaning up Tahina (inside and out), and Karen spent all late-afternoon cooking up a mighty feast. Djarrka and Ascension seemed pretty impressed with our comfortable new home. I, of course, had to show off some of my tech toys (VideoRay, cameras, kite rig, etc.), and photography. It turns out both of the crews had been gone so long, they had not even heard of the Wii. So, we gladly gave them a taste of the Wii experience. And naturally, a fair amount of time was spent talking about sailing adventures, problems, and fishing stories.

During the day, we also managed to get laundry done, trash unloaded, and a propane tank filled and put back in place. Today we hope to get more errands run, and in the afternoon pick up the repaired jibsail hardware. If we do that early enough, we hope to re-rig the forestay and hardware so we'll be ready to simply re-install the sail when its done on Friday (tomorrow). We will then be able to leave for Bonaire as soon as the appropriate time/weather window opens.

Yesterday we went to the Fedex place first thing in the morning to pick up the furling unit sent to replace our broken furling drum. We had to take a bus over to St. Georges (the main city in Grenada) to get to Fedex. Once there, the guy asked if I had the proper paperwork - which I did. He then got out the receipt and said unfortunately I would have to go back to Prickly Bay to get customs to fill out a form. Oh great. I started to walk out the door and saw the nearby yacht club - which I knew had a customs office. So, I walked over there and went to customs and explained I had a part arriving. He got me a form, signed off and stamped it, and sent me back. That was easy! So, I went back and paid a small $35 EC fee on my "duty free" part (there's always some kind of fee down here). I happily had the package and headed back to the boat.

I won't go into all the details here. But, with the help of my new friend Gord from Ascension, we started the operation to get the old unit off. We were going to need to take the sail off we thought to lessen the weight so we could get the drum off. So, we re-anchored near the eastern shore of the anchorage. When we unfurled the sail and attempted to lower the sail, it wouldn't come down. That was not a good thing. We looked up and Gord spotted that two of the several pieces of metal that make the "slide" for holding the luff of the sail into the furling unit (called extrusions) were not connected properly. The screws connecting the parts apparently had come out. As a result, the sail luff was getting caught in the now uneven slide, and had been chewed up in the sailing since it had happened. So, we were going to have to take the whole forestay down.

It ended up taking several hours as we puzzled out the best way to get it down. We actually talked to the local marina and boatyards, but neither had a good spot available at the moment to park Tahina so we could use a dock to get the sail down. But, we ultimately decided to do it at anchor, laying it on Tahina's deck, with the help of a dinghy and a third set of hands. Before sunset we had it down on the deck, but still couldn't get the sail off. Looking at the extrusion, it appeared we were going to have to get it replaced/repaired. And, the sail is going to need repairs! Ugh. So, today (Wednesday), I'm going to the sail rigging shop to see if they have the time and parts needed to get this job done quickly.

We need to get out of here by the end of the week or we're going to really have to rush to meet our guests in Aruba on the 9th of February.

I owe a big debt of gratitude (at least lots of drinks and food) to GB of Djarrka and Gord of Ascension.

Yesterday when I posted the photos I took while up Tahina's mast showing boats in the anchorage, I had no idea it would result in our meeting more cruisers in one day than we've met the entire trip so far. One of our regular readers is a guy who sailed 27,000 miles starting in the US, only to stop in Turkey a year or so ago. Chris and his wife KT, on s/v Billabong, had decided to stop their journey on the seas to start a bigger family. Now happily parents of a baby boy, they still keep in touch with the sea by living vicariously through other sailors on the web.

When I posted the photos of the anchorage here in Prickly Bay, Grenada yesterday, Chris stared closely at the boats. He knew some boats he had traveled with before might be in the anchorage. He suspected two of the boats near ours were ones he had traveled with and quickly sent me an E-mail. I pulled out the binoculars to check the names, and it turned out he was right in both cases! One of the boats, a Canadian flagged mono-hull called Ascension, had their dinghy parked behind, so we assumed they were home. So, Karen and I jumped in ours and went over to greet them. I first made a quick copy of the photos onto a USB stick.

You can imagine their surprise when I explained how we had taken pictures on Sunday and posted them on our blog, only to have Chris spot them in the photo! We were instantly invited aboard and began introducing ourselves to one another. We learned they had traveled extensively with Billabong from Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, all the way to Turkey. Ascension also has an extensive web site documenting their travels. They were thrilled to get pictures of their boat off the USB stick.

The coincidences got even more uncanny though. Earlier in the morning I had gone to the boatyard to talk to a mechanic about making some bars to cover our two large hatches used for ventilation located between our bows. There have been reports of burglars climbing in through hatches. The mechanic said it was a big coincidence I came in, because I was the second person that day to ask for that. He had not had anyone ask for them in 6 months. Well, can you guess who the other boat was? Yep, Ascension! And we somehow managed to meet them within 2 hours of learning from the mechanic (without his telling us who it was).

