Dalton W. Williams
Anse a` la Barque
Basse Terre
Whales on the way to Pointe A Pitre!
Pointe A Pitre
Anse a` la Barque
Sailing from Montserrat to Guadeloupe we were sailing in
tandem with Gallant watching the Montserrat volcano at night. As we passed
the end of Montserrat and could no longer see the volcano I tacked to our much
improved windward sailing angle and headed as close as we could to Guadeloupe.
If you read the prior section you know that David from Gallant had spend a
morning sailing with me adjusting the jib sheet cars and teaching me how to
better trim my main sail by slackening off the main halyard in light winds to
put a little more belly in the sail. These changes have made a huge difference
in how Quietly sails into the wind.
Before we could only sail about 60 degrees to the wind and now we are sailing 40 degrees to the wind! The dramatic difference this has made was demonstrated during the night when we were sailing to Guadeloupe. We were able to sail closer to the wind and thus get to Guadeloupe before Gallant even though their boat is 10 feet longer and faster than Quietly. The changes he showed me really made Quietly sail much better. I have a LOT to learn about sailing!!!!!
When we were approaching Guadeloupe in the morning we called our friends on Willow on the HF Radio. They were surprised when we told them we were only about three miles away and headed there way! That day while Brenda and John of Willow were Scuba Diving at Pigeon Island, both Quietly and Gallant continued down the coast another three miles and anchored at Anse a` la Barque where Willow joined us for dinner later that night.
On
Saturday we invited everyone over to Quietly for lunch which turned into to
being one of the best afternoons… We told stories, played games, swam, talked,
and played
more
games until it was dark and then we all went over to Gallant for supper and
talked until after midnight! The synchronized swim team is Brenda, John,
David, Andrea and Tom popping up in the center. That's Tom on the halyard
and Alex taking the plunge with here clothes on!
Basse Terre
Sunday was pretty quiet after the all day party we had on Saturday. The sail to Basse Terre on Sunday was easy, only about eight miles and all three boats, Gallant, Willow and Quietly, arrived outside the Rivie`re Sens Marina about 4:30. Mooring in the marina is "Med-Mooring" which means backing up to the dock and tying the bow to a buoy in the channel. Willow does not have a bow thruster so it is very hard for them to steer when going backwards. I have a bow thruster but had only "Med-Moored" twice before. Gallant had sailed a summer in the Med and were experts at "Med-Mooring" so they were the first to go into the marina while Willow and I waited outside.
While Gallant was getting settled, I took John
and Brenda from Willow
in my dinghy and we took the dinghy into the marina to check things out. There
were three empty spaces and one was on the end of a dock which made it easiest
for Willow. I would take the space next to Gallant in the middle of the dock. I
took John back to his boat and then stayed in my dinghy to help him by looping
his bow line through the buoy in the cannel as he started backing into the dock.
After John docked Willow, then he and David joined me on Quietly and I went in to "Med-Moor". I surprised even my self at sliding into the space perfectly, but with lots of help from John and David getting all of the lines secured while I held the boat in place with the engine and bow thruster.
About half an hour later we heard a boat sounding it's horn and looked out to see someone was pointing to where I was moored. It would seam that the place I took belonged to the other boat so I got to do it all over again in the last space available. A few dozen more times and I may feel confident in doing this! {laughing}
Shortly after this three customs officers approached Gallant and wished to board and in a few minutes they came to Quietly. They were very courteous and wished to help me check in and inspect the boat. After completing the paper work they thanked me and left looking over the other boats in the marina. Later that evening I learned why three customs officers were out doing check-in’s on a Sunday afternoon… Several days before they had discovered a sailboat with 990 Kilo’s of cocaine on board in the Rivie`re Sens Marina! Thus the boarding and inspecting of all boats entering the marina.
That night we all had dinner in a small restaurant at the marina finishing dinner at after 11:30.
Monday I slipped in the cockpit and really banged my knee by falling into a corner. My knee cap hit the upper part of the cockpit seat and my knee hit the engine instruments so I really banged it up good. I packed it in ice for an hour and was able to then get around slowly at first but it improved all day as Gretchen and I took the bus across the island to see if my mail had arrived.
While waiting for the bus in Basse Terre, we went to of all
places McDonalds for lunch! I was hungry for something predictable...
{laughing}
Gretchen
and I took the slow “local” buss on the way to Point A Pitre which took 2.5
hours and was wonderful! The island is lush and green with rain forest,
large banana plantations and sugarcane plantations.
Guadalupe is the first island that matches my mental image of a lush tropical
Caribbean island. Returning we took the “express” buss which stayed on the
main road making the trip just 55 minutes complete with a French movie on
screens in the bus!
