Atlantic Passage

Woke up this morning with my hand throbbing. Blah!

Eric our Doctor arranged for a tour guide for the day so I went ashore on the early skiff after a hurried breakfast. Once there we had a bit of time to kill so Eric bandaged my hand properly. At least this way it might actually heal in a timely manner.

The tour was fantastic. Kurt, our driver, is actually the captain of the whale watching boat at the Anchorage Hotel and has access to the hotel’s 4×4 so we were able to get up high in the mountains. The roads on Dominica are very narrow, many are literally a single lane. Plus there is a lot of road construction underway which means they are rough and muddy in places.

We went up to Freshwater Lake which is in the crater of an old volcanoe. Very nice high up in the rain forest covered mountains. We also went to Trafalgar Falls which are beautiful. A quick side trip to Pitou Gorge was interesting. That is the narrow channel part of Pirates II was filmed in, when they fell into the gorge in the cages.

The landscape here is very much like the West Coast of Canada but with tropical foliage. In fact part of the trip today was in deep V shaped river valleys very much like the area around Sandon near Kaslo B.C.

We went all the way across the island to the Carib Territory which is the last indigenous area in the Caribbean.

After we got back to Roseau we had a great dinner of fish and chips and I’m now hanging out with Eric at an apartment he rented here.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Eric is a bit of a video wiz so check out his latest here: Picton Scullery Ackbar
Pictures of my day ashore as soon as I can upload them.
They are here.

Spent the morning doing osfo and doing spot painting of the starboard bow topsides.
It was nice and cool, sitting on a plank suspended off the rail, as that was the shady side of the ship. This afternoon we are going to be doing the same but on the port side which is facing the sun which will be really hot.

The schooner Spirit of Massachusetts was anchored here. Her captain was 2nd mate on the third world voyage of the Picton castle and came alongside for a visit. When she was leaving she sailed across our bows and saluted with a shot from her cannon and a proper dipping of her ensign. We responded with a good horn blast. Very cool.

David and I went ashore yesterday and wandered around the town of Roseau. The town is beautiful and still pretty much as this area was 50 years ago. The buildings are mostly two story with the lower story stone and the upper story wood.

The current crew hangout is a fabulous bar/restaurant called the Ruin Rock Cafe. It is built inside the ruins of an old building and serves an amazing variety of flavoured rums that they make themselves. The Guava was definitely “dangerously yummy” They also have things like coconut pineapple, ginger, tamarind, lemon and other fruits as well as very exotic ones like snake and centipede ?!?.

I’m hoping to go on an around the island tour when we get ashore tomorrow.

More later…

It’s later and I have a very sore left hand. Blah.

I’m going to file the following under the “It seemed like a good idea at the time” file or maybe the “20/20 hindsight is a bitch” one.

After lunch I shifted the scaffold over to get at the last spot on the starboard bow. In doing so I tried to position it such that I could reach it from the rail. Well, as I tried to lower myself down I realized that the plank was about a foot too low! Unfortunately I didn’t find this out until I was so far over the rail that I couldn’t get back up!

Then I made my big mistake. I figured I would just hand over hand my way down the rope to the plank, it was only 1 foot after all right? Wrong! The line was too thin to hang onto and before I could get both hands onto it I slid down the rope, missed the plank and ended up hanging off the end! I also badly rope burned my left hand, ripping most of my callouses off and giving myself second degree burns on my index finger and the palm of my hand! Ouch.

So there I was hanging over the brilliant blue sea by my fingertips feeling like a right great goof. I tried to climb back up onto the plank but because my weight was on the end it kept swinging away from the ships side. I yelled “On deck!” and got an immediate response and then yelled “Help!”. There wasn’t anything anyone could really do and in hindsight I should just have dropped into the drink to swim over to the ladder. Ben and Susie were working alongside in the skiff and they came over to see if I could clamber into it before letting go but I ended up swimming anyways.

To everybody’s credit nobody laughed, which was nice

David, helped me bandage my hand, fresh water rinsed my gear and hung it all up for me while I found some dry clothes. Thanks David!

It’s a good thing I have a couple of days off to let the blisters break and get a start on the healing process. Hauling on lines is going to be a pain for a while.

It’s also a good thing I mostly type with one finger

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Mar 30,09

We up anchored and sailed off the hook this morning and went from 8:00am muster to sailing under all plain sail in about one and a half hours.

Just as we were preparing to get underway a small tanker came into the anchorage which made things a bit crowded. We also had an inter island freighter anchored beside us. As the anchor came up we backed the outer jib and set the fore lower topsail aback and we spun around on our heal quite nicely.

The winds have shifted around more to the East which means we will be heading into them going this way as we were going into them coming North. The Captain says we should be able to sail most of the way however which will be good.

