I have lived for almost three years in what some call the ‘Sailing Capitol of the World’ yet, I have never been on a sailing trip. Until now…
Early February brought a lull in the diving business so Justin, Gary, Kath and I decided to take two days off and sail to Virgin Gorda. The day before we were to depart, Gary arrived at working looking a bit gloomy. Apparently, he had decided to make a test run on his batteries the previous night and well, they were dead. The fate of the trip hung precariously on whether or not new batteries could be found, purchased and installed before tomorrow. But hey, it’s a boat. Something is always wrong with a boat, so I wasn’t too concerned. As soon as Gary and Justin returned from the morning dive charter, they took off again on a battery replacement mission. A few hours later, just as Kath and I were beginning to get nervous that they had not returned, Justin and Gary arrived. They had found a new battery but had decided they should completely rewire the entire boat. That’s when Kath and I realized it was up to the two of us to go to the grocery store for provisions.
The next day was a mad race to get the dive and snorkel boats back to the dock and us off the dock. Finally, at 3:30pm, we were backing out of the slip. It was low tide and five seconds later we were grounded. Justin put the boat in forward, reverse, a little more gas, forward, reverse and gradually we oozed our way through. Everyone was extra excited about the sailing trip because Cleo had a new green life vest.
Here’s Cleo as serious sailor:
And here’s Cleo as happy sailor:
The wind blew us across the Channel and into our own private bay on Peter Island. The anchor went down smoothly (both times) and before we knew it, we were throwing together hotdogs, potatoes, marshmallows, drinks, and lighter fluid. Yes, we were going to build a bomb fire! I don’t know if anyone could have a bad time at a bomb fire, but we certainly had a fabulous time. There is one thing I must make clear about bomb fire night however, no one, absolutely on one, accidently fell off the dingy while attempting to climb back on the sail boat. No one.
The sun came up far too early the following day. Justin was excited to make biscuits and gravy for our new English friends, but I just nibbled and decided that I should go back to bed. I had just drifted off to sleep when an incredible loud noise jolted my eyes open. There were loud voices and scrambling feet over my head. My mind decided I should get up and assist many moments before my body finally followed.
By the time I arrived on deck, everything was back to normal. Since I was not there I cannot relate the excitement of what happened, but somehow the bowline knot which ties the jib (the sail at the very front of the boat) to the boat came untied. Now, of course it is impossible for a bowline knot to just untie itself, but we did not have much time to ponder this mystery. On the horizon, but very close was a humongous black storm cloud. I do own an ultra waterproof rain coat, but of course it was back at the dive shop. So Justin and Kath were looking all smug in their rain jackets while Gary and I were looking dejected and miserable and soon to be wet.
Nonetheless, the wind pushed us decidedly into the dark storm cloud. When a storm comes to you its approach is gradual, but when you come to the storm, it hits as if you have run up against a wall. I remember the next few moments as if it were a single photograph: I remember Justin tossing me Cleo’s life vest and as I strap it on her, Justin was saying, “We should take down the sail because last year a boat was caught in a squall and sank in 3 seconds” but as I hear these words, the boat keeled over onto its side and a thick heavy wave splashed into the boat. The fancy rain coats provided little protection against such a large body of water; we were all drenched. Even poor Cleo had water dripping off her ears and down her green life vest, but the sail was loose and flapping and that was a good thing. The rain poured down on us as we watched that other sail boats did not get too close and slowly we motored out of the storm.
Everyone had had just about all the excitement we could have ever hoped for and were ready to arrive at our destination. We were ready to relax on the beach and have a pina colada; however we were traveling against the wind and were making pathetically little progress. My mind kept drifting back to the dive boat yesterday when I bragged about how easy sailing was. I scoffed at all the fancy sailing terms and said, “All you had to do was keep the wind in the sail”. It was that easy. Today I was reevaluating my proclamation and decided that sailing would be a lot easier if one didn’t have a specific destination. Anyway, it was approaching dusk as we were still slowly approaching Virgin Gorda, so we decided to swing into Marina Cay to pick up a mooring for the night.
The wind howled and the mooring line creaked through the night, but we were happy and safe in our little boat. Gary made delicious spaghetti and we played cards not too deep into the night as we were all very exhausted.
The next morning we sailed close enough to Virgin Gorda to say “Hah! We made it!” We shook our fists at her and then promptly turned around and zoomed back down the channel with the wind at our backs. After a quick detour into Great Harbour for a bite to eat, we returned to Sea Cow’s Bay. Everyone was sore and tired but cheerful and proud to have made it there and back.
