Islands of Saints

After a relatively benign trip from St Martin, we have finally arrived in Guadeloupe….well Iles des Saintes to be exact.  When we first planned the route, we had planned on making our first stop in Deshaies, which is the first anchorage on the northwest coast of Guadeloupe. Since we hadn't anticipated that Moitessier would make such good timing during this passage, we ended up deciding last minute that we would skip Deshaies and move on to the anchorage in Basse-Terre, off of Marina de Riviere Sens (the next port for clearing in).  Originally we had planned on making landfall in Deshaies the following morning, but with the winds in our favor, MoMo was cruising at a nice average speed of  about 7 kts, making our would-be arrival in the middle of the night, which we all know is not something we ever want to do. And so we trudged on, moving further down the coast to make some headway, as we are currently already a little behind schedule (when are we not?).  Upon arrival the following morning at Basse-Terre, we noticed that the "anchorage" was essentially a tiny sliver of shallower water off of the side of the island very very close to shore, with the depths dropping from 65' to 165' in a matter of 2-3 hundred feet.  And so, once again, we decided to sail a couple more miles south to Iles des Saintes, meaning Islands of Saints in french and, boy, does it live up to its name.  

Sailing into this set of Guadeloupe owned islands was such a lovely surprise after the stressful debacle of a morning we had with deciding last minute where to go. We hadn't done any research and  didn't know what the deal was with all the mooring balls dotting the shore where the charts had labelled "anchorage," and so we tucked into Marigot Bay as this happens to be the only place  around with reasonable water depths that you can anchor in. After dinghying it in to the town of Terre de Haut and checking in, we discovered that it would cost us 11 Euros a night stay on the mooring balls, or 60 euros for a week, which we justified as reasonable considering the mere 2 euro check-in fee into Guadeloupe.  We also decided to take a mooring as our anchorage, though sheltered in settled weather, was starting to become unsafe with building winds clocking around and bringing in huge swells.  We ended up staying and relaxing in this lovely town for over a week, awaiting a tropical wave to pass before moving on.  We didn't do much but deal with some repairs on the boat (i.e. rewiring the SSB antenna, re-mounting our exhaust hose that had snapped loose, repairing an issue that had popped up in our steering, and so on…).  We revelled in the homeyness and the "Europeness" that this little town exude, and I swear it felt like I was walking around some small town in Europe somewhere, with its delightful colorful houses, once again set upon a lush island backdrop.  Though there isn't too much to do but just enjoy the beauty of this little set of islands, Frank and I thoroughly enjoyed taking it easy and just getting into the groove of the small island community here.  There is a sleepy Sunday feel to being here, and as brief of a stay we had here, we quickly fell into a routine of walking into town, getting some gelato, some baguette and cheese,  buying groceries, and simply marveling the quaintness of this place.  My words are not doing it justice, so I'll just stop right here and hope that my photos can portray just a little of what I'm going on about…

Underway….

That's St Eustatius behind me

Approaching Guadeloupe

Entering the Islands of Saints

Marigot Bay, where we anchored while it was sheltered

On a mooring ball...

Town of Terre de Haut

Church in the center of town

I've never seen this flower before

Goats everywhere…not sure if you can see in the photo

Hiking to the top

Fort Napoleon at the top...

"And I'm One too Many Mornings, and a Thousand Miles Behind…."

One of the things that people don't often talk about while cruising are the spells of restlessness you suffer from.  You'd think that since we are on this "adventure" that every day would be filled with novel, mind expanding experiences.  That the days of feeling "stuck in a rut" would be over.  Nope, not the case.  There are times when you just feel restless and bored, like you're directionless, floating around from day to day just "relaxing".  I find this feeling very disorientating, and it most often happens to me when I've been anchored somewhere for way too long (in this case Georgetown) with too much internet.  Right now, what's bothering me the most is being stuck here due to weather and not getting to be in St Thomas to work and just going into debt.  Since being stuck here I find I have fallen into this mindless rut, acting like a crazy person, surfing the web often addictively, compulsively checking my Facebook feed and looking at Instagram pics.  Basically doing a boat-load of nothing, repeating this meaningless act over and over again, while gaining nothing substantial from it, a bit like chasing my own tail…(but dogs make it look like so much fun!)   I find that the less productive I am, the more depressed I get, and more depressed I get, the less productive I am.  These spells can last for days and during this time I start to worry and panic about the future, our plans, being in debt, and so on.  Yeah, pretty demented.

This feeling of direction-lessness,  it's maddening and at times depressing.  Not knowing what the next year is going to bring and not even knowing where you will be, can both be paradoxically exciting and mentally exhausting.  You wonder if you're just wasting your life away, not settling down, buying a house, having kids, working towards a retirement...you know, what most people consider responsible. Perhaps this is the reason why people have these things in the first place...the house, the kids...so that they also have a reason to live, something to work towards.  I guess I underestimated the power of this notion.   Now I understand a little bit of why my father tells me he doesn't want to retire...he always says "if I rest I die" (sounds a lil more eloquent in Chinese, but you get the point).  I guess not having something to work towards can be considered mental suicide.  We all need some sort of structure and something to move towards.  For some, it's all about the goal and doing everything in their power to get to that goal, losing sight of everything along the way.  For others, it's not necessarily the end goal that matters but simply having a purpose.  I believe there has to be a balance between these in order to be truly happy.  But I suppose there is no right answer.  

