Atlantic Passage

Had a great day racing on board the Charm III captained by Richard West. We actually beat the one schooner the skipper was most anxious to beat which was the Astor.

I have never been in a sailing race before so this was an interesting day.

The schooner Charm III is a staysail schooner, this means that instead of a gaff rigged foresil she has a staysail on a boom. Above this she carries a Fisherman’s Staysail. The advantage of this rig is that it is essentially self tending in tacks and is supposed to be marginally faster upwind. This schooner was designed and built in 1923 so she is a bit older than the Picton Castle actually. She has the distinction of having the oldest masts still afloat on their original hull

She sails really well and ha a very friendly and fairly laid back crew. Which was good cause I’m not sure I was all that useful a hand. Shackle and Sarah and I were the Picton Castle crew that were aboard for today’s race.

We headed for the starting line about 9:30 this morning. We got the sails and lines sorted and ten tacked back and forth waiting for our class to start.

One of the schooners in our class is called “When and If” I believe. Her owner planned to sail her around the world when and if he had chance. He died before he could do it. His name was George Patton.

We crossed the starting line bang on time which was met with much rejoicing. This is not an easy thing to do apparently.

The race was on a course that had two downwind legs and a couple of up wind slogs, very cool, lots of room for tactical sailing.

On one of the downwind legs we set a massive sail called a “Gollywobbler” that fills the space between the fore and main and is used as a downwind sail like a spinnaker. Setting this monster is quite a process. We first had to douse the Fisherman, un shackle and stow it, then set the Golly and take in the staysail. When we rounded the bouy we had to do the opposite.

During the race the giant “J” Class boats roared by. They sail like giant fish more than boats. They are very impressive and they create quite a wind shadow as they go.

Watching all these classic yachts, gaff riggers, schooners of all sizes all churning along in the beautiful tropical blue seas was wonderful.

The last leg is upwind and here the tactics get tricky. Our skipper elected to do a bunch of short tacks really close to shore and this made all the difference. Although we got very close to shore at one point.

Once the race was done we motored into the dock and stowed away the sails. A couple of Gin and Tonics to celebrate our victory and a nice lamb dinner prepared by one of the crew ended a fabulous day.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

There are some photos of the race here.

Had a very interesting day today.

I went ashore expecting to spend a quiet day surfing annd chilling while everybody else went racing. The first half of the day went exactly like that but just about 11:30 John came by. He had rented a car the day before and driven Spencer to the airport so he could go home. After a bit of Internet surfing we headed out in his car, with blessed AC, and found a local bar for lunch which was wonderful and CHEAP!

Then we headed down to the shore near Rendezvous Bay and watched the all the boats racing. It was a fabulous panorama of great sailing vessels like the “J” class sloops, schooners and ketches all the way down to our brightly coloured brave little dinghy ” Sea Never Dry”.

After the race we went back to the harbour in Falmouth to meet our crewmates who were sailing on some of these vessels.

I have been shanghaied into sailing on a staysail schooner named “Charmed III” which is an Alden designed Malibar 5(?) ship. Deb, Bruce and Charlotte sailed on her today and it appears that I will be sailing on her in the racing tomorrow.

Hmmm…

Should be fun, I’ll let you know how it goes. I’m off to get in on the free food and booze action down on the docks amongst all these expensive yachts.

Wish me luck.

For tonight and tomorrow

Thanks for reading.
KJ

We were on watch today so spent the day doing ship work.

In my case I spent the morning spot painting the breeze way overheads “tropical blue”. This was interesting actually cause the last time I did this was April last year and it was rainy and cold!

I spent this afternoon sanding the starboard quarter deck rail in preparation for it being varnished. The day was sunny and hot so the breeze through the bay was very welcome. While we were working a whole bunch of boats from small dragon class sloops to the giant “J” class racing yachts and several schooners and ketches of various sizes sailed past heading out to sail in the strong alongshore breeze. Our dory with it’s gaily colored gaff sail joined them and made a brave tiny splash of colour far out amongst the giants.