The next coincidence was also fateful. Ascension told us there was a meet up going on at a nearby beach in the evening to meet other cruisers in the anchorage. So, at 5:30 we took the dinghy to the beach and got to meet a bunch of cruisers - including those on Djarrka - the other boat Chris recognized. Most of the other boaters were world travelers who have already gone most or all the way around. I was nearly overwhelmed with offers for useful information about our upcoming destinations. And, there was a lot of interest in what Tahina is doing with our web site and photography. Karen and I were both thrilled with getting to meet so many people who share our passion for the cruising life.

The only thing wrong with the day is that the furler never showed up at the marina. It never moved from the Fedex facility all day. One of our cruiser friends suggested it is most likely actually at customs waiting for us to go fill out paperwork and pick it up. Oh wonderful, I could have done that earlier in the day! So, first thing on Tuesday I'll call FedEx and go over if needed.

On Thursday we had a fast 5-hour sail down from Sandy Isle to Prickly Bay on the southwest side of the big island of Grenada. Prickly Bay is a large popular anchorage with a variety of boat services available including a marina and boatyard. We dropped anchor in the middle of the bay and have been here every since. We plan to do a number of boat projects while here in Grenada including fixing our furler, installing some fans, new LED nav lights, and a variety of other tasks. We want to be in fit shape before we head west and marine stores and services are harder to find.

We had a nice italian-style pizza at the marina restaurant the first night. On Friday we went to Budget Marine - a marine chandlery - and bought a bunch of little items for the boat including a tricolor LED light bulb for the mast light. We also bought some charts for the ABCs, pump parts, courtesy flags, and solvents. You can view the GPS tracks of the recent passages: Sandy Isle and Prickly Bay.

We had planned to do some sightseeing on the weekend, but decided to make sure our boat tasks were worked on first. On Saturday, I found out some medicine we had ordered had arrived at the Marina late Friday. We went to pick it up with no hassles, but opened the box to find the company we bought it from put the wrong dosage. It's a problem that we hope we can get them to fix quickly (we'll find out Monday). We next went into St. Georges by bus to go to a marine chandlery.

The bus ride was kind of interesting. We walked down the street from the boatyard to a round-about. Before we could find the bus stop some guys in a van (that looked like one of the buses) swerved over opened the door and a guy said "Get in!". I said: "Is this the number 1 bus to St. Georges?". He pointed at the front and said "Yeah, get in!". We got in and the bus zoomed around and went up a back street. I was a bit nervous thinking we were picked up by thieves or something. They backed up across another street and another van/bus zoomed by. Our driver yelled at that bus and took off and passed him. Then the guy who opened the door made a cell phone call. As we drove down this back street the door guy was yelling out the window "Bus?". One guy stopped walking and jumped inside. Then we picked up some girl walking down the street. We then turned on a street I recognized and I finally felt like this was a legitimate bus. The buses were actually competing for business. Times are tough down here.

At the chandlery we found an LED anchor lightbulb to go along with the tricolor light we had purchased Friday. We also got a few other misc items for the boat including a new set of GPRS walkie talkies which come in handy when we split up to run errands.

On Sunday we worked on several projects. Karen did some sewing projects - working on a seat cushion and some oven mitts. I decided to perform a service on a winch (there are all kinds of sailor jokes about their winches - just watch out for the spelling). One of our main electric winches has been acting up, and it was time to do maintenance anyway. So, I disassembled the unit, cleaned up the gears, checked and oiled the pawls and springs, re-greased the gears, and re-assembled the winch. It took a little long since this was the first time for this sized winch. And, it made a big mess (see the bigger picture in the slideshow below). But, it worked fine mechanically once I got it re-installed. Unfortunately, there's an electrical problem still.

I also went up the mast twice. First to take down the anchor light assembly. Then I spent an hour taking out the bulbs and installing a custom socket for the new tricolor bulb. It took so long because the bulb receptacle was larger than the original, so I had to file it larger. I also was unsure of the correct orientation of the unit towards the bow. But, I managed to deduce what I thought was right. Went back up the mast, and everything looked right. So, I put it in place and we turned it on to test. Guess what? It actually worked! While up the mast, I took several photos of the anchorage and nearby boats. Two nice things about the LED bulbs: 1) they use far less energy during the long hours of the night - so less drain on the batteries, and 2) they last much longer, so don't need to be replaced often (incandescents last as little as 6 months).

We did a variety of smaller maintenance items as well during the weekend. You can see photos from the weekend in this slideshow of photos including the mast shots, fireworks we saw one night at a house behind us, and the work on the winch:

I was awake well before dawn on Wednesday. First I wrote the blog post about our plans to leave for Grenada. I also wrote the post about the kite aerial photos, but had a technical problem with the superoverlay. Then I started preparing the boat for departure, and got Karen (reluctantly) up at 6 AM. We raised anchor and motored out away from the other boats before raising the mainsail (so we wouldn't wake people up). Then we started sailing for the western point of Bequia before heading southwest toward Carriacou.

