October 28, 2008

St Petersburg, Florida

Slip, Slip, Sliding Away

It has been way too long since our last update………..we’ve been busy, but that is no excuse.  As our last update was in August a lot has happened since then.

Our last update had us in the British Virgin Islands where we enjoyed a rendezvous with my boss from the working days and his friend Peter.  Our next leg was scheduled to be a crossing of the infamous Anagada Passage which would put us in Saint Martin in time for the wedding that had been our target for the last six months.

As often happens in the cruising community, on the morning of our departure day a couple approached our boat and asked if we were the Sea Wings leaving for Saint Martin that night.  Seems they met someone in a bar (it is always a bar, isn’t it?) who had run into us on another island and passed our boat card to Chris and Kathy on Joule as they knew we were both crossing the same body of water.  It is always nice to have another boat along to keep an eye on each other on a long overnight passage and even better that we all hit it off immediately and became fast friends while in Saint Martin.  Turned out they were even more liberal than us so we could actually talk politics, something of a rare opportunity for us in the cruising community!

Ahhh, Saint Martin………..not a possession, but actually a part of France itself, awash in the magic of French cuisine!!!  The French side of the island is full of restaurants with either French or French inspired local fare, and numerous grande marche overflowing with French cheese and wine and twice daily, hot baguette fresh from the bakery.  Trust us, there is nothing quite like a fresh baguette covered with real French butter.  To appreciate our fascination with this access to haute cuisine  you must consider that, with the notable exception of El Quinepo on Vieques (see our earlier logs), dining has consisted of the tasty but basic fare of the Bahamas, Puerto Rico and Virgins for the past six months.  Walking into a grande marche was like little kids walking into Willie Wonka’s Chocolate Factory.

After a week of fun with Chris and Kathy and our friends Chris and Pam on Wildcat, we bid them all farewell as they jumped on a good weather window to move on south through the Leewards.  They were soon replaced with the wedding couple Steve and Casey and the proud parents of the bride, our good friends Scott and Jan Clarke.  Scott and Jan will be moving their boat from fresh water in South Carolina and sailing southeast to St Maarten next March where we hope to join them for some buddy boat cruising.

The wedding was truly a ‘destination’ for us as our schedule for the previous 6 months was dictated by the date of this event.  And a wonderful event it was.  Nearly a week of parties every day led up to a perfect ceremony on the beach and partying late into the evening with good food, good company and local reggae/pan music.   Having never attended a destination wedding before, we couldn’t quite grasp the appeal as the big downside appeared to be the fact that many times family or close friends are unable to attend due to the travel distance or cost.  But we learned that while more people can attend a ‘traditional’ wedding, you most likely only get to see them during the wedding and reception.  Sure the numbers might have been smaller for Steve and Casey’s special day, but this group spent days together and so we all had the chance to get to know each other and party together so on the big day the event was more like a gathering of old friends than a show put on for a large audience.   It was a very special day and we thank Steve and Casey for showing us another way to skin a cat.  And our best wishes for a long and happy life together.

Following the wedding we spent several days with our good friends and parents of the bride, Scott and Jan Clarke.  They have long standing ties to Sint Maarten and thru them we got to know Michel and Kathy Deher, Michel being Casey’s godfather.  Michel was born here and through his many years here as well as business and community service connections seems to know just about everyone on the island.  They were kind enough to take us under their wing and treat us like family for over two weeks which allowed us to see the island and its people in a way that would be impossible if we were just a visitor.  Sint Maarten/St Martin is particularly interesting as it is a relatively small island with a very French side (actually French soil, not a possession), a very Dutch side (the schools speak Dutch) and a population of slave descendants that manage to all work pretty well together.    We got an insiders view of the island and we deeply appreciate them taking us into their lives for our visit.  We are looking forward to being back in Sint Maarten for the Heineken Regatta in March!!

We spent the next few days of “rest” tearing the floor out and making calculated holes in structural beams to replace the hot water piping system (to fix a leak in the aft cabin head) and relocating all of the gear in the aft cabin garage.  This was to make the space available for our first long term guests on the voyage.  We had expected more folks to take advantage of our open invitation to join us anytime but Guy and Barbara, friends from Jacksonville, were the first to join us after 14 months.  But when we think back on how difficult it is to schedule a vacation when you are working and then add the fact that the destination is a target moving around the Caribbean, we really aren’t too surprised.  They flew into Sint Maarten and we spent a few days on the island before sailing over to the nearby island of St Barts, very French and very expensive.