Once we were finished working we went for a sail in the dory, my first, and just as we passed the headland out to sea and had gibed back into the harbour the tiller broke! A mad scramble ensued as we doused the sail and shipped the oars to row back to the ship. An exciting end to the work day that

Dinner tonight was really good. Gunner and Susie were on galley today and they cooked up a great meal of Spaghetti Carbonara, green salad and mango cobbler. To make it special Lynsey ordered the watch to “dress for dinner” so we all put on clean and fancy clothes and ate in the salon accompanied by wine and ice water. The ipod was playing big bang music, Frank Sinatra and Louis Armstrong. Lovely.

Currently the watch is hanging on the welldeck listening to reggae and I’m chilling below typing with both hands for the first time

Thanks for reading.
KJ

We had to move the ship closer to shore this morning so after breakfast it was hands to the windlass!

Once we were anchored again I went ashore on the first skiff and spent the day wandering around Falmouth and Nelson’s Dockyard at English bay.

Today was the start of the Antigua Classic yacht Regatta and there are an amazing number of beautiful classic yachts here. I have never seen so many schooners and ketches in one place before. There is even one massive three masted staysail schooner from France that is almost as long as the Picton Castle! There are also some very pretty smaller boats mostly ketches and cutters. The glare from the varnish was almost blinding in the bright Sun

Needless to say the place is swarming with people from all over the world. Most of whom are either very “well heeled” or the paid crew for said well heeled people. Several of our crew managed to get on as volunteer crew on several boats. There are a nice clutch of wooden sloops built on Carriacou some gaff rigged as well as bermudian sloop rigged. They are noticeable mostly because they are painted using ordinary paint. No fiberglass, varnish or brass anywhere. Doesn’t seem to hinder their sailing at all.

English Harbour and Nelson’s Dockyard (which is now an Antiguan National Park) was once the equivalent of Halifax for the Royal Navy. The dockyard has been restored fairly well and has a lot of plaques and information boards even though the buildings are now hotels, bars and concessions so you get a good idea of how the place worked when Nelson was in charge (hence the name).

Tomorrow our watch is on and then we get the next two days off.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Here are some photos from my trip ashore in Antigua.

Sunday April 12,09

I hope Eostre’s Hare was good to you all and you didn’t overdose on chocolate

We had a busy day today.

This morning we cleaned up the ship, re-lashed all the stuff that had been unlashed over the last few days so the on watches could paint the topsides. We also stowed a lot of stuff preparatory to getting underway for Antigua.

We up anchored and motored away from Martinique at 3:30pm this afternoon. We kept motoring using the fore and aft sails until we passed out of the lee of the island then took in the sails and motored North East until around 6:00 when we set all sails.

The plan is to sail North towards Antigua on the Windward side of the islands. This will mean some tricky steering as we will have to steer really close to the wind to make the Northing we need.

We finally had some luck with the fishing lines. We caught a Barracuda and a pretty big Marlin within a half hour of each other.

Just as we were getting ready to go off watch at 8:00pm a big rain squall came in and thoroughly drenched us before hitting us with strong wind gusts that necessitated taking in the flying jib in the pitch dark and rain. A damp but effective way to get everyone back into sailor mode.

My tattoo looks good still, which is a relief frankly as I was afraid of a bout of “buyers remorse” this morning There were lot of tattoos done while we were in Martinique something like 20!

The trip to Antigua will take a couple of days so we should get some good if tricky sailing.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Mon Apr 13,09

Just got off our very wet night watch.

I woke up around 3:00am to the sound of heavy rain beating on the deck over my head. Just before we came on watch the squall passed bringing with it a big wind shift. e came up on deck just as the order to brace the yards around came. Nothing like starting a watch off with a bang

A half hour later we braced them again as the winds returned to their pre squall direction.

About midway through our watch the skis opened up and I spent my lookout in the pouring rain.

By the time our watch ended the winds had dropped and shifted such that we were pointing directly at Dominica. So we fired up the main engine and took in all sails and are now motoring North off the eastern shore of Dominica. FWIW you can see the steam from the boiling lake, like a cloud stuck in the forest, cool.

My hands are a mess, even my “good” one is a bit torn up. Callouses and water don’t mix.

More later…

Just got off a very busy watch.
We tacked this evening at around 5:00pm ad it went very well.
Since then we have been sailing full and bye but in the wrong direction. That leads me to believe that we will be tacking again. Possibly even later tonight which mens we would be doing it in the dark. Fun fun that!

