I'm Fundamentally A Homebody

Sounds very strange given the fact that I'm moving amongst the Caribbean islands. But given that home is where the boat is, the status of homebody is easily obtained. I know I know, all these wonderful islands and cultures to investigate and draw a more rounded view of the world from. But what can I say, I love puttering about Christa for days on end with only a small itch to get ashore. Habits are so easily formed and I suppose I don't have significant needs, but the needs I do have are pretty strong.

Take my nearly two weeks in St Maarten. I didn't budge outside of the area known as Simpson Bay. When I first arrived I had every intention of doing some exploring. But on the first night sitting in the cockpit I was watching an incredible stretch of car lights that snaked through the hills towards Phillipsburg. I thought back to the bus service on St John USVI and begun to worry that I could be stuck for a substantial amount of time on my way to.....well I don't know where. Part of the cruising experience? You Bet. But by then I had my aforementioned strong needs readily taken care of right in Simpson Bay. So I fell right inline with my well worn habits of a great breakfast joint, wifi, bookstore and of course the infamous beaches. So really my exploring as of late has been linked to my running regime. These sojorns normally lead to some type of adventure.

I ended up generally doing the same in Antigua. I didn't budge outside of Jolly Harbor. I hide behind the fact I was only their for 4 or 5 days. So now that I am in Dominica I'm now on day 3 and have been off the boat only twice, once to visit Customs and once to stretch my legs down the main drag. So I'm now self consious of this and am going to make more effort to interact and get out and about. What can I say. It is not like I'm sitting in a room watching TV. The anchorage and the surrounding beauty is like Reality TV. So much going on and so much to soak up. I'm now saturated and plan on getting some serious hiking in this week. More Later.


Capt Chris

PS: Please check out My Photo Album and Youtube Videos

Video of My Recent Sail To Dominica

You can view all my videos by heading on over to my Youtube channel. Link provided on the right hand side of the page or click http://www.youtube.com/user/clallaire

Capt Chris

On the Anchor in Dominica

Capt Chris
Total Distance Last 24 hours: 105.3NM
15 34.8N 061 27.7W, Prince Rupert Bay Dominica

I set the hook around 7 am today. Here is a shot from Christa's anchorage. More to follow....must sleep......

Broad Reaching in the Trade Winds

Capt Chris
03/11/2009, 15 miles NW of Guadeloupe Leeward Islands

Wow what a difference a direction change can make. In fact it makes all the difference. I weighed anchor at first light today from Jolly Harbor Antigua with light northeasterlies. I shut down the engine after clearing the last set of buoys and have been sailing ever since. The winds were about 10 knots for the first few hours. Christa was having trouble keeping air in the sails with all the rolling around in the swell. I solved that by flying the cruising spinnaker. Man what a difference that sail made. It can be a handful for just one person and can really over power the boat if the wind gusts up. Once I set the green monster were were trucking along at 5.5 to 6 knots with the wind vane keeping Christa tracking. The wind gradually built throughout the morning and I had to strike the spinnaker and reset the Jib. The wind has been a steady 15 to 20 knots out of the NE with some surprisingly large swells.

It is so beautiful. The boat is sailing on its strongest point of sail, off the wind on a broad reach. Westsails are very seakindly, meaning she rolls a bit but it is obvious that the hull design is meant specifically for these types of trade wind conditions. The Monitor Wind Vane takes practice and is part art and part science. Since I have done little downwind sailing my knowledge of setting the vane gear correctly on this point of sail is limited. So I have been playing with the sail balance, sail trim and actual setting of the vane gear. A combination of tweaks to the gear, sail trim and course result in finding the sweet spot. Once you find the sweet spot, the self steering does its job incredibly well. It is possible to stare at the thing for hours on end. Most people have a name for their vane gear. Mine is Big Daddy. So other than the poetry of the boat in motion I have the deep blue sea to stare at and the peaks of Guadeloupe appearing over the horizon.

