Sailing with the Treleavens

Whales, Dorado fish, turtles, turquoise bays, everything Caribbean, we are having the perfect sail south with Pip and Geoff Lavis on board. Grenada is 350 miles away with 14 or more islands to anchor. Bay hopping, swimming, eating and drinking, island after island, is very relaxing as we cruise back where we have been before.

The sail from Antigua to the eastern end of Guadeloupe is a bit close to the wind so we ease away and sail the 45nms to the northern end of the river that separates the 2 islands of Guadeloupe. Negotiating the channel between the buoys in the reef and then meandering up the river through amazing mangroves, we anchor for the night under the 1st bridge. Once a day at 0430 hours the bridge opens so it’s an early start in the dark to negotiate the rest of the river.

After a day in Point a Pitre we set sail again for Les Saintes and then on to Dominica.
Pip can’t believe the comfort of sailing in the Caribbean with warm weather, 26 degree sea and a constant breeze from the east. The constant haze we have for the next few days turns out to be sand from the Sahara dessert. Long time in the atmosphere crossing the Atlantic and visibility at sea is poor.

Phil and Robbie on ‘Anteater Blues’ meet up with us in Prince Rupert Bay for a fun evening; they are delivering their yacht to Fort Lauderdale and then shipping her to Brisbane.

A special treat in Marin Martinique was watching the start of the Yole Regatta; traditional fishing boats all very colourful come from villages around the island. Bamboo masts and wooden poles, this was how they went to sea for up to 5 days fishing. Now used for racing, crew of 20, no harnesses and a beach start, one could compare them to the 18 footers.

Marigot Bay in St Lucia is very welcoming as we chance drinks at the newly opened Discovery Resort. The Snail Bar is named after the pink snail in the movie ‘Dr Doolittle’ which was filmed here. Carved out of the tropical hillside the resort couldn’t be in a more beautiful peaceful bay once used by pirates.

Between St Lucia and St Vincent a huge Dorado takes our trolling lure and before we get it on board 2 whales are cruising beside us. In rolling conditions and doing 9 knots it’s an urgent call to luff up and roll up the headsail as Ian struggles to land it. We are not sure of the whale’s intention and all the time I am not sure what to photograph. From the bloodied deck to the BBQ we have fresh fish with fresh pineapple curried rice for lunch.

A Princess Margaret beach swim on Bequia, cocktails at sunset on Mustique and snorkel with the turtles at beautiful blue Tobago Cays and in between we are on port tack sailing all the way between the islands.

Salt Whistle Bay on Mayreau Island is voted number 1 for its crystal clear water, perfect anchorage and half moon bay of golden sand, lined with coconut palms, what else would you expect.

The local boys are cleaning sea urchins off Palm Island and advise the men to mix the pulp with white wine and then you will spend the night “cabin jabbin”.

Checking out of the St Vincent Grenadines we sail 5 miles south to The Grenada Grenadines and the island of Carriacou and feast on the local mangrove oysters, fresh from the swamp, with a bottle or 2 of white wine as Simon the local boatman opens them for us.

We have arrived in Prickly bay Grenada to spend 2 days preparing the yacht for hauling for the hurricane season. Sitting in a one piece cradle firmly tied to the ground with strong anchor points, we pray that no hurricanes will pass through this year.

It’s been a long and exciting 10 months on our new yacht this year; and I am looking forward to getting the sand out of my shoes. Sailing from the 42nd parallel south to the 12th, from France to the tropical Caribbean, covering in excess of 6000 nms has been challenging and rewarding especially the Atlantic crossing.

We return at the beginning of November to continue our exploring of the Caribbean.

Thank you all for enjoying our experiences.

Interesting word ‘cruising’ but what does it really mean? Our line up for the 1st race has Ian in the front row, I will show them? It’s nearly over before it starts. We have entered the cruising division, which Ian assumed would be a casual start. Not so as we just get out of jail. With rules being quoted as we reach the top mark in 2nd place we now realise this isn’t ‘cruising’ as serious racing yachts fully crewed mows us down.

Now its time to get serious as Ian whips us all into shape. Baney and Annie Richardson from Sydney and Don Reid from Noosa have never sailed on our yacht and by the end of the 23 mile race around the west coast to Fort James we are exhausted but very excited about our 5th place out of 16 in our division. We only missed 3rd place by 3 secs on our handicap so we are told we will just have to try harder the next day.

The 41st Stanford Antigua Race Week attracts 185 yachts from around the world. 80 in Division A and 105 in Division B. Division A is the serious racing yachts with the 98ft ‘Leopard’ and the 90ft ‘Rambler’ previously known as ‘Shockwave’ fighting it out along with TP 52’s and other hot racing yachts. This division has 7 races to complete.

Division B has 5 races all about 23nms long to various bays on the island. It is broken down to 10 divisions, 5 for chartered bare boats. All competing yachts have to be rated with the Caribbean rating certificate with several choices for rig, main and genoa, main and poled out genoa, main and 2 genoas and main genoa and spinnaker. We elect to race with poled out genoa as we will be short handed for some of the regatta.

Fort James Bay is a mass of yachts and one big beach party ashore; I think everyone on the island is here to join in. BBQ’s are covered with crayfish cooking, a live Reggae Band keeps us awake all night and we are all the time wondering if we are too old for this stuff.

Race 2 and Ian puts more effort into the start. We have from New York Phil and Ann Smith joining us for 2 races so we are now a ‘professional’ crew of 7 or pretend to be. Nudging jade coloured coral reefs and Ian taking every advantage of shifting breeze we get 2nd and celebrate back in English Harbour.