One of the islands we have been sailing slowly past is Marie Gallant (?!?) this island is NE of Dominica and is actually the edge of the Caribbean tectonic plate thrust up over the Atlantic plate. The volcanoes of Dominica are the molten remains of the Atlantic plate melting as it descends. This is the classic plate edge volcanic system but normally you can’t see the edge of the overriding plate so clearly.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Tues April 14,09

Had a good night watch, pretty uneventful.

I had first lookout which was wonderful as the skies were pretty clear and the mostly full moon was bright.

Last night at the change of watches around midnight they tacked ship. It was nice that they didn’t have to wake us up When we went on watch this morning we were again sailing North towards Antigua.

Paul caught two more Baracudas this morning, one of which he threw back because it was small.

We may arrive in Antigua later this afternoon.

More later…

We arrived in Antigua and anchored next to a very large yacht in Falmouth harbour at 6:00pm.
I’ll be off tomorrow so will have a chance to check out the lay of the land.
Many of the crew are looking forward to crewing on some of the classic boats in the races here. I’m happy to be looking on I think

Thanks for reading.
KJ

So after much consideration I have decided to get a tattoo.

I know Biz, my daughter, thought I should get one to mark the trip but I couldn’t decide on a pattern I’d like to live with for the rest of my life

The primary reason we are here in Martinique is to visit a tattoo artist that does Polynesian style tattoos and is well known to the Picton Castle crew.

Many of the crew have got new tattoos, some small some very complex all beautiful and unique. Her style is very light, which I like, not heavy and blocky like most tattoos I’ve seen.

John got a nice one on his calf you can see it here.

This is the place then to get it done, after crossing both the Atlantic ocean and the Equator I’ve an idea that I think will work well, a combination of traditional and artistic. I’ll see what the artist thinks.

My appointment is at 2:00pm today and I’m sitting in the cafe drinking cafe ‘o lait listening to the buzz/wine of the tattoo gun…

More later…

It’s later and I have a nice tattoo on my left forearm.
At least all the pain and healing itching will be on the same side
Now the dilemma is to post pictures or surprise everyone when I get home?
What do you think?

Thanks for reading.
KJ

My galley day yesterday went by without a hitch.

Luckily Donald was cooking, boo yeah!, so we just had to stay ahead of the dishes. Keeping my freshly bandaged hand dry was a challenge but a bright yellow rubber glove managed that

This morning I came ashore on the first skiff run for a look around. Being Good Friday it was very quiet but the museum was open. There were lots of before and after photos of the city in 1908. The most powerful display to me was the huge bell from the cathedral. This inch thick bronze bell looks like a squashed beer can! The force of the blast and the extreme heat simply mashed it flat as it fell from the tower.

There are also examples of things found in the ruins as people began to build anew. Blocks of fused nails and screws from a hardware store, melted coins and smashed ships portholes plus many ordinary things made into macabre artifacts by the sheer power of the volcanoe.

Nicko and I wandered through the town and saw the ruins of the theater, a large church and the prison where one of the only two survivors was in solitary confinement in a small cell deep inside the prison.

The ruins show the power of this event. There are great blocks of masonry piled up like they were children’s blocks dumped out of a bucket.

The current town, built amongst the ruins, has made no attempt to hide it’s charred and blasted predecessor. Many of the houses incorporate the walls directly, they are usually blackened bare stone and mortar whereas the new walls are painted cinder block. The streets are the same as well, many with the original cobbled surfaces.

All in all St Pierre is a fascinating, if slightly macabre place to see. Rising above it, to the North, is the grey peaked Mt Pelee still rumbling a bit and being very carefully watched.

The crew has adopted a restaurant bar tattoo parlour called L’ Escapade which has WiFi even Unfortunately they closed at 3:00 this afternoon as did everything else in town. Apparently this weekend will be very quiet so not sure what we’ll end up doing tomorrow as we also have it off.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Here are some pictures from my look around in St Pierre Martinique.

This morning after breakfast and domestics we began the process of heaving up our anchor and the three shots of chain hanging almost straight down from the hawse pipe. Pulling this up with the windlass was a lot harder than normal because we had to lift the whole kit ‘n kaboodle. Normally the chain is laying on the bottom and we drag it along only lifting the part that goes up to the ship.

Once the anchor was up we motored away from the shore and set all sails as we got out of the lee of Dominica. We were under sail by 11:20am.