Our furler is broken, but it still turns. The drum just raises out of place on a tight reach. So, we can carefully deploy the full sail. We just can't reef it (make it smaller) if the winds are too high. Fortunately, we were on a reach (wind behind or to the side) and so we were on pretty perfect conditions. Tahina was making 9-10 knots much of the 30 miles down to Carriacou. With an early morning sun, and heading south, we were in the shade at the helm. Always a pleasant thing. And the seas were less than 2 feet. Awesome!

The only things bad about the trip were that an errant wave rocked the boat and two of our dishes flew out of the drying cabinet and shattered on the floor, and water came through the galley portal and got on the floor and counter. We're usually more careful.

To make things better, we had a pod of dolphin join us for a while and dance off our bows (check out the photos of them in the slideshow below). We dropped sails just before arriving at Hillsborough in Carriacou. The trip lasted about 4.5 hours. We took the dinghy ashore and cleared customs by noon. The only unusual thing were the two soldiers we saw carrying M16s. Security problems? Karen got some bakery items while I was doing customs.

We went back to Tahina and weighed anchor to move to the nearby island called Sandy Isle. This is a very picturesque island that earns its name with a beautiful white sand beach along the length of its eastern shore. There is beautiful turquoise water in the anchorage and we decided to stay for the night. Check out the pictures - including a few underwater shots when I went snorkeling. Unfortunately, the reef was damaged in a hurricane and most of the coral is dead or covered in sea grass. But, I was excited to see a small school of reef squid and got some close-up shots. We had a nice lunch and took a self portrait. And, check out the sunset!

Earlier this month, you may have read how we flew a kite over the lovely "deserted" island of Petite Tabac near the Tobago Cays in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. The same island used for shooting the scene where Elizabeth burned Jack Sparrow's rum in the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. We flew a camera from the kite and took a bunch of photos from the sky. The aerial images have been given to Google who will later put them into Google Earth's imagery. Like what was done with our marina back in North Carolina back in November.

A friend of mine, Stewart Long of GonzoEarth , happens to specialize in processing imagery like this. He just yesterday finished taking the kite photos of Petite Tabac and stitching them together to capture the island from above. You can actually get an advanced look by viewing this file with Google Earth which overlays the kite photos. We've sent the imagery to Google, who will hopefully get it in Google Earth soon.

Oh, and here is a self-portrait taken as the kite was first going up (you can see the remote control panel in my gloved hands - the gloves are for winding the string on the big kite):

By the way, for a real technology treat, you can view the entire kite aerial shoot with a cool technology called Photosynth. This gives you a 3D perspective of the photos, but requires you to install some special software. Check it out here. Amazingly, all I had to do was install some software and upload the photos. Photosynth did the rest!

Tuesday was our last day in Bequia. It was a VERY productive day though! I spent a good portion of the day finishing set up on the new laptop. I had not backed up the windows partition on the old laptop. A foolish mistake for which yesterday's work is only the beginning. But, I managed to get the most critical work done rebuilding the Windows side of the laptop (under Boot Camp). This was critical because several navigation related applications we have only run on Windows. In particular, our boat charting/navigation software called RayTech, and our radio e-mail software.

First the new laptop had to be backed up, and then I had to partition the drive, install Windows, update the software multiple times, then install the software, and test it with our boat systems. Although very time consuming, the process went remarkably smoothly and I was done by mid-afternoon.

Meanwhile, I was able to do engine maintenance on the generator includings: oil change, oil and fuel filter change, zinc anode replacement, and belt adjustment. That was a big relief as I was about 75 engine-hours overdue.

We got word from Profurl (who makes the furling unit which broke), that they had a new unit packaged and ready to go by FedEx to Grenada. So, it should arrive in a few days when we get to the main island. We're having it sent to a marina near one of the main anchorages. Not sure what day its going to arrive yet though.

We got word our house has been shown several times during the past week. One person even looked twice. But, still no offer. Big news though: yesterday we finally had someone agree to buy my plane - it has been up for sale for 14 months. That's a big relief! Lots of good memories in the plane though - *sniffle*.

It's a shame we spent so much time here the last week, but hardly did any sightseeing. I had tried setting up a special dive to take the VideoRay out with a local dive shop. The hard part was identifying somewhere we could park Tahina near a dive site since we need somewhere with electrical power to drive the ROV. We also just got too busy to schedule it. The computer stuff took a lot of time as well.

We're leaving today at 6 AM. Hence the early morning post. We'll be headed to the northern-most island of Grenada called Carriacou. Not sure if they have Internet, so we may not report in for a couple of days.