Yesterday while I was ashore I spent some time reading up on Dominica. There are 9 volcanoes there many of which have been active in the last 10,000 years. Dominica is probably island that has the greatest concern since it is overdue for a major eruption. My kind of place Since we will be there for about 10 days I hope to get a good look at some of it.

More later…

It’s mid afternoon and I go on watch in an hour or so.

The weather is fabulous with a steady Force 4 wind blowing from the East and we are sailing “Full and By” as close to South as we can get. The water is an amazingly luminous blue to windward. I noticed on the way North that it changed from the green that was common around Grenada to blue. Going this way the bright Sun in the almost cloudless blue sky is making the seas practically glow to windward of us. I’m continually amazed at the range of colours that the surface of the sea assumes. Sometimes it depends on the weather or the depth of the sea but other times there doesn’t seem to be anything obviously different from the day before but the sea is definitely a different colour. Today is one of those days. Beautiful!

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Tues Mar 31,09

I can’t believe it’s nearly April already.

Well the nice weather didn’t last through our aftermnoon watch resterday by 7:00pm it was squally and raining pretty heavily. After we got off watch the ship really started to roll for a while but settled down by the time I went on watch at 4:00am.

Our night watch was good. My helm trick was from 6:00 to 7:00am this morning just as the Sun was rising above a bank of clouds in the East. We are sailing “Full and By” trying to head as close to South as we can get. I always have trouble sailing that way because I tend to over steer a bit when correcting which causes us to fall off farther than we need to. Also today we didn’t have the royals set so we have to use the leach of the T’gallant to determine our closest windward course. It is more sensitive to the rolling of the ship which mimics the luffing which means we are as close as we can get to the wind. I think I did OK as I managed to keep the course close to SSE on average which was pretty good. If I do say so myself

We are heading SExE under all sail, except for the Mizzen staysail and gaff topsail, and we may be able to get to Dominica under sail alone.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Wed April 1,09

We took in our sails and fired up the engine midway through our watch.

We arrived in Dominica at 9:30am this morning and am now anchored “stern to” just off shore The shore is very steep here our stern, which is maybe 40′ from the shore, is in something like 20′ of water and our bow is in more than 70′! We are waiting to get cleared in currently then I will be going ashore to check out what there is to see.

More later…

So it is Saturday March 28th and our watch is working today.

Yesterday and Thursday evening we were ashore.

I went to the opening party of the Moonsplash Reggae Festival which was cool, but expensive.

Our watch was the vanguard of the “Picton Castle Landing Party” and as such was charged with acquiring the requisite provisions and billeting. Lynnsey found a guest house apartment which was big enough for the invasion to proceed. I slept on the tile floor that night with the bath mat under me and the towel from the bathroom as a blanket. Surprisingly the biggest problem wasn’t the hard floor but the cold from the constant breeze of the ceiling fans.

On Friday morning I got up had an awesome breakfast of bacon and eggs cooked by Geoff, watched the Great Lobowski (sic) on Ben’s laptop then headed out to find Internet and see what the day would bring.

I met up with the ship’s doctor Eric and David and we decided to go an check out the local Rum company. They had free samples but their prices were basically retail. Then we took a cab tour of the island which was pretty cool. We went to Shoal Beach which has been rated as one of the best beaches in the area and I can see why. The beach is busy but very clean, bright white with the water an intense blue with brilliant breaking white rollers out on the reef.

In the evening we had a fabulous dinner at a small beach restaurant then headed back to the ship on the 9:00 skiff.

Today I’ve been sanding and varnishing the main and fore fife rails.

Not sure what I’m going to do with my day ashore tomorrow. Being Sunday it will probably be pretty quiet. Just have to find a shady spot with WiFi and some good rum punches and chill for the day. We will be sailing for Dominica on Monday morning.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Here are some pictures from Anguilla.

This is a continuous post read down for the latest!

Monday Mar 23,09

We up anchored and sailed off the hook, after loading our “flotilla”,all 4 of them, back on board, around 10:00am.

A brief sail under topsails courses and t’gallants brought us to the other side of Union island by noon. As we approached Union Island I went aloft to the t’gallants to stow the sail. This is the first time I’ve done that and it was exhilarating and scary at the same time.

The Captain has gone ashore to clear us out of St Vincent and the Grenadines and we will be sailing for Anguila some 350 miles to the North.

The passage to Anguila will take about three days which, in the words of our Captain at muster this morning, “For the new people is an epic sea voyage, for those who’ve been aboard longer it’s detox”.

Heh

Actually it will be nice to have a longer passage. I like the normal watch routine and sailing the ship. It’s quite a comforting routine for me now which is a bit odd but cool too

We hoisted the anchor and sailed off the hook headed North on our passage around 3:30 this afternoon. That is the first time we have done that twice in the same day, at least whilst I have been aboard. A great way to get back in Seaman mode for the passage

The night has fallen and left the ky sprinkled with bright white stars and bright green flashes of phosphorescence along the hull. A great end to a busy day full of seaman’s work on this fine barque of ours.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Tuesday Mar 24,09

Had a great night watch.

