It has been both wonderfull and at the same time hectic week since the Odyssey started on My 24th.
Internet access during this time was non existent since I have not set up my systems on the boat yet.
The following copy of my journal should keep you up to date to on the first few days here at least.
The rest are coming soon with pictures and videos.
24 May 2011
Early morning we have officially started our Caribbean odyssey by leaving our home In Ottawa in a taxi to go to the airport to catch our WestJet flight to Toronto, connecting to St. Martin from there. We arrived at St. Martin on time and started to wait for the short hop over to Beef Island airport, at the east end of Tortola, BVI. The small 25 person turbo-prop took us to Tortola one hour late, and we were settled on RUYAM II, which was docked at Port Purcell near Road Town harbour, around 7 pm.
26 May 2011
Late this afternoon we have left the marina at Port Purcell for the first time and motored out of the bay into the main Road Town harbour where we anchored (in a fairly crowded area) just outside the harbour limits. We had a very successful first anchor after only! two tries. The hands-free two-way radio headsets worked very well for communications between the helmsman (me) and the crew (Nel) at the bow during anchoring. (I have been told by the admiral on board that the roles will have to be reversed next time!)
Earlier that day, we took the dingy out to Village Key, tied at the sea-wall by the restaurant and went onto Road Town on-foot. We visited the bank, the insurance company and had lunch at Pusser’s.
27 May 2011
This morning we went again into town on dingy to do some provisioning. I also checked my emails (for the first time since we arrived) at the Village Key Marina. There is free WiFi by the pool side, but the lemonades cost $3 each!
Then we sailed RUYAM II into the Sir Francis Drake channel. Winds were non-existent (2-3 knots from SE). We motored for a while then we decided to try the sails. We somehow had hard time hoisting the main sail. (We later found out that the tangled state of the jiffy-reef lines left by the last people chartered our boat, combined with our inexperience with reef system caused the trouble.) After playing around with the sails, trying to tack and gybe (if you can call turning the wheel and waiting a while for the boat to come around for many minutes tacking or gybing), we took all the sails down and motored straight to Trellis Bay. Trellis Bay is a small protected bay, right at the end of the runway of the Beef Island Airport , at the east end of Tortola.
Dad hasn't got to the part where Dev or I came aboard, but it has been a blast so far. we even sailed today for a short time!
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