Yesterday was a major milestone. I finally cleared all the customs and delivery hurdles and got the new laptop on board Tahina! I need to give a special thanks to an anonymous benefactor who made a big contribution towards the new laptop. And, I want to thank my friend Andy who took delivery of the new laptop in the US and arranged to ship the computer to me here in Bequia. I'll be thanking him again when he visits us in Aruba next month.

I spent yesterday afternoon and evening getting the new laptop situated. My hats off to Apple and their migration tool which very quickly migrated all the backed up data from my old laptop to the new computer. The only problem I encountered is that one of the licensed software packages requires registering to the new laptop, and it won't let me do that again without buying a secondary license. I also spent several hours downloading software updates on the slow Internet connection and getting them installed so the laptop is up to date.

Today I plan to build the boot camp partition on the laptop so I can install the navigation software on the laptop. Later I hope to retrieve the windows partiition on the old laptop (which I hadn't backed up), but we need to remove the hardrive from the broken laptop first. We'll also retrieve the 5 or 6 days of data I had put on the OSX side of the laptop which was not backed up - including some photos.

Meanwhile, the Profurl replacement furling part is finally being shipped to us today (I have a tracking number) from France. It will be going to a marina in Grenada which we'll pick up in a few days. We plan to leave early tomorrow to move down to Grenada - first to the island Carriacou where we will clear into customs and do some snorkeling.

We have started buying some items we want my friend Andy to bring out with him when he flies out to Aruba to visit us. He may need to pay some extra baggage fees, but it will be worth it verses normal shipping costs.

As mentioned in yesterday's post, we went for a sail yesterday to make some fresh water with our watermaker. As we were arriving back to Bequia, a guy in a rubber dinghy started taking photos of us under sail. This is a professional photographer, with PhotoAction.com who later comes to your boat and offers to sell you his photos if you like the results.

Seven years ago, when we arrived in Bequia on our previous boat, we later regretted that we chose not to pay the rather pricey amounts for the photos. It's surprisingly hard to arrange for good photos of yourself with your boat under sail. So, this time we bit the bullet (nearly $200 US), and bought the package. Check out the results here (click on the option below to view them full-sized).

On Friday afternoon, two good things happened with deliveries: The pump part we've been waiting on for two weeks (a maintenance kit needed for our primary fresh water pump), finally arrived. Naturally, I had a very frustrating time disassembling the pump thanks to confusing instructions. But, the work was finally completed after 2.5 hours and we tried the pump: it worked! No leaks now. That was a big relief.

Meanwhile, the laptop finally arrived at customs here in Bequia late in the afternoon Friday. I went to sign for it, and found out they recommended getting a broker to fill out the paperwork. And, at 4PM it was too late to have it done. So, naturally we have to wait until Monday when they next open up. Oh goodie.

On Saturday, I decided to do some basic engine maintenance. Changing oils, fuel filters, checking belts, etc. I got about 50% of the work done on the two main engines. The generator still has to be done as well. One problem is that I need a new filter wrench. Couldn't find the one I thought I brought, and I walked all over town trying to find one for sale. But, I was happy to get done what I did. Karen also got some tasks done as well.

So, we decided to go out for dinner. We went to the only good tex-mex mexican restaurant we've found in the Caribbean. A place called "Tommy's Cantina" here in Bequia. Karen really liked the margarita she got when we last ate there, so we both ordered margaritas and a nice dinner. After dinner, we walked back to the dinghy and drove it to where we left Tahina anchored. Only, when we got there, there was no sign of Tahina! Oh my gosh...I drove around in a circle two or three times. Did we drag anchor?! Did someone steal it!? We had left the keys in the ignition. If someone stole it, they couldn't have gotten far. But, finally, I started going in bigger circles and suddenly saw Tahina on the other side of a boat we had been near - right where we left her!

Well....I think that Margarita was a little bit strong for me. You have to understand we had been parked in the same spot for 5 days. And, I have a pretty strong sense of direction - normally. Now I know why I rarely drink strong drinks! :-)

Today - Sunday - we took Tahina out for a sail. Although the furling unit is broken, it can still be deployed manually - but, we can't reef it. But, the winds weren't too strong today. We wanted to sail a few hours so we could make more fresh water with our water maker. We make about 15 gallons per hour. So, after our 5-hour sail we had added a good amount to our tanks. We also got some chores dones while we were sailing, but no fish were caught. As we were approaching Bequia, a local photographer was taking pictures of boats arriving. We'll probably buy one or two of his photos.

As mentioned in the last few posts, we're spending some extra time in the Grenadines to await some shipments including a replacement laptop, and some pump parts. We also now need to wait either here or in Grenada for a new furling unit (an essential part to deploying our headsail) to replace ours that went bad a few days ago. We hope to leave for Grenada by the end of next week - although we may go earlier if the furling unit can't get here until later than next week. In which case, we'd have to manual deploy our sail to get down there or just be a motor boat (not something I want to do!).