I was first helm and we were trying to sail as close to NxW as we could get. We had all sails set and she was steering really well so even though it was a bit tricky to keep from swinging to far into the wind it wasn’t too bad.

About halfway through my trick, around 4:30 or so I caught sight of a bright light to the NE and when I glanced over to see what it was I saw what looked like two objects coming down like very bright and slow meteors towards the East. There was a flash and they vanished. Later as dawn began to break there appeared to be a band of very brightly lit clouds in the NE about where the flash was. These clouds were high enough that they were in sunlight before even the cirrus clouds over us were. As the light grew these clouds spread out into an ellipse almost like a giant smoke ring hanging just over the horizon. They were no longer visible by the time the Sun came up. I think the clouds were the result of an explosion of something at very high altitude. Pretty cool!

We took in all square sail and fired up the engine around 6:30 and are currently motorsailing North.

More later…

Just got off my afternoon watch and we are still motoring North. The winds are light, force 3, from the North. The sky has been cloudy all day and was looking fairly grim at sunset but as we were coming off watch there were a few stars visible so maybe nothing will come of it.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Wednesday Mar 25,09

Had a quiet night watch.

We are still motoring North. For a wile this morning the wind picked up to Force 4 from almost dead ahead and we set the fore and aft sails to try to take advantage of it but soon took them in again as we came abreast of Guadalupe and the wind died away.

The skies are still cloudy but not as threatening looking as they were at dusk yesterday.

The boat frame that we acquired in Grenada is being worked on. The main hatch has become a boatyard and by the end of the day it looks like one with wood shavings everywhere.

More later…

It’s now 3:30pm and we are approaching the island of Montserrat. This island has an active volcano that forced the abandonment of the principle city on the island about 10 years ago. The top of the volcano is hidden in clouds but you can clearly see the broad ashy looking fan of lahar and pyroclastic flow debris running down to the sea from the summit.

The remains of the city can be seen rising above the grey ashy concrete like flows. This area is in stark contrast to the lush green of the north side of the island where most of the people relocated to.

The ash from the volcano seeds the clouds causing them to boil up downwind of the island. It almost looks like it is erupting furiously but it isn’t at the moment.

The 12-4 watch is busy setting all our sails so we will be sailing by the time I go on watch in 20 minutes or so.

Later…

Had a workshop on wooden boat building while the ashy coast of Montserrat passed by to starboard. You could smell the sulphur inm the ash plume. As we passed by the island the wind curved around and briefly headed us then picked up speed so that we were really moving along under all sail by sunset.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Thursday Mar 26,09

We really earned our breakfast today!

About halfway through our night watch. The wind was a gusty force 5, the gusts were up to force 6 apparently,and we were sailing “Full and By” as close to the wind as we could go. We took in all sail and then had to go aloft and stow it as well. While we were stowing the mainsail the Sun came up behind the island of Saba which we were passing at the time. The Sun cast a shadow of Nick SA, David and I on the Main Topmast Staysail. We looked a surprisingly salty trio wrestling with the heavy sail as it flogged a bit in it’s gear.

The 8-12 watch had some excitement as well, about 3:00am the sheet on the flying jib parted with what sounded like a gunshot. I woke up in my bunk to the roaring and deep bass rumbling of the flying jib as it flogged madly. The watch rushed to take it in before it totally shredded itself or wrenched the jib boom awry. I was glad to still have 45 minutes before I had to be on deck!

We are now motoring into fairly heavy seas and a steady Force 5 wind from the NNE trying to make Anguila by early afternoon.

More later…

Arrived in Anguilla around 3:30 this afternoon.
Anchored and headed ashore for the evening.
Believe it or not I am sitting in the Reggae Festival called Moonsplash and thought I would see if there was Internet and surprise there was!
Shoud be a cool evening mon
Thanks for reading.
kJ

Had a great ‘mandatory fun’ day

I went snorkeling on the reefs this morning. We used the rescue boat and motored out to three different spots. The first spot was a bit too deep with a fairly big swell running so we moved to a second spot closer to shore which was nice. I haven’t used a mask, fins and a snorkel for probably 30 years or more so it took some getting used to. Once I got comfortable using them I was able to dive down and get a good look at all the multi coloured fish hiding around the bases of the coral mounds. The last place we went had a lot more coral of different kinds and consequently more varieties of fish. It was really cool!

In the afternoon I went ashore with David and wandered through the town. We then went back to the beach across from the ship and I snoozed under a tree on the beach for an hour or more.

