Recently in Preparations Category

We haven't been very productive from a tourism perspective so far in Colombia. We arrived on the weekend and spent two days before we found the agent we had been looking for to help with getting our clearance. Fortunately, some friends of ours were here the first evening (but, left for San Blas the next morning) and gave us some insights on local conveniences and information. Of particular use is the local marina's guide to cruisers, which is available on their web site here. This is the best online guide I've seen by a marina to date. You may not find all the services you want here, but at least they have information on what is available.

Unfortunately, the marina - Club Nautico - is in the middle of doing a major re-construction. For some reason the local government put it to a halt at the worst possible time. So, they are operating out of a rustic shack of an office and the main facilities are in shambles - no showers, no bar, etc. And, they aren't allowed to continue construction (no building permit?). The docks are still in place, and have power and water though. And, the staff are doing their best to maintain services for the boaters.

Cartagena doesn't seem to have full-service chandleries (marine stores). There are two nearby stores, but they only have a subset of the usual items found in chandleries catering to serious boaters. I couldn't even find 3M's popular 5200 glue/sealant at the two stores, nor the usual oil we use for our engines, and I haven't been able to get the cruising guide for Panama I expected to buy here. More importantly, and this isn't as surprising, they don't have the pump we need - to replace the one that drives the water pressure on our starboard hull. I spent two days trying to determine the best way to have a new one sent to us here. We finally ordered two of the pumps (one as a spare) in the US, and are having it sent to Miami. An outfit there sends it to Colombia in the main port. Then it is brought down to Cartagena, clears customs, and is finally brought to us - where we pay the fees for the shipping, handling, and customs. If all goes as planned, it will be here by next Tuesday. We may also see if the old pump can be overhauled.

Meanwhile, we have gone to a few restaurants. We even went to Centro - the old part of Cartagena - and had a nice dinner and walked through the scenic area one night. Cartagena is a beautiful city, and we look forward to seeing more. Karen has been a bit out of commission having consumed something that didn't agree with her. We're hoping she'll be well enough today to do some sightseeing. There is a wonderful grocery store with nice Internet cafe nearby that has been our favorite haunting ground outside the boat.

We have a couple of candidates for crewing on Tahina for the upcoming long passages. If you think you may meet our criteria/dates, please contact us soon.

There is a young married couple, who are photo journalists, with whom I've been communicating with for several months now on the chance we could get together. Turns out they are in Colombia right now. They may be joining us for a couple of weeks as we depart Cartagena and go to San Blas in Panama. Then they would leave us when we reach the Panama Canal. We hope to pick up some traveling tips from them as they have done two round-the-world trips (not by sailboat). And share some photography tips as well.

The weather here has been hot and muggy. It hasn't been helped by the lack of wind the last couple of days (and more still air the next few days). We have actually been running the A/C while charging the batteries with the generator the last two times (something we never did in the windward islands).

We have some long passages coming on Tahina, and would like to have some additional crew to help us with the sailing. The need for a constant watch 24-hours-a-day is more challenging with only two people on board. When we left North Carolina in November, we had our friend Wilson join us for the 7 day passage to St. Martin.

We have two long passages to consider:

1. The passage from Panama to the Galapagos Islands - an approximately 7-10 day passage. This passage can have variable winds (mostly light, but also in direction). We would be leaving near the beginning of April for the Galapagos.
2. From the Galapagos to the French Marquesas - a two to three week passage. Two boats identical to ours completed this passage in 15 days in 2008. This passage can have some variable conditions at the beginning, but is typically a nice downwind (with following seas) ride for most of the days during the time of year we are going. We would be leaving the Galapogos about 10-14 days after we get there. So, approximate departure would be mid-April or closer to the end of April.

Our goal is to have crew who have experience with blue-water passages, and are not prone to sea-sickness. Prior experience crewing with similar passages is a big plus. If you have the time flexibility, and enjoy our company, you would be welcome to stay several days beyond the passage to see the sights at our destinations. These are long passages and everyone has to live together for many days and share responsibilities including sailing, cooking, and cleaning. Read our about page to learn about our backgrounds. Ideally two additional crew would be nice, but we will do fine with one extra crew.

You need some flexibility in your time commitment to crew with us on these passages. We don't have an exact date yet for departure, or especially arrival (which is somewhat dependent on weather). You will need to have a valid passport and possibly some vaccinations.

Tahina is a beautiful 50' catamaran with 4 queen-sized staterooms (see photo gallery). We have plenty of room for crew and many comforts including: watermaker, icemaker, fridge/freezer, generator, TV with DVDs, and have at least basic (text-only) E-mail access. We also have a satellite phone when calls or Internet connection needs to be made (costs are high though). Our boat is rigged very well with electric winches, and most lines led to the cockpit. Although, going on deck is rarely a problem since we have plenty of room. We also have a spinnaker to help with the downwind sailing.