In many, many ways, St Barts was an island unlike any other we have seen in the Bahamas or Caribbean.  Probably best described as a ‘5 Star Island’, it is the first island we have found with no obvious poverty. It is a small island with narrow mountainous roads, numerous beautiful beaches, strong architectural continuity between old and new construction and a ‘Frenchness’ that touches every part of the island.  Leave your USD at home folks, no one takes anything but Euros……..and lots of them.  We could not even clear in with anything but Euros, so we had to find an ATM to get them before we were officially cleared in.  And everywhere we went collected them at an alarming rate.  A beer goes for around $10.  Remember beereconomics?  That equates to around 3 to 4 times higher than US prices and that is what every thing else costs and sometimes more.  Want to go shopping?  No tee shirt shops or tacky souvenirs here.  More like Coach, Hugo Boss, Chanel, etc, etc.  Cha ching!

Fortunately, you get a lot for your dollar, er Euro.  The island is truly beautiful (renting a car to tour it is a must do), it is clean and well kept and like any place where everyone speaks French, food is important.  Everyplace we ate was excellent, an experience to be remembered.  Just don’t let the ‘damage’ give you a heart attack.  Our advice?  Bring lots of Euros and have a great time.

After several enjoyable days on St Barts, a nice weather window presented itself and we had a great 75 mile passage to Antigua.  I must put in a plug here for one of the best things about modern cruising in the Caribbean……….Chris Parker and Caribbean WX.

Chris is the weather ‘guru’ of the Caribbean, giving weather forecasts and routing advice three times every morning (except Sunday) via SSB radio.  Cruisers can listen in for free, or become a sponsoring vessel for a fee and contact him directly for routing advice.  This is what we chose to do and we contact him for every significant passage and he has been spot on every time.  Our trip to Antigua is a good example.  Hurricane Gustov was just a tropical low at the time and traveling north east between Antigua and Sint Maarten.  We checked with the French weather service (a private source servicing commercial shipping and long distance offshore racers) and were told the seas would be high and the winds strong and we should wait for the passage.  Chris said the storm would slip just to the east of us and we would have 15 knots and 3-4 foot seas.  We went with Chris’s advice and had a great sail in 12-16 knots and 4 foot seas, arriving in St John, Antigua around 4pm.  We had a great passage, watching the storm brewing to the east of us, just like Chris predicted.  He has given us this kind of accuracy for every passage we have made.  If you plan on being ‘out there’ in the Caribbean, you need to sign up with Chris……….best money you can invest.

We spent two nights in the harbor at St John which sounded fine in the cruising guides.  Don’t believe it.  The harbor was so foul that it is one of the few places we would not even consider using the water maker.  After bidding farewell to Guy and Barbara we moved around the island to Falmouth Harbour and enjoyed a week there before moving to Jolly Harbour Marina where we had Sea Wings hauled out for a few months while we came back to the USA for a visit.  We found we missed our kids so much that taking a few months off during the hurricane season looked like a great idea.

That was in late August and since then we flew to Pennsylvania to visit Lew’s parents and brothers, then on to Kingston, Ontario were we spent a wonderful week with Andrew and Denise from Samaria II (thanks Number Twos!!!).  Then on to Atlanta to spend time with our daughter Blair and her hubby Ashley, and to Jacksonville to see our son Keith and wife Shannon and now we are in St Pete to visit Lyn’s mom.  Then it will be back to Jacksonville for Thanksgiving with the kids, a few days in Ft Lauderdale to visit Lew’s brother and finally back to Antigua to splash Sea Wings with her new bottom and polished topsides on December 10.  We anticipate next season to be spent in the Leewards and Windwards, probably finishing in Trinidad for haulout next storm season.

Hold on a minute.  Like all of you who are ‘out there’ or maybe just thinking about it, we have been sitting watching MSNBC or listening to the radio as our cruising kitties dwindle in size with the fall of the market.  Probably like most of you, we never dreamed the market could fall so fast or so far.  Remember the days when the market rose or fell in single or double digits?  Now it seems every day we see triple digit swings and mostly the wrong way.  Sure, we know it will come back, but for now it seems that every decline means days in paradise slipping away with no certainty that we can get them back.

For our cruising friends, we hope that all of this does not dramatically change your plans or worse, end them.  Like most of you, I’m sure, we are making adjustments and trying to guess the future.  Right now one of those options is going back to work, at least part time.  We are trying to avoid this if possible, but if things continue to worsen, it may not be an option but a necessity.  Of course we would not go back to the USA to work but try to do it in the Caribbean.  Maybe some of you are thinking the same thing and there might be a lot of competition among cruisers for work?  I hope there are not too many cruising architects out there…………….

Definition of a boat?  A hole in the water that we will throw less money in.

Fair winds and cheap (really cheap) diesel,

Lew and Lyn

s/v Sea Wings