Hello everyone.
We hope you are all recovering from the holidays and are well and looking forward to 2009.
Well as you can see we made our Atlantic crossing in exactly 17 days getting into Rodney Bay St Lucia at 0700 on Saturday the 20th of December. We actually had to slow the boat down as we did not want to arrive before daybreak. We tied up in the marina and celebrated with breakfast of bacon and eggs and champagne and orange juice on a boat that was not moving around. When I went up to clear customs and immigration I had to hold onto the desk and was walking like a drunk as it was strange to be on land! I did the clearing in before the champagne. We spent the rest of the day napping and doing a little visiting with other yachts crews and just relaxing. On Sunday I washed the outsides and Marian did the interior cleaning up before we went out for a much deserved nice dinner.
On the morning of the 22nd we packed up, put the boat in bond, and headed for the airport. It is an hour and a half drive to the south end of the island through fields of bananas and tropical rain forest. We made it up to Toronto and spent the night before getting a flight to Vancouver the next morning arriving around 11.00. It wasn’t that easy as all the flights were oversold and we had to standby and did miss a few flights. When we arrived it was not the usual sight as there was snow and it was cold especially for us shorts and t-shirt folks!! We were picked up by Linda and in a short time we had the truck licensed and saw Nevan, Sarah and Elise, bought some groceries and arrived at the marina to find Kilkea, our power boat that is home away from home, frozen up and locked in ice in the boat house even! We got the heat going and went to see Andrew, Lindsay and the grandsons Eamon and Calum who were most surprised to see us in real life and not in the computer on Skype.
Anyway the Christmas season flew by with a Danish dinner on Christmas eve at Henning and Lindas, then the Crawfords for Christmas dinner and then on the 28th Natalie and Derek arrived from Calgary and we celebrated at Nevan and Sarahs. All the time we were home it snowed and was cold. It was so bad boats and boat houses were sinking under the weight of the snow. It was great to see the children and grand babies who are growing up fast. We were very busy with Marian and Natalie finding a wedding dress and sorting out some other wedding plans. The big day is the 29th of August. Our apologies to friends who we did not get to see as we just ran out of time and we look forward to seeing everyone this summer.
We arrived back to Kilkea II on the 11th of January at Rodney bay to some impromptu drinks and dinners over the next few days. We sailed down to Marigot bay to visit with Sea Mist and on the second night with Red Herring as well. We had not seen them since Sicily. They all left for the Vincent and Grenadines and wanted us to come with them but we were too tired and went outside Rodney bay anchored and spent four very quiet days.
We are not in Guadeloupe where there is a general strike going on with the island pretty much shut down and are waiting for Larry and Elaine to arrive tomorrow. We did a quick run up here through Martinique, Dominica the Saints and here to see Amel about some problems we are having with the batteries. On the way we spent a couple of days with Rapture I and Howard and Kelly were in good form and enjoyed there crossing.
Looking back 2008 was a busy year with us going back to Turkey from Vancouver in January then onward to Greece, Cyprus around the Peloponnese up to the Ionian then on to Italy, Sicily, Malta, and Tunisia. Then it was back to Vancouver for seven weeks before returning to Tunisia. Back up to Sicily, Rome and Northern Italy before arriving at Monaco, the French Riviera to Hyeres then the Balearic Islands. Over to Spain to see Dave and Sandy along the east coast to Gibraltar down to Tangier then Rabat in Morocco before sailing down to the Canaries and finally across the Atlantic to St Lucia. I’m exhausted just thinking that we did all this in a year. I think we sailed over seven thousand miles at six and a half knots so you can do the math. It was a lot of fun and we look forward to this year in the Caribbean, our daughters wedding in August and four to five months at home.
PS Photos to follow!!
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Well finally I will put down a few thoughts of our last month or so.
We went up to Fez for three days and had a good time with John Cheryl and Ian touring the old walled city which is medieval and still holds 500,000 people. With its narrow lanes that only facilitate donkeys and carts you would think that you had been transported back a thousand years. You name it and it can be bought in the Medina. We spent two days here before heading back to Rabat via the mid Atlas mountains which had snow. Not what one imagines when thinking of Africa. Morocco, at least the parts we saw, is very fertile with big farms quiet modern.
When we got back to the boat we had planned to leave the next day for the Canaries but I got the Fez fuze and was out for a couple of days so did not leave until better. It was a four day sail down to the Canaries and we managed for a change to sail all the way. We stayed at Rubicon on Lanzarotte before going over to Las Palmas on Grand Canary. There we met up with other boats we are friends with and the next morning we went out on Sea Mist to observe the start of the ARC. This is a yacht rally called the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers. There were over two hundred boats at the start line and it was a sight. We spent a few more days in Las Palmas doing odds and ends and still getting over my bug.
Marian and I left for Tenerife where we spent a night then over to Gomera which is a beautiful island which we drove around right up into the clouds with mist and fogs. Very pretty and had a good lunch and were shown the art of Silbo which is a conversation that was carried on by whistling over great distances. This island was not really connected to the outside until after 1956.
On December 03 we untied from the dock and left for the Caribbean at 1100. Oh it is 2700 miles and you have to leave sometime. We ran into a squall right away which got us into the program quickly. We did over 180 miles the first day which was great as we have to sail not having the fuel to get very far. We have made good time the first week with a couple of days with winds up more than we wanted but again it moved us along. Since then the weather has been very nice with each day getting warmer as we move south west. Today is Friday the 19th and we are 120 miles from land fall at St Lucia. We will have done the journey in just under 17 days. I think that is pretty good for two old folks sailing across the Atlantic with no crew. Actually it is pretty easy the hardest part untying from the dock.
We went up to Fez for three days and had a good time with John Cheryl and Ian touring the old walled city which is medieval and still holds 500,000 people. With its narrow lanes that only facilitate donkeys and carts you would think that you had been transported back a thousand years. You name it and it can be bought in the Medina. We spent two days here before heading back to Rabat via the mid Atlas mountains which had snow. Not what one imagines when thinking of Africa. Morocco, at least the parts we saw, is very fertile with big farms quiet modern.
When we got back to the boat we had planned to leave the next day for the Canaries but I got the Fez fuze and was out for a couple of days so did not leave until better. It was a four day sail down to the Canaries and we managed for a change to sail all the way. We stayed at Rubicon on Lanzarotte before going over to Las Palmas on Grand Canary. There we met up with other boats we are friends with and the next morning we went out on Sea Mist to observe the start of the ARC. This is a yacht rally called the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers. There were over two hundred boats at the start line and it was a sight. We spent a few more days in Las Palmas doing odds and ends and still getting over my bug.
Marian and I left for Tenerife where we spent a night then over to Gomera which is a beautiful island which we drove around right up into the clouds with mist and fogs. Very pretty and had a good lunch and were shown the art of Silbo which is a conversation that was carried on by whistling over great distances. This island was not really connected to the outside until after 1956.
On December 03 we untied from the dock and left for the Caribbean at 1100. Oh it is 2700 miles and you have to leave sometime. We ran into a squall right away which got us into the program quickly. We did over 180 miles the first day which was great as we have to sail not having the fuel to get very far. We have made good time the first week with a couple of days with winds up more than we wanted but again it moved us along. Since then the weather has been very nice with each day getting warmer as we move south west. Today is Friday the 19th and we are 120 miles from land fall at St Lucia. We will have done the journey in just under 17 days. I think that is pretty good for two old folks sailing across the Atlantic with no crew. Actually it is pretty easy the hardest part untying from the dock.
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