Long Passage to Bonaire

(Pictures will be added when I have a better connection)

This is a long tale describing our two-day adventurous trip from Grenada to Bonaire. We left Grenada on Saturday morning. It was a shame we weren't able to stop in some of the islands of Venezuela like Los Roques. Especially unfortunate because we had hoped to link up with some American friends of ours (Sid and Manuela) who have been staying on their boat (called Paradise) in Venezuela for the past few years. Unfortunately, they were not ready to leave in time for us to link up.

The winds were going to be a bit strong at the start of our passage, but it was all going to be down wind with a following sea as well. We planned to leave after 10 AM so we wouldn't arrive too early in Bonaire. When we left Prickly Bay, a regatta race was under way so we went around the race area. The winds were especially strong (near 30 knots) near the island. It's common for the winds to be accelerated around the ends of the islands. But, once we were a few miles away, they calmed down to around 20.

We had been flying the mainsail only with the stronger winds, but they started slowing down to less than 15 knots by lunch. So, after lunch we raised the spinnaker. Karen and I have only raised this one a few times. It can be challenging at times to manage this sail. But, we raised it without too much difficulty. Because the winds were not real strong, we went ahead and lowered the main. We were soon going 8-9 knots. The winds picked back up and soon we were doing 10-11 knots and surfing on waves up to 15 knots!

We had a nice afternoon sail, but as evening approached we decided to drop the spinnaker in case the winds picked up at night. So, we first had to raise the main going downwind - which we haven't done before. By using the reefing lines, I was able to get the sail between the jacklines and we got it up. We then used that to block the spinnaker's wind. The chute came down ok, but we forgot for a few moments it was best to tied down the chute line and had some difficulty holding on. Then lowering the sail without the bottom portion fly out was a challenge.

Since we were pretty much directly downwind, we had to keep an eye on the wind to make sure we didn't jibe. We had one accidental jibe which makes a huge racket and really shakes the mast.

I turned on the tricolor (with our new LED light bulb) before dark. Karen cooked up a nice meal, and we had dinner. We were still making 8-9+ knots with just the main. I looked up to check on the new light, and it wasn't on! So, I tried turning on and off the switch. No luck. At first I guessed maybe the bulb (which was a bit wobbly when I installed it) was loose. So, I turned on the anchor light to make sure it was still working. Uh oh, it wasn't on either! Now I was really worried. I remember when I went up to install the light module that the locking ring was hard to get to lock while at the top of the mast. But, it seemed pretty firm when I pushed on the module. But, I remembered that jibe and how hard the mast shook... So, I got out a spotlight and the binoculars and looked up at the top of the mast. My worst fears were realized - our entire light was gone off the mast. A quick look around the boat (including the sail cover) showed there was no sign of the light. I imagine that hard jibe slingshotted our light right off the boat. Our light was in Davy Jones' locker. Argh!

To some, this might be funny. But, after I spent weeks looking for those new bulbs, and hours climbing up the mast and custom installing the bulbs (and lets not forget lots of money), the loss of the light was particularly painful. And, now we'll have to buy and install another one! Captain Frank is not a happy camper.

We had a full moon during the night, so the seeing conditions were great. And under mainsail alone we made good speed and a comfortable ride. We did have to jibe a few times to make the direction we wanted. There were several ships in the area, which we had on our AIS and radar.

Sunday morning the weather was great, and I was anxious to get the spinnaker back up. I knew we would go 1.5 knots or more faster. We made another mistake with the spinnaker though. I decided it would be nice to have the spinnaker all rigged up before we dropped the mainsail. So, we got it all ready on the trampoline. We were very careful to get it set up right. Then we thought we'd quickly tack into the wind and drop the mainsail the easy way. The winds were so light going downwind, I forgot they were pretty strong. As I was making the turn into the wind, the spinnaker started to fly off the deck! I immediately turned on the autopilot and grabbed the sail. Some of it had already gone off the side. Karen helped get the sheet out of the water, but the sail was all jumbled up again. We eventually got it back in place and dropped the mainsail while Karen was lying on it. We just learned another obvious lesson about the spinnaker. This time the spinnaker went up very smoothly without incident.