You can read about us on our about page. If you are interested in making one of the passages, please contact us by E-mail as soon as possible.

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.

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 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.

View Route Changes in a larger map

Just a post to let those of you following know that we are leaving today for Guadeloupe. We'll be passing the active volcano on Montserrat on the way. Originally we thought about visiting Montserrat again, like we did in 2003, but because the volcano has been very active we've decided to just sail by instead. Because of the prevailing winds (and the chance of ash fall from the volcano), we'll pass on the North and East sides of Montserrat.

We'll be sailing all day, and our first stop in Guadeloupe may not have Internet. So, you may only see updates on our position on the Tahina Maps page, or if you follow our Twitter @GoTahina, see some updates there.

Also, yesterday we spent some time doing provisioning, and taking some 360 panoramas. I had planned to do some kite photos as well, but the first location I went to didn't have enough wind. By the time we got to another location (Oualie Beach), I realized we were out of time (too bad, there was plenty of wind there). I needed to go to customs to clear out for our early morning departure. We did take a 360 at that location though.

We got cleared out and the weather looks fine for today. Winds between 15-20 knots along our route. Chance of showers 20%. Typical for down here. We'll be pulling into Pigeon Island in Guadeloupe which is home to the Jacques Coustea Marine Park. We plan on doing some diving, and using the ROV there.

An update on our near-term travel plans. But, first a quick update on where we are. We left St. Martin on Thursday and had a wonderful sail to St. Barts. We stopped at Anse Columbier for the night, then on Friday moved to the capital - Gustavia. There we entered customs, shopped, and got some Internet time.

Yesterday we ended up making arrangements for our daughters to join us during the Christmas holidays. They will be flying into St. Lucia, so we will need to be there to pick them up.

We're currently in St. Barts (or St. Barths) and plan to leave on Monday. Currently our planned stops are: Nevis, Montserrat*, Guadeloupe, Martinique, and then St. Lucia. Here's a map with a rough outline of the route.

We'll probably spend about 4-5 days in each location (counting sailing days) until we get to St. Lucia.

Also, yesterday we moved to Baie St. Jean on the north side of St. Barts. Its not normally a good anchorage, but the winds were right. So, we moved over. We went to a restaurant on the nearby beach for dinner. Also, upon arrival we watched a couple dozen plane landings and takeoffs from one of the scariest little runways in the Caribbean (here in St. Barts). It has a mountain on one end of the runway. And another mountain less than half a mile from the end of the other side of the runway, which ends right on a beach of the bay. Very crazy runway - only good for small planes.

* Looks like we may give Montserrat a pass this time. Current reports show the volcano is at a high level of activity. We will at least pass the island on the windward side (to avoid ash) and get some pictures of the changes.

We miss being at home enjoying the Thanksgiving holiday with family, but to make up for that we've decided to go sailing! We were planning to find somewhere catering to Americans (turkey) for the holiday, but last night Karen and I decided it was time to get moving. So, we're going to clear out of St. Martin and make a short 25 mile trip around to St. Barts.

Who knows? Maybe we'll catch some fresh fish for our Thanksgiving dinner! Since its a short trip, we may not even update the map. We'll see how things go. Its supposed to be a light wind day, so the sailing could be slower than normal.

Happy Thanksgiving to all our friends and family! We wish we could spend it with you. But, we have a lot to be thankful for and we can't think of a better way to spend it than sailing in the Caribbean.

We have added a Map page for the Tahina Expedition web site that will let you check on our current position, our past passages, and will even show position reports while we're on a passage which are being made through a Twitter log. In addition, we'll make occasional blog posts during a passage to report on how things are going, and you can follow our Twitter at @GoTahina for short messages about how things are going. Hopefully all the new radio systems will work, so you'll actually see these reports and updates during our first passage starting tomorrow.

After careful consideration of all the factors - including weather - we've decided to make a change in our route. Our goal has been to start in the Caribbean with St. Martin. We have been planning to sail out to Bermuda and stop a few days because often the weather is better if you head toward Bermuda from the US east coast before heading south for the Caribbean. However, we have a weather forecast which gives us the option of heading straight to St. Martin.

Since we were delayed by about a week by weather, we have considered the option of going straight to St. Martin and by-passing Bermuda. Our crewmember Wilson would like to help get us to St. Martin, but he needs to be back home in time for Thanksgiving. If we go straight to St. Martin our route plan shows us arriving in 6 days. This would give plenty of time for Wilson to get home. And, it would give us more time to spend going through the islands on our way south. We plan to be in Grenada for Christmas.

So, we now plan to leave Saturday morning early. We'll still head east to insure the right winds for our route. But, we'll turn south sooner and therefore save lots of miles off the original route taking us to Bermuda. See the map of the two options here:

Keep watching the blog for updates. I'll probably make another post before we leave in addition to the subsequent tweets and posts during the passage.