Passage to St. Martin
On March 13th, Brianna returned to Grenada, along with Jon and Nate, two other crew members from Bellingham, Washington. I arranged a ride for them from the airport to Clarke’s Court Marina and asked their driver to play the best, fastest soca music he could on the way. He gleefully obliged. (I later learned that in addition to the blaring music, he also drove like a maniac during the 15 minute drive to the boat)
We had less than 24 hours to prepare Coda to sail to St. Martin. A boat orientation was conducted. Systems checks were performed. Rigging for the flying sails was re-run. Safety equipment was taken out of storage and checked for readiness.
We had to hoist and furl the genoa (which had been taken down prior to Coda being taken out of the water, per the boatyard requirements). That turned into a nervy affair because it was very windy when we did it. The boatyard crew came over to help us reduce the boat’s exposure to the wind, warning us that there was a chance that the cleats on the wooden dock might rip out due to so much force with the sail in the air. It would have been catastrophic if the cleat for the bow line had torn out, but we managed to get the sail furled before anything terrible happened.
I took a taxi to the grocery store and raced through the isles, filling my cart with provisions for the journey. While I was gone, the daggerboard that had been removed from the boat for repairs was reinstalled. I returned with the groceries and stowed them away. Then we cast off from the dock and motored to Secret Harbor Marina a few miles away to refuel the boat.
At a little past 4 p.m., with her fridge, fuel and water tanks full, Coda and her crew left the island of Grenada for good. We had hopes of flying the newly repaired Code D headsail, but as afternoon turned into evening, it became clear that the wind was not going to cooperate. It was too strong and too far forward of the beam to use any of the flying sails, so we were forced to use the genoa and the mainsail, each with two reefs.
For the next 36 hours, the wind and the swell were both coming in forward of the beam, which made the boat’s motion notably uncomfortable. I somehow managed to fight off feeling queasy, but the rest of the crew struggled mightily with being seasick. I suspect having had such a long flight from Seattle to Grenada and almost no time to adjust put them at a significant disadvantage. The conditions made sleeping almost impossible in the cabins below deck; most of the crew ended up sleeping (or trying to) in the cockpit or on a bench in the main salon when not on watch.
On top of all that discomfort, the ocean finally managed to find a soft spot in Coda‘s otherwise iron underbelly. The alarm for water in the port bilge went off several times, and it took us at least three tries to remove the water from the port bilge using sponges and buckets before we were finally able to determine that the seal around the port escape hatch (used in the event that the boat capsizes) was allowing water in at an alarming rate.
On the morning of March 16th, conditions finally abated enough that sailing the boat actually became enjoyable again. After passing between the islands of Sint Eustasius and St. Christopher, we were able to turn downwind enough to fly the newly repaired Code 0 headsail, comfortably reaching speeds of a little over 13 knots as we approached the island of St. Martin:
We doused the sails about 3 miles from Fort Louis Marina (everything in the Caribbean seems to have George, James or Louis in the name) and motored in. For 30 minutes we attempted to hail the marina on the VHF radio to get instructions for docking, but received no response. Not knowing what else to do, we crept into the marina and found an accessible spot to tie up until we could figure out where we belonged.
While Brianna went to the marina office with our passports to see what was what, one of the marina employees grumpily told us we couldn’t stay in the spot we’d found. He seemed to revert to a more jovial mood when we explained we’d attempted to make radio contact without success (since he was the guy with the radio). Brianna returned a few minutes later with Coda‘s location in the marina. We were guided into our spot between a large power boat and another catamaran, tying up stern-to with the dock. It took a few minutes to get stern and bow lines (tied to a mooring buoy) adjusted correctly, and then we paused for a moment to relish the fact that we’d made it.
Since we were flying out the following afternoon, we had to make the most of our time to get the boat “picture ready” before leaving. We washed down the deck and the rigging to remove the salt, stowed the rigging for the headsails, put on sail and deck hardware covers, tidied up the cockpit, scrubbed down the galley, gathered up sheets and towels to be taken to the laundromat, wiped down the floors to remove salt from the water we’d spilled emptying the bilges, tossed leftover food and half-used bottles of sauce, put away tools and parts, then fluffed up the accent pillows to make Coda as pretty as she could be.
That evening we enjoyed a very nice meal at a French restaurant called Tropicana. Our table allowed us to watch the chef send out each carefully prepared dish through a little paned window, ringing a service bell each time he did so. A French gentleman played cover songs on his guitar, and we enjoyed a shot of the house rum at the end of the meal.
The following day involved pastries, final touches to the boat, hauling garbage ashore, packing, wandering the nearby waterfront, meeting with the new skipper Dave (who would be watching the boat while it remained in St. Martin), trying and failing to find an open laundromat, arranging a taxi, whisking off to the airport and boarding a plane for Miami. Our jam-packed adventure in the Caribbean was officially at an end.