We had originally planned to go to Trinidad and Tobago after Grenada. But, based on input from several other boaters down here, we've decided not to go. The primary concerns are that Trinidad and Tobago has undergone a lot of change since Hurricane Ivan in 2004 struck Grenada and altered the boat insurance practices for hurricane season. Insurers no longer cover boats in Grenada. So, hundreds of boats suddenly moved south to Trinidad and Tobago causing a huge upswing in business. Then, when the economy plunged last year, hundreds of boats got left on the hard indefinitely there. This upset the economy enough (at least from a boating perspective) that the prices have skyrocketed, and the quality of work has dropped. Meanwhile, reports are that the main port of Trinidad is a real messy port with both water and air pollution that mucks up your boat. So, we've decided not to go there. We've also decided to not go to Venezuela due to deteriorating political conditions in that country.

So, we're going to go straight from Grenada to the ABCs by early February. The ABCs are Aruba, Bonaire, and Curucao - part of the Netherland Antilles. My friend Andy and his wife are coming to stay on Tahina for a few days while we are in Aruba. We're looking forward to sharing our wonderful new life with more of our friends. Part of the reason we got Tahina (with extra staterooms) is so we can have guests. We hope other friends will join us as we continue around the world.

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After exchanging e-mails and photos during the last two days of our broken furling unit, with the manufacturer - Profurl in France, they have offered to replace the unit under warranty. It's good to know they stand behind their product. Now, I just hope they can deliver the replacement unit quickly. We also have to return the defective unit back to the manufacturer. We can't sail practically until the unit is replaced, so we're anxious to have the work done.

The new laptop is on its way and won't arrive until Monday. So, we were planning to stay at least that long here anyway. We're still waiting on a basic maintenance kit I ordered two weeks ago here in Bequia. They claim its been in customs for two days now. The kit will help repair one of our two fresh water pumps which has been leaking.

Meanwhile, its time to do some basic maintenance on the engines. So, I'm going to take advantage of our time here to do that work, and a few other odd jobs. Internet has been pretty good here this week, so we are definitely getting plenty of communications and computer stuff done! Speaking of which, here is my latest 360 Panorama - of our favorite beach in the Caribbean: Macaroni Beach in Mustique (from our visit there last week - added photos in that post):

Macaroni Beach, Mustique - St. Vincent and the Grenadines in Grenadines

The title of this post is an old adage - you really do spend a lot of time repairing your boat as you cruise. But, the locations you do the work in certainly makes up for it! The process of finding, ordering, and having parts delivered is actually more challenging than most repair jobs. Hopefully I don't find I'm wrong about that someday.

Here are some photos from Admiralty Bay in Bequia - the main anchorage of this beautiful island in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. When we arrived here on December 30th, the anchorage was crowded. Nearly 300 boats were here during New Year's Eve. This is a popular anchorage anyway because it caters to boaters. There are stores, restaurants, chandleries, a fuel barge that delivers to your boat, customs facilities, ferries, dive shops and more. In fact, that's why we're back here now. We have some boat work to do and mail to receive (the new laptop is on its way). It's easier to have parts delivered here than more remote places.

Here are a sample of pictures from Bequia - I'll probably add to this album as we process more photos here:

I haven't taken any 360 Panoramas here in Bequia. But, another sailor, named Honza Kudr, has taken a number of panos of Bequia (and other islands in the area). Here's one he did from his boat deck in Bequia:

Bequia, bay at Port Elizabeth - The Grenadines (Caribbean) in Grenadines

Trying to catch up on some important events from the past couple of weeks. Shortly after the new year, I went on a scuba dive with Mark, the skipper from s/v Northfork. We went with Dive Bequia - one of the dive shops here. They picked us up at our boats with our equipment. We got our equipment together as the boat took us to the dive site. We ended up diving for about an hour on a nice reef along a ridge in a bay on the western end of the island. It had lots of lively coral and sea life. Depths were between 30-70 feet. We saw many unique fish including both a baby and adult spotted drum, scorpion fish, flounder, lobster, eels, and more. I also took a number of video clips (which will take me even longer to process). Here are a few of the best photos from the dive:

We intended to go back north to Bequia this week to pick up some stuff we had shipped there. We ordered a maintenance kit to fix our leaky fresh water pump, and the new laptop will be coming hopefully later in the week. On Monday we left Tobago Cays and moved over to Union Island to check the Internet, get the Monday post out, get fuel for Coconut, and make some calls. The anchorage off the reef there is actually pretty nice, so we decided to stay the night.

The next morning (yesterday), decided we would leave. But, it was kind of rainy when we got up and the Internet was behaving better. So, we stayed until almost lunch time. It was still a bit squally and the winds were a tad strong (about 20 knots), but we were going to go slow to make more fresh water with our water maker.