Tuesday was Alex on Gallant birthday so everyone met on
their boat at 6:00 PM for her birthday party. It was her 19th, her last
birthday as a teenager. She is really a great kid and has taken the last year
off before entering college to sail with her parents and older brother. She
will be off to college in California after the summer to study pre-med. It was
my first time to be at a "typical British birthday party" and as you can see the
party as you can see from the pictures was a blast.
Whales on the way to Pointe A Pitre!
Sailing around the south west end of Guadeloupe at about 1:30 I was looking off towards Guadeloupe and kept seeing spray in the air. I was thinking that I did not remember seeing any rocks that far off shore. As I continued to watch the spray began to separate and then I saw what it was... Whales! I am not certain how many they were, but I saw two on the surface at the same time. They were swimming slowly towards the boat as we were heading north. As they got closer we could see them jumping out of the water and their huge tails in the air. As they approached Quietly they turned and swam behind the boat coming up to the surface and taking a good look at us. We could see their head and their eyes looking at us. Then they turned and swam past us with one making a jump and back flip in the air with a huge splash when it hit the water. The closest they came to the boat was perhaps 150 feet. I did not have time to grab the camera as I was so fascinated watching them and don’t have a book on whales, but I am pretty certain they were Grey Whales from visiting Sea World and seeing them there.
This is turning out to be quite an experience ... seeing a live volcano and now having whales playing next to the boat! What marvels!!! Both Gretchen and I were so intent in watching and I also trying to make certain we did not hit them or them us. The larger one was perhaps half the length of Quietly.
Pointe A Pitre
The sailing great with Quietly making 7.2 knots in a cool breeze and blue sky up the coast of Guadeloupe. My navigation was spot on as we came up to the first sea buoy and turned up the channel to the anchorage just off the town of Pointe A Pitre and outside Port de Plaisance Marina Bas du Fort. This evening, Gretchen was tired and wanted to stay on the boat so I went to dinner with Brenda and John. I enjoyed Beanies followed by grilled tuna and ice cream for dissert getting back home at 11:10 PM
The next morning, Gretchen
and I took the dinghy around the corner into Pointe A Pitre and spent the
afternoon following the walking tour through town. Pointe A Pitre is a mixture
of 1950's square concrete buildings and older French style buildings. The sad
part is that they all look moderately shabby as though no one takes care of them
which is a same because the city could be absolutely beautiful with just a
moderate amount of care. The pictures were taken during our walking
tour and show what the city could look like. The brightly colored house
with the gable roof shows how some people are starting to restore some of the
beautiful old buildings.
The upper floors are where
people live. Either rented or owned apartments. The ground floor is shops
ranging from rather elegant shops catering to the cruse ship tourist to shops
selling clothing and house hold items to the local residents to ware house
space. There are ladies wearing brightly colored clothing selling scarves,
sarongs, and ladies underwear out of canvas bags on the sidewalks as well as
cobblers repairing shoes on little tables on wheels while their client sits on a
box on the sidewalk.
My mail finally arrived! Well, actually it had been here since April 1st, but it was filed under my first name rather than my last or under Quietly. I guess I now know to look under everything possible. To retrieve it, I took a cab out to the airport where it was being held in the International Mail department and retrieved a large box.
It must have weighed 15 pounds and opening it was like Christmas! There were even several Christmas Cards! This was the first mail I have received since November so of course now I have lots of magazines to read and catch up on. But as you can imagine, most were bills and bank statements. At least most of the bills are paid by automatic debit so all I had to do was file them away. My W-2 came along with two 1099's so now I can do my taxes. Well, I could if I had the tax program on my computer. I will have to find a high speed internet café and download Tax Cut. The postage on the box was $72.00, I am wondering if I can claim that as a deduction?
The first thing I did was make a huge mess on the floor with stacks of things and a huge pile of torn envelops and junk, then I opened and read just a little of one of the magazines before guilt over the mess prompted me to gather up all of the trash and stuff it back into the box and then to file all of the piles I had carefully made. So tonight everything is in its place except for the magazines that I will keep out until I read them. It may be months… {laughing}
A young lady about my daughters came by Quietly to exchange books with us. Maranda and her husband Robin are from New Zealand and had sailed their boat Kimosabi from New Zealand to Turkey . They left their boat in Turkey when they were hired as Captain and First Mate to sail a 65 foot sailboat for Portuguese owners. They now live on the Portuguese boat full time as crew for when the owners come and spend one week every other month on the boat. When the owners are not there, they are told to sail where ever they want to find interesting places where the owners would like to visit. Pretty nice Job! They have interesting stories to tell about sailing up the Red Sea and through the Suez Canal. She said they felt perfectly safe though they did stay away from known trouble spots.
Isle de Saints is just a short sail south and though out of the way, we plan a stop there on the way to Antigua.