We were so busy with the spinnaker that I completely forgot to call on the SSB to Grace at the time we had picked. So, I got on the SSB and sent them E-mails. We had a wonderful day of weather and sailing. We were making very good speed all day with the true winds 18-22 knots steady. And all afternoon there was not a cloud in the sky. In fact, it was so good we decided to continue with the spinnaker into the night. We were passing Los Roques by dinner time.

We were going to run the generator to recharge the batteries, so after dinner we decided to watch a movie. I had to pause every 10 minutes to check for other boats, and the winds. Things were mostly good except that the wind was starting to come a bit from the ENE instead of due east. This was making it hard to maintain our course due west which we needed to get around another set of islands. After the movie, I realized the winds were picking up a bit too. We were debating taking the spinnaker down and either tacking, or just going to main. But, I was focused on missing those islands. I found if I hand steered I could maintain the west course. So, we pressed on. But, after an hour or so, the winds started picking up more. It got to 25-30 knots true. The boat was flying at about 12-15 knots (sometimes faster).

Now we really needed to get the spinnaker down. And, we knew from past experience this would be challenging with these winds. Not only that, but the autopilot was having a hard time maintaining course on its own. I changed the rudder settings, and the winds eased just a bit. So, I got the autopilot going. First, we needed to get the mainsail up to block the wind. We turned on our bright decklights to help. In these winds, it was challenging, but we eventually got the mainsail up. I had to watch out that I didn't get thrown off while trying to coerce the mainsail up the jacklines.

Next, we got the spinnaker chute lines ready. Karen was on the deck with the lines, and I got ready to release the sheet. I got the mainsail fully out to block the wind. The spinnaker started flopping. I released the sheet, and Karen started pulling the chute down. I ran up to help. We got it down most of the way. But, the bottom portion of the sail was still blowing hard. We quickly got the bottom of the chute tied to the mast (although, my hand almost got caught in the line). Then we attempted to start lowering the spinnaker. For some reason, as we lowered, the winds grabbed the sail and started pulling it out of the chute! Now we had a big part of the sail flying in the wind and trying to go into the water! I quickly re-raised the sail. We were trying to gather the bottom portion to collapse it. It took us many minutes and a LOT of effort. I grabbed the tack and pulled it to the mast and tied it off to help block it. Then we were both lying on the tramp on top of the sail. Somehow, I managed to get back up to the mast (while holding to sail) and quickly dropped the entire chute. With the weight of the chute on top of the sail, it was finally under control! We got the sail into the bag and stowed. This entire operation must have taken well over 90 minutes as it was now 2 AM. We were really tired and a bit bruised. Thank goodness the autopilot did its job! We were still going 10-12 knots with just the mainsail up with these winds. And, during this time we were headed right for those islands (but, they were still 40 miles or so away, so I wasn't worried).

We decided to lower the mainsail and just motor a while until we got around the islands. Karen took the watch while I slept a while. Around 5 AM, I woke up and we raised the jib with a reef, and turned off the motor. Karen went to sleep. The winds eased just a touch to just 20-25 knots. This is still quite strong, and the seas were pretty strong about about 3 meters. But, it was a relatively smooth ride since we were downwind with following seas. We were still making 8+ knots with just the reefed jib. We were soon approaching Bonaire on its southern tip. I saw the lighthouse first, and at dawn I saw land. "Land Ho!" I said to myself quietly (since Karen was sleeping). We were almost to the southern tip when I called Grace and Ascension and told them our position. Grace told us some friends of theirs should be in Bonaire on a boat called Sunboy.

Once around the southern tip, the seas gradually smoothed since we were in the lee of the island. When you've been at sea for several days, you get used to pure clean air. When you approach land, you always notice how much the land (and what people do on it) smell. Yuck! But, soon your mind filters the smell of garbage and other things out - thankfully. We had a nice early morning sail up to the port. By 9:30 we had picked up a mooring and were at rest. We were just tidying up the boat, when a dive boat pulled up right behind us. A couple of scientists told us they had some instruments behind our boat and needed to collect measurements. Wow! I'll have something for the ROV to go look at! We were very tired at this point, so we decided to go catch up on sleep.

So, thus ended our adventurous sailing trip from Grenada to Bonaire. Although we had a few bad things happen (the light, and challenges with the sails), we had a successful passage of nearly 400 nm in less than 48 hours. We're really looking forward to being in one of the most-famed diving sites of the Caribbean - Bonaire!