Clifton Harbor, Union Island
walter@comcast
Salt Whistle, I was sunburned and exhausted by10:30 AM. We had 20 kts
of breeze and waist high kickers inside the reef, and chest high over
the reef. I re-acquinted myself with backrolls and jumping on
relatively flat water.
We headed off to a nice little restaurant on the hill for a nice lunch
of red snapper and conch for lunch, which served as our dinner.
I waited for 4:30 to set up the kite for a sunset session. I was very
disappointed when I crashed the kite hard after just a few minutes,
and on relauch saw a 6" tear in the kite. On inspection, it was clear
that there had been a small tear from beach trauma that opened up more
on impact. I tried to fix it on the beach, but with 25 Kt winds, that
wasn't going to happen. I did not think to just go get my 9 meter and
continue, so the session was over.
The hell here never ends.
We retired to the boat for a very nice evening of dominoes and rum
punch, and watched the monohulls sway in the swell. At this point in
the game, Dana is slightly in the lead. We quit around cruisers
midnight (8:30) and will continue tonight.
We spent a lot of time talking about what boat Dawn's sister and
brother in law should buy to begin their planned trip south. My big
conclusion after having spent more time on a Cat is: I would not do
another trip here on a monohull unless I had something to dampen the
rolling in these (relatively) unprotected harbors. The nights can be
just too long when the northerly roll sets in. On the Cat it is not
problem, the motion at harbor is very nice. I do prfer the motion of
the monohull at sea, and Cats are very expensive; so I would try to
find out all I could about "flopper stoppers" before I ponied up for a
Cat. I have talked to mono cruisers that said it was the single most
important piece of gear they carried. This morning, the crew of
Unabated was exhausted, and we were well rested.
Sorry for the typos, This keyboard is skipping letters and there is no
spell check.
I was up at 6:30 and patched the kite with the emerency kit I brought.
I though I would do a morning session before we moved on, but the crew
was read to move by 8:00. We were underway in a flash, and secure on
two anchors in Clifton Harbor Union Island by 9:30. This is a great
chan of Islands - Line of sight sailing like the BVIs but wihtout the
annoying British Customs and immigration people.
Off to explore. BTW - I have not been able to get my email, so don't
feel ingnored if you have replied without acknowledgement.