The main island of Guadeloupe is shaped like a big butterfly. Basse Terre, on the Western side, is full of tall, volcanic mountains covered in lush green forests and beautiful waterfalls (which we have yet to go explore, alas). Grande Terre, to the East, is more flat and dry, and largely developed with towns and Continue Reading
Guadeloupe
The sail from Jolly Harbour, Antigua to Guadeloupe is about 40 nautical miles, or 7-8 hours of sailing time in our boat. We calculate an average speed of about 5.5 knots/hour when planning our journeys – when the winds are up we will sail faster than that, but you can quickly end up getting slowed Continue Reading
A Winter in the Caribbean
It’s the first week of August as I write this, and I am back in Trinidad after spending a few weeks in Vancouver for a break to visit friends and family. Obtviously our blogging efforts lagged once we started island hopping in the Caribbean in February, but we’ve really enjoyed our travels and there are Continue Reading
Boat TLC, and Goodbye to Antigua
Sailboats use “anti-fouling” paints on under the water to stop, or at least slow down things growing on the hull. Without the paint, hard growth such as barnacles, and soft growth (plants/sea weed/slime) happily attaches to the hull and grows. The developing forest makes it harder for the boat to move through the water, slowing Continue Reading
Happy New Year!
We took a quick trip back to Canada in early December to see family, and returned to Antigua about a week before Christmas. With the all hot weather and sunshine, it has been hard to believe that it’s winter, let alone the holiday season! Our friends Aaron and Kelly came to stay with us for Continue Reading
Antigua – First Impressions
Land Ho! After 12 days at sea, we arrived in Falmouth Harbour, Antigua
Passage to Antigua
While on passage to Antigua, we posted daily updates on our progress and things going on to the PredictWind tracker. Since we’ll be shutting down that tracker shortly, we’ve copied those posts here and added photos and videos.
The weather window is Open. Antigua here we come!
Our 44 hour sail down to Cape Lookout was a great chance for our new crew-mate to get used to life on passage, and arriving for a few days on the beach with warm weather felt positively tropical. Almost like we had a mini-version of the passage to Antigua. Anticipating a spell of bad weather, Continue Reading
High Tide
A wise friend once told me that ‘Sailing plans are written in the sand at low tide’. Well, the tide has come in, and sure enough those initial plans to sail to Antigua have become a little bit fuzzy. Instead of leaving for Antigua on November 1st, some questionable weather patterns in the Atlantic and Continue Reading
Antigua Bound!
We are terribly behind on our travel posts from this fall! I think part of the reason we’ve fallen so far behind that (at least for me!) the very idea of trying to catch up is so overwhelming that I struggle to even get started on a new post. Nevermind all the time it takes Continue Reading