3rd race is a coastal along the southern side of the island. We want to go to the left side on the 1st beat to the top mark so Ian decides to be in the 2nd row at the start line. But he spy’s a hole and can’t resist taking it and once again we are in the thick of it leading around the mark. Coming home 4th it’s a long hot day with the wind dropping below 5 knots, something we have not experienced in our 5 months in the Caribbean.

A welcome lay day and it’s time to head for a bay for a quiet BBQ lunch and swim. Antigua boasts 365 bays, one for each day of the year.

The 4th race is to Jolly Harbour Marina for the night and it’s down to Annie, Baney, Ian and myself. Phil and Ann have gone back home and Don has departed with his yacht ‘Honey Moon’ to the USA for hauling for the hurricane season before returning to Noosa.

Ian promises to take it easy as we are seriously under crewed. No such luck as a snide remark from one fully crewed yacht accuses us of reducing crew for the light conditions. The light wind is frustrating but with a little bit of luck and low cunning we manage to get another 2nd after 6 hours of sailing. After each race the top 3 yachts are presented with a gold, silver or bronze pennant to fly from the backstay, a nice way to recognize results. Thanks to sponsor La Perla, the Jolly harbour resort puts on the most enjoyable party at the local Golf Club with great food, rum and music.

Race 5 the last race back to English Harbour under blue skies is tough, challenging and exhausting with winds from zero to 20 knots and we manage another 4th. Thank goodness we only had 5 races. This is the first time in 9 months aboard that we have actually had to sail ‘Cape Finisterre’ into the wind and tack. We are thrilled at the way she easily handled the conditions and especially against fully crewed yachts with lots of experience aboard.

Our 4th overall position in Antigua Sailing Week is a thrill and well worth all the effort.
It was great to be there and participate in these beautiful waters with perfect temperatures all day, every day and catch up with old friends Dayne Sharp and Susanne and also to cross tracks with Trevor and Maggie Joyce with another Mariner Boating Rally.

Annie and Baney fly out and Geoff and Pip Lavis fly in for our sail back down the islands to Grenada for hauling the yacht. With nearly 3 weeks up our sleeve it will be a leisurely sail for the 350nms, thank goodness!!!!!!

What a wonderful treat to be in Antigua for the Classic Yacht Regatta 2008, with over 60 vessels competing from 148ft down to 30ft. Our favourites ones are the vintage gaff rigged yachts built from 1890 to 1915. Some of course were only built 5 years ago but to the original drawings, construction and rig. It seems to be that vintage is the new toy for those that have everything.

Of particular interest was the dog fight between the old Americas cup J class ‘Ranger’ and ‘Velsheda’ both at over 130ft with close match racing around the course. ‘Eleonora’, a 120ft gaff rigged schooner, is an exact replica of the Schooner Westward designed and built by Herreshoff in the early 1900’s and successfully raced with the famous Charlie Barr as skipper. She looks stunning under sail and was even more amazing to go onboard.

The regatta only competed 3 of the 4 races as the last day was abandoned due to no wind, a first for us in the Caribbean since arriving 4 ½ months ago.

Between the two regattas and with Annie and Baney on board we have an opportunity to sail around to Green Island for a few days. On approach to the entrance of the lagoon we spot a catamaran up on the reef and always a reminder to be very aware. The unfortunate owner was late leaving port and arrived in the dark to negotiate a narrow channel between reefs. There was no hope of salvage and the owner was trying to save everything possible.

A stunning area of shades of blue and green, white sand and conch shells everywhere. Conch is a local food and the beautiful shells lie everywhere broken on the beach but live ones can also be found at your feet in very shallow water. It’s very hard to accept the waste of these beautiful shells but to them they are like oysters to us.

At anchor in the lagoon one of the yachts organised a beach party and before long as the sun was setting over 10 inflatable’s were lined up on the beach as we all shared stories of our travels.

Lobster is also plentiful around the island and relatively inexpensive if purchased from the local fish market. It is always a treat to have them freshly killed and head straight back to the yacht to BBQ. Along with the rum which we can buy by the cask in the Caribbean we are certainly enjoying the local produce.

Antigua Sailing Week starts tomorrow and should be a lot of fun. Not too much preparation as we are in the cruising division with no spinnaker so plan to enjoy as the big maxis ‘Leopard’ and ‘Rambler’ fight it out. There are nearly 200 entries with about half the fleet in cruising divisions.

Passing the mid winter marks the weather warming up, the sea temperature will rise to 28deg and this means the hurricane season is fast approaching. Most owners will start to store their boats outside the hurricane belt (south of 12 degrees) around the end of May. Our plan is sail 350nm south on the 5th May to Grenada taking 3 weeks. Geoff and Pip Lavis from Sydney are joining us, so we have plenty of time to enjoy as we sail back down the arc of 11 islands.

Storage will mean hauling ‘Cape Finisterre’ out of the water, placing her in a one piece cradle and strapping down to very deep anchor points in the compacted ground. We will strip the mast and deck of all the sails, halyards, remove the dodger and bimini and lay the boom on the deck. All this reduces windage when and if a hurricane does pass through. We will keep our fingers crossed!!!!

Plans for next season are to return early November and sail very quickly back to Antigua and then enjoy the rest of the Leeward Islands, the stunning Virgin Islands then all the way to the white sands of the Bahamas passing through the Turks, Caicas Islands and maybe Cuba on the way.