We are now sailing along at about 5 knots headed south towards the French island of Martinique. I mostly know this island for the destruction of the city of St Pierre by the volcanoe there. Many of the crew are looking forward to this stop because they want to get a tattoo. I may do so as well but haven’t decided for sure yet

We will be in Martinique for at least 3 days probably 4.

More later…

Just finished cleaning up from dinner.

I had first helm on our afternoon watch. We were motorsailing towards Martinique and ran into a rainstorm with gusty winds. I had my fowlie jacket on but hadn’t done it up yet. I ended up standing my trick at the helm with my jacket open. Luckily the rain was fairly warm

We took in all sails around 5:30 and motored into the anchorage at St Pierre and dropped the starboard hook. The Captain says the holding is not great here but the anchorage is fairly sheltered so we should be OK.

St Pierre never really recovered after the eruption of 1908. From a population of 40,000 there are now only 7,000. The current city is built inside the ruins of the old city. There is a good museum here which I intend to check out.

I have looked at the picture taken the day after the eruption so many times that my mind overlays that scene of utter desolation over the current lush green countryside. We are anchored near to the point where the photo appears to have been taken so it’s almost like a temporal shadow. It is a very odd sensation.

Our watch is on tomorrow and I have galley so it will be a long day.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Went on a great hike up into the mountains of Dominica today.
WT, Nicola, Susie, Nicko and I took a bus up to the mountain town of Laudat where we paid our $5.00 US site fee then started our hike by Pitou Gorge.

Our objective was the Boiling Lake and the Valley of Desolation high up in the Morne Trois Pitons National park. The trail is very good and fairly easy to follow but it is essentially a 6 mile stairway! The valleys are very steep and covered in lush rainforest. The first part of the trail we climbed relatively slowly under scattered showers and then we came to the top of a ridge and started a 2 mile up and down that was a real workout.

Eventually we came to the top of a high ridge and looked down into the valley of desolation with the steam from the boiling lake rising from the forest on the mountainside beyond it.

After a very steep scramble down into the valley we passed hotsprings and boiling pools with steam rising straight into the sky. Everywhere there was sulphur coated rocks and bubbling hissing sulphurous steam. In places the ground was hot and you could here the steam hissing and roaring beneath your feet. Very cool.

The valley of desolation is indeed desolate the result of a massive phreatic (steam) explosion in the 1880s sometime. There was a smaller one in 1997 as well.

From there we followed the hot streams down the valley a bit and then climbed up to the edge of the Boiling lake. This lake is the largest of it’s kind in the world and is a very impressive example of the power of the tectonic and volcanic forces beneath our feet. The lake is in the bottom of a perfect cylindrical pipe maybe 300′ across. The center of the lake is in a constant state of roiling boil. It makes a steady rumble a it does so.
Very impressive.

On our way back through the valley of desolation we stopped to look into many of the boiling pools and steam vents and followed some of the sulphur mud flows. The guide of another party gave us a hard time for “analysing” things without a permit?!? Apparently looking too closely at things is considered “research” and needs a permit of some kind. Go figure.

Susie figures I must have looked like a geologist or somebody scientific. Who knew

Of course every downhill we had done meant a subsequent uphill and vice verse. My knee which occasionally gives me trouble when hiking was really sore by the time we got back to the Pitou Gorge.

Susie took off ahead on the way back and was down almost a half an hour before Nicko and I stumbled out the forest. WT and Nickola followed us out maybe 15 minutes later. All safe and sound.

Tonight the Ruin Rock is putting on a BBQ for us so that’s where I will be heading once I get cleaned up.

Thanks for reading
KJ

Here are the pictures from our expedition.

Spent the day yesterday doing shipwork like sanding and painting, all of which can be done one handed
We also loosed all the square sails so they could dry. Unfortunately I couldn’t go aloft to help. Bruce did however which was a first for him and I have a photo to prove it!

This morning we had to hoist the anchor and motor a little further out to give the anchor a better grip on the steep side of this island. We are now anchored in about 100′ of water and almost the same distance from the shore. Nothing like a little anchor work after breakfast to start the day off on the right foot!

I’m thinking of spending the day fairly quietly today and will join a bunch of people heading into the hills tomorrow. We will be going to the boiling lake and the “valley of desolation” the most recently active area of this volcanic island.

More later…