After all of this, I have to ask myself?  What am I working towards?  I know it's all about traveling and seeing the world and the wonders of nature....but is that it?  No, it's more than that.  I guess what I want from all of this is personal enlightenment.  Seeing what life has to offer from a different perspective, a little outside the norm.  Seeing the good, the bad, and the ugly both from myself and from this beautiful, cruel world…

El Derecho

Been here in Georgetown for about a week and half now.  Some of it due to weather, some of it due to procrastinating the things we need to do while we are here (fuel, water, groceries, etc)…some of it just from being boaters.  I'm getting anxious to move on to the next place, because to be honest, Georgetown is one of my least favorite parts of the Bahamas.  With the exception of availability of goods, like awesome groceries and other needed amenities, there really is not much to do here in terms of spearfishing or underwater activities.  The sailing community here is large, with the anchorages full of other cruisers, which to me poses a deep love-hate relationship.  I hate how many people there are here; zipping by on dinghies, anchoring way too close, yapping on the VHF.  Sorry for sounding crotchety, perhaps I'm just getting used to being in less inhabited islands?  That being said though, what I do love is the how cruisers come together in a time of need and once again, how they abide by philosophy of communal living.  

About a week ago, a weather system technically known as a "derecho" hit the Exumas.  A derecho, according to google, is "a widespread, long-lived straight-line wind storm that is associated with a land based, fast-moving group of severe thunderstorms.  Derechos can cause hurricane force winds, tornados, heavy rains, and flash floods..."  This particular one hit us unexpectedly, with winds reported at 70-100kts in some of the anchorage, I personally only noticed a sustained wind between 30-40 for a couple of hours on our anemometer.  Regardless, it was a bit of a shit show.  At the time, Nico and Lindsay were on our boat just hanging out, making dinner with us, when out of nowhere within minutes, the winds go from 15 kts to 50 kts.  Frank and Nico were in the cockpit, and Lindsay and I were down below preparing dinner.  Of course we stopped what we were doing to check on what was happening, and next thing you know, we notice that Nico and Lindsay's boat dragging.  The waves in Elizabeth Harbor were large and violent, and there was no way that anyone could safely get in a dinghy and drive over to his boat, which was a half a mile away.  The waves were so strong that we were getting soaked just from them crashing over the bow, and into our cockpit.  So there we were sitting helplessly watching their boat drag clear across the anchorage, while monitoring the VHF and the anemometer.  At this point, I'm at the helm putting the boat into the wind and driving forward so as to take some strain off the anchor and keeping an eye on our neighboring boats.  Frank was forward checking on the anchor and letting out more scope.  Next thing you know, our friends' dinghy starts to blow vertically and the point on which their line was attached at the bow rips off their dinghy.   Luckily, there was an aft line holding it as well, and Nico was standing close by, and able to catch it.  There he was holding onto his inflatable, which at this point is behaving much like a flapping sail, You never realize how much windage those things have until they start flopping around the side of the boat like a dying fish.  I call Lindsay who is down below to help because he was struggling to hold it.  Frank rushes back, grabs a line, and they both struggle and tie the line to the dinghy.  

Their boat continues to drag across the anchorage, and with every boat Vida del Sol (name of their boat) passes, we cringe hoping that they don't get closer. We watch helplessly as the boat slowly passes a couple other boats unscathed.  We keep an eye on the anchor light at their masthead, and hope that it's still bobbing, indicating they haven't run aground.  Eventually, Vida del Sol starts to get pretty close to another boat which at this point is now in our anchorage, half a mile later.  We see spotlights illuminating their boat as it starts to inch closer to another boat.  The owners of the said boat start yelling at Nico on the VHF shouting that he needs to get on his boat and drive away.  Nico replies that he can't because it was unsafe for him to get in the dinghy.  The woman on the other boat starts panicking and wailing like a banshee at Nico to get his ass to his boat now, which then ended with Nico calmly replying in broken english, "Look, be sure as soon as the weather is nice and it is safe for me get in my dinghy for go my boat, I will.  But be sure I will make a stop to your fucking boat first."   Nice...

 This situation was rather infuriating as number 1, why would anyone WANT to sit and watch their boat drag clear across an anchorage with the possibility of it running aground and sinking...idiots. Number 2, the other boat was  perfectly capable at that point to start their engines, hoist anchor, and drive away, why the hell didn't they?  I know damn well if I saw a boat coming even close to us, that I'd be ready to get the hell out of its way, regardless of whether or not there was someone helming it.  That to me was simply poor seamanship, not taking responsibilty for their own boat and leaving it to someone else to take care of it.  Anyhow, luckily, there was no such collision, and Vida del Sol continued to merrily drift on by, naive to any potential danger.  Shortly after, the winds die down to the 30s and Nico takes the opportunity to get in the dinghy and to his boat.  He gets to his boat safely and turns on the engine, and pretty much drives it into the wind for the next hour or so until Frank deemed it safe to leave Moitessier and go over and help him re-anchor.  All said and done, the only major loss was their solar panel, which decided to take flight and seek shelter elsewhere during the derecho.  Very lucky considering all the close calls.  

The next day, getting on the cruisers' net and seeing if anyone needed help, we re-discover just how amazing cruisers truly are.  People, ourselves included, were offering help to whomever needed it as well as loaning supplies and offering what we could to each any boat that needed it.  One woman lost one of her stays, and immediately 5 other boaters offered what they could to help her replace it,  another ran aground and were on the rocks and cruisers came together on their dinghies to get it off.  Some lost their dinghies, some floating away completely,  while others flipped over, ruining their outboards.  It was really touching to see people so selflessly come together.  Georgetown wasn't the only one affected by this...it was as far north as Warderick Wells which had reported winds of 110kts.  A lot of yachts, I hear, at Staniel Cay were found aground and on the rocks.  I am so grateful that nothing happened to Moitessier, considering the conditions.  We had seen worse in terms of wind and waves in both Miami and Long Island, but this system posed the greatest threat simply due to the crowded anchorage.   I hope to not see one of those again anytime soon. 

Anchorage from above