The plan is to continue on sailing past Guadeloupe and make landfall in Prince Rupert Sound on the NW coast of Dominica. Right now I'm struggling to keep about five off of Guadeloupe as the island is so big that is casts a huge wind shadow. So If I'm in to close I lose all my wind. But at current pace I should be off Dominica around 2 or 3 am. I will be sailing under a full moon which is beautiful in its own right, but provides some nice illumination for a night time landing in The Dom.

Capt Chris

Important Update Regarding Sailblogs

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Capt Chris, 80's, NE 15-18 Knots
03/10/2009, Jolly Harbor Antigua

I have been working on a new blog to eventually replace sailblogs. Christa's New Website can be found by clicking on the hyperlink. Also Christa's New Website can be found by looking under my sidelinks. I am a fan of Google and use many Google products. iGoogle, Gmail, Google's electronic health record, Google reader, Google maps, Google earth and Google photo album called Picasso. So Blogger is also a google product and simply superior. I can do much more with Blogger than sailblogs and Blogger is free and is intergrated to maximize all of Google other products. This is the same reason I am a MAC user. Apple also arranges things, such as iTunes and other Apple products to work together. I like that. The thing that really has compelled me to change is Sailblogs chokes all the time. As a cruiser wifi is an unknown in each port. Many times you have to pay for a signal or deal with weak signals. Sometimes I'll sit and watch a sailblogs trying load a picture only to have it time out. It happens over and over again. Doesn't seem to happen with Blogger. But expense aside, the ability to click on pictures within the Blogger site and have it expand is wonderful. I would enjoy some feedback from you all regarding Christa's New Website. So I intend to maintain both sites simultaneously and then at some point leave the forwarding link within the last sailblogs post. I will be working on moving all the archived blog entries to the new site. A big undertaking, but a great way to retrace my recent history.

I have been surprised at how important the blog has become. Chock it up to one of those unforseeables prior to leaving on a cruise. I really enjoy maintaining the blog and passing along my adventures. I think their is some kind of deep phycological need or desire to document one's life. So having more tools to document my life and sailing trip is great. Speaking of things of a phycological nature.

I have been thrilled since arriving in Antigua to know that basically all of my easting is now done. I need to do only a slight amount of easting from here. Nothing hard on the wind, maybe close reaching. The difference between the two is night and day. Thus far, since I left in September of 2007 I have traveled about 3500 nautical miles. Just about all of it to windward. Clearly the most difficult thing I have ever done in my life. Making progress to windward has been a mental anvil weighing on me for 16 months and now I can relax about it a bit.

For example, I plan on leaving for Dominica tomorrow. Of course I check the weather but I don't need to study the details and calculate departure and arrival times on a micro scale. In fact, I very well may be broad reaching for the foreseeable future and enjoying the classic trading wind sailing in deep blue water.

So with that I'll check out. Please check out Christa's New Website and leave comments on the new blog. It is a work in progress and some things may still be a little Jimmied up. I'll correct mistakes as I go along.


Capt Chris

A Video From Jolly Harbor Anchorage

Capt Chris, 80's, NE 15-18 Knots
03/09/2009, Jolly Harbor Antigua

I took this nice panorama yesterday of Christa's current spot.

Enjoy!

Capt Chris

View from the Spreader St Maarten to Antigua

I took this shot from the spreader to try and capture the water's hue. It really must be viewed in person. I marvel at how beautiful the tropical water is. Hope you like!

Capt Chris

Arrived In Antigua

17 05.3'N:61 54.09'W
Capt Chris, 80 degree's, winds NE 25KTS

I arrived yesterday afternoon in Jolly Harbor on the west coast of Antigua.......and really just in time. I made it just in front of a vigorous cold front. I had been watching the weather closely as always to try and take advantage of the NE and ENE winds decending from a whopper of a low coming off the east coast of the US. As always, things are tricky and never as simple as the cruising magazine make it seem.