We put up the mainsail with two reefs (greatly reduced sail), and let out two reefs worth in the genoa as well. We were going to have to be on a reach (going a bit against the wind), so the winds would be strong. It wasn't too strong though, the strongest gusts we saw were up to 30 knots - and that only happened a couple of times. Because of the reduced sail, we were going a modest 6 knots or so most of the way.

We were about 3/4 of the way and the winds had reduced below 20 knots for some time. So I had let out the genoa sail. We were considering letting out the main. But, the edge of another squall caught us and we started speeding up. I noticed the winds getting up to the mid-twenties and told Karen we needed to reduce the genoa. In fact, the winds got up to the high twenties at that point. So, we immediately put two reefs in the genoa. Since it was raining, we went inside the cockpit, and a minute later I heard an unusual bang.

I stuck my head out to look, and noticed the genoa was all the way out again. I looked down and saw the furling line was somehow below the drum of the furler. I went up to look and realized the whole drum was lifted up a few inches. Uh oh! The squall had already passed at this point. I told Karen to fall off the wind (go downwind) and we took the pressure off the sail. I untangled the line a bit and then we rolled up the furler manually. Obviously the drum mechanism attachment had either broken, or come loose somehow (I suspect broken).

Having the furling mechanism broken on this essential sail is not good. So, we'll have to get it repaired or replaced quickly if we want to sail. Otherwise, we're just a motor boat. In fact, we had to motor the remaining 1.5 hours to Bequia where we dropped anchor. We grilled some cheeseburgers for dinner and made some Skype calls home during the evening. Today we plan to investigate the broken furler, extend our stay a few days in the Grenadines, check to see if the part arrived, and maybe upload more photos.

I've mentioned Petite Tabac in recent posts. It's a beautiful island located just outside the horseshoe reef protecting the main anchorage of the Tobago Cays - a marine park which is part of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Petite Tabac was used as the island where Elizabeth and Captain Jack Sparrow were stranded and Elizabeth burned his stockpile of rum in the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie.

I had been on the island once before, so I knew we had to go again and take some pictures. We took a 360 panorama from the deck of Tahina in the small anchorage. Surprisingly, four catamarans managed to squeeze in there for a few hours that day. I had never seen more than two. We also went ashore and took some kite aerial photos, but you'll have to wait a while to see the results of those (which will show up in Google Earth someday).

So, imagine yourself on the deck of Tahina and view this panorama. Make sure you zoom in (choose full screen too) and tilt your view up to look at the mast. Turn around to see the Tobago Cays, Canoun, Union Island, and many other islands and boats. (NOTE: The anchorage was choppy, so Tahina was bobbing on the seas. I tried to keep things level, but there are some stitching problems with the horizon if you look closely. Overall, I think it works though.)

On Friday, I went out and did some snorkeling at Tobago Cays and took some underwater photos. Back at the boat, I realized this was turning into a perfect day without a cloud in the sky. I took some photos and video of the amazing scenery. I had just finished taking pictures and noticed another catamaran making a turn behind our boat looking for a spot to anchor. Suddenly, I realized it was a St. Francis catamarn just like ours! A quick look with the binoculars, and I saw it had the new hard-shell dodger I had read about in a forum, and I was not surprised that the name of the boat was "Bamboo". The hard-shell dodger allows them to have glass windows you can open to let ventilation into the cockpit.

I hollered to Karen we had a sister ship in the bay, and she came up to look. We watched them anchor and then got some things together and took Coconut over to visit them. We drove up to Bamboo and said: "It's not often we see another St. Francis 50 in the same anchorage." Their eyes searched around as they said "Where?!". We laughed and said they passed right behind us. Bill and Roxanne introduced themselves to us, and we were quickly making talk about our two boats. They had mentioned they were tired after a rough ride up from Grenada, so we made a graceful exit telling them we were headed to Union Island for a few hours.

Karen and I wanted to get some provisions and get some Internet to take care of home stuff, and get the post done I made that day. We then headed back to Tobago Cays. It was nearing sunset so we immediately dropped the dinghy again and headed to Bamboo to see if we could get together. They invited us aboard for drinks and a tour. We ended up staying well into the evening sharing stories about boats we've owned, and learning about the interesting customizations they had made to Bamboo. (My favorite is the built-in lazyboy chair in the salon, but there are many other nice features).

We got back to the boat and made a quick dinner. We knew we'd be trying to invite Bamboo over to our boat the next day, so we started cleaning up after dinner. But, before I could go to sleep, I was not feeling well. I tried going to the back of the boat to sit in the cool breeze. A few minutes later, I was leaning off the back of the boat emptying dinner into the water. Apparently there was some leftover I ate, that Karen did not, and it did not agree with my stomach. I was awake most of the night, and did not stop emptying the stomach until Saturday evening. Karen guitily admitted she kind of enjoyed the lack of typical activities and spent the day cleaning up the boat.

