11 October 1995 Mount Harman Bay to St Georges Lagoon
We sailed around to St Georges Lagoon. We went to the bank and got some money out, had lunch in the Nutmeg and bought some food. We had a two hour rest (I mustn’t drink beer at lunch time!) and then met Gary at the Yacht Club bar.
We got collared by two drunken Glaswegians who retired here 5 years ago. They must be desperate for company because they invited us up to their house. Gary came for dinner and we didn’t bother to say goodbye again!
12 October 1995 St Georges Lagoon to Tyrell Bay, Carriacou
There’s a wave at about 55°W, but no convection activity so we decided to go up to Bequia. It was a pretty miserable day with rain showers. We spent some of the journey hiding under the spray hood. I’m getting sick of getting wet – on our next boat we are going to have a hard roof and windscreen on our cockpit so that we can sit in comfort in bad weather.
We decided not to stop at Ile De Ronde and continued straight to Tyrell Bay, where we spotted “Tekaroa”. We caught up on all the news since we last saw Kirsty and Pete in St Maarten last April.
13 October 1995 Tyrell Bay
We decided to stay here for a couple of days to spend time with “Tekaroa”. Glenys did school work while I sorted out the stern gland leak and checked the sea cocks – we’ve been taking on quite a bit of water over the past week and I think that it was the stern gland. I went snorkelling with Pete in the afternoon and we went to “Tekaroa” for dinner.
14 October 1995 Tyrell Bay
Nursing hangovers - will we ever learn? We did school work in the morning. After lunch we went for a snorkel on the wreck in the bay. Brett speared his first fish - a tiny three inch long, black bar soldier fish. We had a fairly quiet afternoon - I played the clarinet and then cleaned it. After this abuse, the middle B & C seem to be harder to get. I’ll have to investigate when we get to Bequia.
I only had to do 50 pumps on the bilge pump, as opposed to 250 yesterday, so I seem to have sorted out the stern gland. We had a quiet night in with a nice bottle of red wine that we bought from the Tyrell Bay smugglers.
15 October 1995 Tyrell Bay to Admiralty Bay, Bequia
We said goodbye to “Tekaroa” and had a very pleasant sail past the west coast of Union Island. We caught a 2 lb Dorado and caught the sun. At about three o’clock, a squall hit us with 35 knot gusts and torrential rain. We then had two hours of squall after squall. When we were about ½ mile from the islands at the SW tip of Bequia, we had such heavy rain that visibility dropped to about 100 metres and I had to turn North West because I couldn’t see the island! Finally, wet through, we made it into Admiralty Bay and anchored off St Margaret’s beach.
16 October 1995 Admiralty Bay, Bequia
We filled up with water and diesel from Daffodil. I went into town and cleared in and out at the same time which still cost me £5! I picked up the new bilge pump, but couldn’t get the correct inlet and outlet pipe fittings.
My karma was very low today and nothing went well – I scuffed my knuckles, I locked the dinghy to the dock in town and didn’t have any keys. When I stuck a screw driver through my finger, I decided not to do any more important jobs. I cleared the cockpit drains of a super ball, a Lego man, a marble, a Carib beer top and lots and lots of hairs and sand. It’s no wonder no water was escaping!
I keep trying to think of reasons to not go to Venezuela tomorrow but I can’t come up with any good ones, I suppose that we’ll have to go to that strange, foreign land!
17 October 1995 Admiralty Bay to Los Testigos, Venezuela (Day 1)
We got up at six o’clock and received a weather fax. It looks like the whole area to the east of us is cloudy, but there are no tropical storms or bad convection activity, so we decided to set out. We started off with nil wind and then, after about an hour, picked up a 10 knot wind which pushed us along at 5 knots. I listened to “Mistine” who warned us about a wave at 61°W, which may have squalls of 35 knots in it. I’ve decided that having good weather information can be detrimental to sailing because it makes me want to stay in harbour until we get perfect conditions!
By eleven o’clock, we had to put the engine on – so much for “Mistine’s” squalls. We caught a nice 4lb Dorado. I’ve started to put a smaller double hook on the lure and also hidden the hook in the squid tentacles and it seems to have worked – we’ve caught three Dorado in three weeks. As we motored 20 miles to the West of Grenada in the afternoon, I managed to call Gary on the VHF radio to say goodbye again!
We continued motoring until dinnertime when the wind picked up to 15 knots from the NE. I poled out the genoa to starboard, prevented the main and off we went downwind into the night. We spotted our first whale. It was lying in the water 200 metres away. We could see its water spout but couldn’t identify it – I assume it was a sperm whale.
18 October 1995 Admiralty Bay to Los Testigos, Venezuela (Day 2)
By midnight, the wind had veered to the SE and I gybed the main and we slopped along at 4 or 5 knots. I sighted a cruise ship at half past one and the bastard just kept coming on the same bearing. Eventually, I had to alter course and put the radar on before he started to move from the collision course. I’ve been reading a book called “Maiden Voyage” about an 18 year old woman who did a single handed, 2½ year circumnavigation. She hit a ship and another yacht, so I’m a bit cautious at the moment.
I spotted Los Testigos at about six o’clock in the morning and by eight o’clock, we were motoring in our first strange landfall in over a year – I was quite excited! We anchored by the small village on Isla Iguana and I went through the thirty minute ritual of assembling and inflating our big 3.2metre dinghy. Glenys and I went ashore to check in with the coastguard – I needed Glenys for her linguistic ability and moral support. In the event we were done in about five minutes, including negotiating a four day stay instead of the normal two days.
We went and anchored behind a small island off Testigo Grande and went to explore the huge sand dunes. We clambered up a very steep sand slope and walked over to the windward side where we went looking for shells, but didn’t get many.
On the way back, the boys ran ahead so that they could get a few rolls down the steep slope. Five minutes later they came running back, wailing at the tops of their voices – they had rolled down, out of control and crashed right into a vicious plant that I can only describe as a super, tropical nettle. Within minutes their backs, arms, leg and bottoms were covered in huge bumps. We got them back to the boat and put on some antihistamine cream. We were quite worried about a more serious reaction, but fortunately after about half an hour, the bumps and the pain started to go. Nasty bit of plant life!
We’re finally in vampire bat country, so we made sure that all the mosquito screens were in place before we collapsed into bed at nine o’clock.
19 October 1995 Los Testigos
We were going to have a lie in, but our alarm went off at six o’clock – not switched off after our early start in Bequia. I had trouble getting back to sleep after that so, by half past seven, I was up and about! We did school work Lesson 10 (that’s ten for this month so far!). I went ashore to take a picture of the nasty tropical nettles and we went snorkelling. We stayed by the shallow reef and I found a spotted sea hare. A quick tootle and the day was gone!
20 October 1995 Los Testigos
Glenys went over to “Honey Jar” to borrow their SSB to call Gareth – yesterday we listened to him calling us for two minutes but there was no-one near with an Single Side Band radio. Today, Glenys spent thirty minutes trying to call him but no answer – typical! We did school work and then motored around to Testigo Pequeno and anchored off the beach.
Testigo Pequeno is a small island connected to Testigo Grande by a 25metre wide spit. The waves are crashing on one side and it’s very calm on our side. We went for a walk to the top of the island which was pleasant, if a bit treacherous with all the cactuses about. We then spent an hour snorkelling on the rocky reef by the side of the boat, collecting shells.