I left St Maarten at a 4:30 in the afternoon in light, 10 kts or so of SE winds. Since the weather system bringing the NE winds had been around for days, was well defined the computer models and weather folks had a pretty good handle on what was forth coming. My destination, Antigua was 90 miles to the SE and a NE breeze would be just perfect. But as I have come to discover with sailing in the Caribbean, there are few perfect sailing days. Ahead of the front, ESE winds were predicted at 10 knots and as the day and night wore on the wind should start to move more east and then NE. With the passage of the front winds were going to pick up in spectacular fashion and crank at 25 to 30 knots from the northeast. I had about 24 hours or so to make my way to Antigua before the front. Now a prudent question that some might have is why not wait for the cold front to pass and then ride the 25 knots of wind to Antigua. My answer to that is I am a chicken. As I have said before this is not a men against the sea type of trip. I will go out of my way to avoid riding bucking broncos and favor calmer weather conditions even if that means waiting in places for extended periods or gasp....using the engine, than so be it. This is not to say that Christa and company could not handle those types of weather conditions. I simply don't seek it out. In my current circumstance I am glad I did what I did. About an hour after I took this picture that nice little round hump off Christa port bow was not visible as squalls and sideways rain had engulfed it. The cold front arrived with rain and heavy gusts. Another reason I error on the side of caution as I am by myself. A mistake on my part, even a sprained finger or something stupid like that could really impact my ability to manage the boat. So...

As I left Simpson Bay in St Maarten and cleared the south coast I shut down the engine and delighted in the light winds. Christa sailed between 3 and 4 knots in a lazy large ocean type swell. With a 3/4 moon we drifted along and it was wonderful. I was even able to get some sleep which is always nice. Sometime in the middle of the night progress slowed to between 2.5 and 3 knots. Just to slow, so I fired 51 horses of Yanmar and picked up the pace. Throughout the rest of the trip the wind picked up and I'd shut down and sail and then it would go light again and I respond with the turning of the key. About 2 hours before I arrived I could see the huge billowing clouds approaching from the NW.....it was the very distinct front. The winds then went straight north and picked up. I entered Jolly Harbor a little nervous about tying up to the customs dock give the windy conditions. But wouldn't you know it, Doug and Sheryl from Team Prudence came put putting up in their dingy. They had come up from Dominica the day before and were dispatched to the dock to help tie up. I tied up without incident. And by the way, that is the first dock I have lashed to since last July! The paperwork went very smoothly, I paid my $12 entrance fee and had Christa anchored safely within the hour. It is now very windy, but the anchor is well dug in. The surrounding anchorage is just beautiful. I just stepped ashore and haven't done any exploring as of yet. Not sure how long I'll be here. Not very long as I am meeting Sandpiper in St Lucia at the end of this month. Gotta Jam!

Capt Chris

My Latest Hang Out

Check out this cool little beach bar down by the airport. One of the wonderful side benefits of my running habit is that I get out and about to areas one normally wouldn't just saunder into. Of course this can work both ways, but in this instance it lead me right to one of the cooler places I have discovered. It really goes against the grain as this beach bar abuts the airport. I wasn't able to get a photo, but just picture a 747 landing gear scraping the tops of the trees and you'll get a feel for said proximity. Why would a bar thrive in such an area? I have no idea and I would never have found it except I'm always looking for roads that are flat with minimum traffic for safety sake. So on one of my runs, I was in a mini shanty town when I discovered this thriving Danish community. The place was packed, they severe excellent food and beverage and provide chairs and tables. In fact you may have noticed that the bar is actually an old broken down bus. Furthermore they have wifi! If you look closely to the right you can see the little yellow structure that is the home to the young Danish folks who own the establishment. I like it!

So as you can see, I have not left St Martin yet. My weather window changed slightly. The weather was pretty good for a run south, but the wind came around just south of east. This likely would have meant more motor sailing at least for a portion of the trip. I would have taken the opportunity, but it looks like waiting 5 or 6 days is the better choice. Seems a cold front will penetrate very far south and bring the wind right around to the north east. Beautiful. I just hoping we can keep the wind near 15 knots so I don't have to ride a bucking bronco south. So at this moment, I'm planning on leaving Thursday morning bound for Guadeloupe.

Capt Chris

Still at the Beach in St Maarten

View from my perch...