There's good news though, Sunday morning I was feeling completely recovered. I ate a light breakfast, and took a shower - and felt like a million bucks. We decided we would move over to Petite Tabac and take some kite aerial photography, and we got some good photos! And, I did a 360 panorama there as well. So, lots of good stuff to share in upcoming posts.

We headed back to the main Tobago Cays anchorage mid-afternoon. We had made arrangements with Bamboo to have them over for dinner. So, Karen started prepping dinner (and an apple pie), and I did some cleaning and started processing the photos we took.

We had a very nice dinner with Bamboo Sunday night and talked a great deal about the cruising life. I showed them some of the photography we've been taking and the VideoRay ROV. They had sailed Bamboo from South Africa a few weeks earlier and ended up in Trinidad and then Grenada. Unfortunately, Bamboo plans to head north tomorrow as they have visitors coming to stay on their boat. So, we may not see them for some time to come. But, we said our aur revoirs and will certainly stay in touch via E-mails or SSB. The cruising life is sometimes like this - you'll have a surprise meeting, make new friends, and - often too soon - have to part ways, but stay in touch by other means. If you're lucky, you'll run into them again in some later port and have new stories to tell and laugh about.

The southern Grenadines are home to some of the most idealic Caribbean scenery you can find. The highlight area is the Tobago Cays. A set of small islands with white sand beaches protected by a giant horseshoe reef. There's nothing between you and the Atlantic except the barrier reef. You're anchored in bright turqouise shallow waters, can watch the sunrise right off the ocean, and sunsets over islands to the east. You can easily swim to nearby smaller reefs and see many fish, eels, corals, and crustaceans. One of the islands has a protected area as a sanctuary to sea turtles. Swim in there and you're almost guaranteed to see a few sea turtles swimming around.

There can be anywhere from a handful to dozens of boats anchored or moored at the Tobago Cays. And, during the day, several boat boys ply the waters with their boats offering ice, fresh bread, lobsters, fish, t-shirts, and will take orders for other daily needs. There is a $10 EC per person park fee to stay here per night. A fee well worth paying to keep this area pristine.

You can also travel to any of the little islands and enjoy a beach, or walk around on the trails and see birds, lizards, iguanas, and other desert island critters. We saw a 4 foot long iguana on one of the islands!

Make sure you check out just a sample of photos from this beautiful island paradise:

If you want more seclusion, you can move to another island nearby like the beautiful Petite Tabac. Petite Tabac was the same island used in the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie when Jack Sparrow and Elizabeth were stranded and she lit his pile of rum as a fire signal. Fortunately they only simulated the burning of the trees, because the beautiful coconut trees are still there. We'll have pictures of this place up close soon. You can also go to several secluded anchorages at Mayreau, Union Island, or Palm island - all within a few miles of each other. Union Island has a sizable poulation, an airport, customs and immigration, grocery stores, Internet, and more.

So, within a few miles, you can see some of the most beautiful scenery, anchor near fantastic reefs, get provisions if you need them, conduct any number of water sports that strike your fancy, or just relax at peace away from everyone.

It truly is almost paradise!

I'm reporting from Union Island in the southern part of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. We came here to get Internet so we could check E-mails and make some phone calls. We had some issues back home which needed our attention, and the big problems are with our onboard computers.

Our computer woes started before Christmas. My main laptop - a MacBook Pro - lost the LCD backlight to its screen. Everything else worked fine for 10 days or so, but then it suddenly wouldn't wake up from sleep mode properly. I got it to wake up once, but it only stayed on for a short while. All efforts to get it going again have failed. So, the conclusion is a hardware problem. I have a new laptop on order. But, it will probably be a week or so before it gets down here. Then I'll be able to send this one to Apple for service.

Meanwhile, I decided to use our other navigation computer - which is actually a Mac Mini used with a monitor in the nav station. I was going to install the software I use to process 360 panoramas from the backups of the MacBook Pro. Unfortunately, I had only used this computer with the Windows boot camp because it was only used for our navigation software. The monitor we use is an old low resolution LCD screen. When I attempted to boot into OS X, the screen won't accept the resolution the Mini is set to. It took a while, but with help from my friend Andy during the last hour, we finally managed to get the resolution reset. Whew! For a while there we were down to one computer. It's kind of comical in a way. I figured three computers with 5 OSes would give me plenty of redundancy in case a computer went bad. Sheesh!

We arrived on Monday evening in Mustique. This is a very exclusive private island which is home to many rich and famous lucky enough to have one of the <100 custom homes on the island. They also allow boats to visit and have a few beautiful public beaches and restaurants.

Karen and I went to dinner at the famous Basil's Bar and Restaurant out over the water on the first evening. Very nice, excellent food. We were here 7 years ago with our daughters and were fortunate to attend when they had a swedish magician. Even the waiter we had remembered the magician.

Yesterday we went to my favorite beach in the Caribbean - Macaroni Beach. I took a 360 panorama I'll put up someday of the beach. The beach was once the subject of a "Where in the World" contest in the Google Earth newsletter. Read more about the island on their official web site.