This evening we had a BBQ on the ship and as I write this there is still a boisterous party on the welldeck

A lovely day in a lovely place.

Tomorrow we head North towards Anguila which will take several days as I understand it.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Here are some photos from my day in Maryeau.

Spent the day doing lots of different jobs on board the ship.

A short list:
a) Domestics
b) Went ashore with Ben to pick up boxes of oatmeal and ichiban noodles
c) Stored said oatmeal and ichiban noodles in the hold
d) Sanded the varnished rail that runs across the bridge
e) Sorted the enormous pile of cordage stored in various dark reaches of the hold
f) Did the dishes after dinner to help out the galley crew, Susie and Nick SA. (Hi John R )

Whew!

Tomorrow we head out to a small island near the Tobago Cays called Maryeau. It is back South of here almost all the way back to Carriacou.
This island is 1.5 square miles and has a population of 254! Probably no Internet though

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Update Fri Mar 20: Seems we aren’t leaving till tomorrow, Saturday the 21st. Paul discovered some likely looking trees to use for the stems of the schooners so another lumber expedition is currently underway.
Aw shucks! I guess I’ll just have to hang out under those damn palm trees drinking more damned rum and being damned lazy another damn day… Damn

Here are some more pictures from my run ashore. The Royal Clipper came in during the afternoon check it out!

I hope everyone had a happy St Patricks day!

Went ashore in Bequia after we dropped anchor and had agreat afternoon and evening.

Did a bit of Internet stuff and then went and hung out with the crew in two fine beach side establishments singing sailor’s shanties, drinking rum and generally livening up the neighbourhood.

Bequia is a very popular place there must be a hundred yachts at anchor in the bay here. The town surrounds the bay with many most things that a yachty could use

The presence of all these yachts makes it feel more “touristy” than the other islands I’ve been to so far. It’s still really nice though.

I’m going to go and see more of the island today as I also have it off.

More later.
KJ

Here are some pictures from my run ashore in Bequia.

After getting the ship cleaned up and down rigging all the lumber hauling gear we up anchored and motored away from St Georges on a passage to Bequia in the St Vincent Grenadines.

As we were heading North the Royal Clipper cruise ship came in. This is a 5 masted square rigged cruise ship. the only one of it’s kind in the world. It didn’t have any sails set and as we crossed her bows under all our fore and aft sails we blasted our horn and waved. She returned the salute in kind. I wonder what her passengers thought when they saw our little Barque

We motored for an hour or so to get North of Grenada and then we set the courses, topsails and t’gallants. I kinda hoped my glasses would fallout of the sails when the were unfurled but no luck, the sea has them.

The passage to Bequia is 70 miles or so depending on how far we have sail off the direct line and whether we will need to tack or not. We should get into Bequia tomorrow morning so I will have my first night watch since coming back on board.

More later…

My night watch was very busy. We wore ship just after we went on watch. I was on helm which was interesting. Then about an hour later the wind shifted such that we couldn’t keep our course to Bequia so we ended up motoring in.

We arrived at 10:30 this morning and dropped our anchor amongst a ton of yachts. This is a very popular place apparently. I’ll let you know how it goes

Thanks for reading.
KJ

It was an all hands wakeup at 5:30 this morning!

We were aloft loosing the topsails and courses and then onto the windlass by 6:00am.

We heaved up the anchor, sailed off the hook and are sailing towards Grenada under all squar sails but the main sail. Our watch had the deck for the first watch. I had helm for an hour and it was really tricky steering as we are going directly downwind.

They expect us to be arriving in Grenada around 2:00pm. Then, IF all goes according to plan, we will load the lumber and head out to Bequia on an overnight sail arriving sometime tomorrow morning.

This is going to be a very long day.

More later…

It’s later and it has indeed been a very long day.
The bad side of the day was losing my glasses overboard when I was up on the yard working to furl and gasket up the sails as we came into St Georges. The footrope from the upper topsail yard swept them off my head as I was trying to duck under another line. I even had a safety strap on them. Oddly enough I didn’t notice they were gone until I got back on deck. It’s a good thing I have a spare set even if they aren’t trifocals

Once we were anchored at St Georges I went ashore with a gang to get the the lumber ready to be towed out to the ship. This was two very large slabs of wood each one 20′ long 18″ wide and 1′ thick weighing nearly two tons each!

It was probably a lot like loading an 18 pounder onto frigate, except we only had to move two not 24

Once we had them at the ship it took nearly two hours and a lot of work with tackles, blocks and the capstan. Once safely laying on the deck we had to drag one back into the breezeway where it will be lashed down. The other on is currently lying just forward of it and I think we will get to move it in the morning.

We are staying here at St Georges over night and will sail for Bequia tomorrow after we get everything shipshape again.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Here are some pictures of Tyrrel Bay and the masive chunks of wood alongside.