My laptop is not working now. So, I'm anxious to have the new one I've acquired delivered. It'll be at least a week I think. I may not have access to my panorama software until I get the new machine and recover the applications I had on the laptop.

UPDATE: Here are some photos of the visit to Mustique including photos of Macaroni Beach:

And, here is a 360 panorama of Macaroni Beach:

Macaroni Beach, Mustique - St. Vincent and the Grenadines in Grenadines

We're leaving today for the Tobago Cays.

Years ago, when I first downloaded Google Earth, one of my dreams was to have our sailing trip be visible to anyone who downloaded the program. That dream has come true! When Google added the Ocean to Google Earth with the release of 5.0 last year, they included a special layer for following ocean expeditions. Now, you can follow the Tahina Expedition as part of the layer. A special thanks to our partner Google for helping make this happen!

To find us in Google Earth, simply open Google Earth and turn on the Ocean layer. Under that layer are several sub-layers including Ocean Expeditions. Turn it on and a bunch of icons will appear all over the world's oceans. Look for the larger icon in the NW Atlantic and click on it. You should see a window appear which lists expeditions in those waters. Right at the top, you'll see "Tahina Expedition". Select it and it will load placemarks showing our blog entries, and connection lines between each post. Click on the image above for a larger screenshot.

Of course, you can still follow us in even more detail by going to our Tahina Expedition Map.

Last week most people were busy doing the holiday season thing - us included. As a result, I haven't been blogging as often. This post will list some of the events during the past week - starting with our last few days in St. Lucia. We have mostly been relaxing and not trying to do much activity. We have also been going out for meals more than usual - especially since we were in Bequia which has lots of restaurants near the anchorage.

We made one last trip to the southeast end of the island at Vieux Fort. It's kind of a pain that the only major International airport at St. Lucia is so far away. It's a 2 hour taxi drive from Rodney Bay (with the associated costs). So, we decided the 3.5 hour sail is a more practical course - especially considering our two daughters were returning on two different days.

We again spent days at The Reef - a wind and kite surfing center with a nice bar and restaurant on the excellent Sandy Beach just east of the airport. They also have good WIFI. The girls enjoyed the fact they put things on a tab, so they would just go up and order food and drinks as needed.

Unfortunately, I spent our days there dealing with an intestinal bug. I'm still not totally recovered from that after 10 days. Although its mostly just been a nuisance and has not been physically debilitating.

In an earlier post, we mentioned after our second daughter left, we moved to Bequia. We didn't realize it, but Bequia is the happening place for New Year's Eve. They have fireworks and lots of special dinners and parties. Which explained why there were easily 2 to 3 times as many boats as we've seen at that anchorage. Reports were there were 300-400 boats. We had some interesting anchoring issues for a couple days there. But, by the end of the weekend the anchorage was much more pleasant with plenty of room for the < 100 boats there.

On late Friday, our friends on Northfork showed up. They had gone to Trinidad & Tobago and picked up Mark's parents and were making their way back north. After spending a week visiting the Grenadines, his parents were going to St. Vincent to stay in a hotel for their last few days. So, we had brunch with them the next day. Meanwhile, I looked into the local dive shop and got our air tanks filled and investigated going on a dive on Sunday. Mark wanted to go diving as well, so he said after dropping his parents off that night they would sail back in the morning.

On Sunday we had an excellent dive on a reef on the west end of Bequia. I'll do a separate post on that and upload photos from the dive. I also took some video of some eels and lobster we saw on the dive - but, those will get processed even later.

We have been researching how best to get a new laptop delivered to the boat. On Monday, when things were finally open again in Bequia, we got some answers. According to Bequia's customs office a 4% duty would have to be paid. I'm going to try and find out what Grenada would require before deciding where to have it sent. Meanwhile, we ordered some maintenance kits to fix a leaky water pump, got some more provisions, ordered some prescription medicines, and made some phone call home.

Our friends on Northfork are headed north. They have someone to pick up in the US Virgin Islands. But, we will most likely see them again as they are also doing a circumnavigation. So, we said "au revoir" to them yesterday.

Mid-afternoon Monday, we departed Bequia and sailed a couple hours over to Mustique. More on this later as well. That pretty much summarizes the activities over the last 10 days or so.

My wife and daughter signed up for a wonderful experience zip lining through the rainforest canopy in St. Lucia a couple days after Christmas. We sailed Tahina up to Rodney Bay to drop them off at the nearest transportation to the rain forest tour which is operated by Palm Services Adventure Tours of St. Lucia.

It was a 4 to 5 hour trip including travel time, and they had a great time. The zip lines get high marks for safety with double-lines, good equipment, good safety gear, and safety instructions. They also have a gondola which gets the visitors up to the higher parts of the rain forest.

You can see pictures from their trip here: