Weeks 58-60: Grenada to Trinidad (88nm)

The final weeks of our Caribbean adventure saw us lead a convoy of boats to Trinidad before Serenity was hauled out at a boat yard for safekeeping while we’re away for the hurricane season.

What is this convoy thing, you say?

Now that we’ve made it safely to Trinidad and Serenity is tucked away in the boat yard, I feel I can give more detail about what this whole convoy thing was for.

Trinidad is situated just 6 miles off the coast of Venezuela, which is currently experiencing an intensifying humanitarian crisis. Driven by their desperation, some Venezuelans have turned to piracy. Sailing yachts on their own in the calm seas near Trinidad and its oil rigs would be easy targets, and in fact a few incidents have occurred in recent years. As a result, the yachting association of Trinidad has begun helping cruisers organise Coast Guard-supported convoys to make the journey from Grenada to Chaguaramas.

Trinidad remains a very cost effective place to store a boat and have work done, and most importantly is truly outside the hurricane belt, so we were keen to make it Serenity’s home while we are away for the season. When I enquired about the convoy process, Jesse, the liaison in Trinidad, asked if we’d be willing to be a convoy leader. Without quite knowing what that entailed, Alec and I said “yes,” because if nothing else it meant we could pick the dates of travel and make the final call on the weather.

Thus, we found ourselves in charge of a group of 7 boats (plus 4 that were involved but ultimately didn’t join the convoy trip), organising communications, watching the weather and working with the Coast Guard. Though a lot of work and more stressful than anticipated, it was a great experience in the end and we were lucky enough to sail with a wonderful group of people. We had a relatively straightforward journey to Chaguaramas, and happily we arrived safely with nothing untoward to report!

First Mate’s Log

9th June: An easygoing Sunday aboard commenced with banana pancakes (a new favourite) before moving on to the heart of the day: patching up our dinghy. Following the Great Eagle Ray Incident of Antigua, we have spent a lot of time patching and repatching TJ’s many wounds; our experiments last week on getting the dinghy to plane had clearly overstressed one of our earlier patch efforts and it had given up the ghost. We decided to take this opportunity to see if we could patch up our inflatable paddleboard at the same time (it had something on the order of 12 leaks…). Much glue was mixed, many new patches were applied, and now we wait a couple of days for it to cure before we can see if we have been successful. We had our dinner in front of a film called Into the Wild. It was beautifully shot, but also heart-wrenching. Not sure yet if I recommend it.

10th June: Our neighbours on S/V Breeze mentioned a free yoga class across the bay on Mondays, and I couldn’t say no. Shannon kindly game me a ride over in the morning (TJ being still out of action) where we met a few others for a great stretch and workout. Bonus that the teacher’s dog made rounds throughout the class to provide encouraging cuddles. With TJ grounded for a few days, Alec bravely decided to see if he could finally diagnose and fix a funny noise in the outboard engine. Several hours later, completely covered with oil, the engine is as cleaned and improved as possible… but still makes the noise. Sigh. Sometimes boat issues are not only dirty, but also frustratingly difficult to solve. Many kudos to Alec for continuing to persevere on this one!

11th June: The wind abated today, so we could enjoy more time on deck, which was nice because we had friends coming by for dinner and we always like hanging out in the cockpit with visitors. Spent the day spec’ing out various projects that we’re lining up for Trinidad and tidying Serenity before knocking up our signature Thai curry (with the last fish of the season – the freezer is now officially empty!) to share with Lara and Rick from S/V Mai Tai.

12th June: Alec borrowed a set of “fids” (special tools for splicing rope – we suspect they get their name from how unbelievably fiddly a task it is!) from our neighbours on S/V Breeze and successfully managed to create an endless line for our main sail furling system, which is going to make putting the main out and away so much easier. I got my butt into gear working through the Trinidad list and scoping my projects, in particular today working out plans for a new bimini, dodger, fishing gear covers and additional deck shade – lots of exciting sewing projects to come! After a big day, we rewarded ourselves with a relaxed evening vegging out in front of the first episode of the Amazon series Good Omens, which is based on the hilarious book by Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman. It was fantastic and definitely worth a watch (and/or read!).

13th June: Today was one of those days. You hope you don’t get these often, but, well, sometimes they happen. It started positively enough: I made a last minute decision to go to a nearby yoga class; Alec listed our paddleboard for sale on the local cruisers net and got a taker. But then, in an effort to photograph the paddleboard for the potential buyer, a gust of wind launched said board into Alec and knocked his phone out of his hand… into the sea. The phone gods have been incredibly unkind to Alec this year (this was his third phone – having suffered two defective ones over the last months), so this was a big blow, especially as it took with it our local SIM card (i.e. our main connection to the internet). This mangrove-fed water has almost zero visibility so no amount of diving was going to recover it. To add insult to injury, our propane ran out unexpectedly as I was trying to cook food up for dinner (our gauge had read it as nearly full the day before). We figured this was not to be our day and decided to just watch a quiet movie and get to bed early – tomorrow must be better.

14th June: Our spot in Saga Cove was starting to feel a bit stale, particularly after the phone incident, and our friends on Breeze had found an enticing bay a couple of miles west, so we readied ourselves to up anchor. Our friends on Mai Tai kindly offered us coffee and pancakes before we left (since we were stuck without propane for our stove), and we had a nice start to the morning visiting them on their boat. Rick followed us back to Serenity to cast his expert eye over our persistent window leak (good news: fixable; bad news: probably gonna need to redo all the sealant again). We had an easy drive round to True Blue, a lovely little bay near Grenada’s big university, and instantly felt better. Alec found a speedy refill for our propane bottle and we made plans with our neighbours to check out a Friday night food festival at the nearby trendy container park (lots of cool little food places housed in colourful recycled shipping containers). On the way home, we stopped by a local bar, Bananas, for a game of pool and unexpectedly befriended the owner. It turned into a bit of a late one, but in the best way possible, and we felt truly restored after such a crap day the day before!

15th June: We allowed ourselves a lazy start to the day in preparation for a big afternoon heading up island to join the weekly ‘Hash,’ a tradition in Grenada going back to the 1980s (for context, we were joining the 1090th event!). Every Saturday, the island’s club, Grenada Hash House Harriers, put on a walk / run around a different part of the island. They create new trails through the jungle for the groups to navigate (at times multiple, and you have to figure out which one is right). Alec braved the run while I walked with some other cruisers. Despite rain and a run-in with a fire ant nest, it was an absolute blast! It’s the first event we’ve done that felt truly cross-cultural. There were maybe 150 people there, including locals, expats, visitors like us, and whoever else felt like it. Along the trail, locals cheered us on, and at the end, everyone gathered in an open area for a cook out and a bit of a dance party. Very highly recommended to anyone visiting the island!

16th June: Started the day off right hosting our first brunch aboard Serenity First. Without a pressure cooker, making beans from dried was HARD, but… after a solid four hours on the boil I managed refried black beans as part of a huevos rancheros extravaganza with our friends from Breeze. After a bit of time to digest, we headed into the Dodgy Dock (a cute restaurant with, yes, a dodgy dock for us to tie up our dinghy at) to make use of their WiFi for calls with dads for Father’s Day, which is unusually the same day in both the UK and US. A quiet evening followed playing Hanabi over scrumptious dhal courtesy of Alec.

17th June: Thankfully it was a cloudy day as I had a long walk down to the big grocery store to pick up supplies and that would otherwise have been sunburn-city. Food sorted, Alec and I focussed on the main task of the day – deciding whether the weather was okay enough for us to hit “go” on our Trinidad convoy scheduled for Thursday (which I had accidentally volunteered us to lead back in May). It’s looking a bit windy and wavey, but we don’t want to lose our Coast Guard escort. Decided we needed to get consensus, so gathered the other convoy boats at the West Indies Brewery for a pow wow (it always nice to have an excuse to sample interesting beers, and this is really the only craft brewery we’ve found in the Caribbean!). The group feeling was clear – let’s go for it! Relieved, we could then relax and enjoy an evening getting to know a lovely group of cruisers, who were all great people with great stories to share.

18th June: In an unusual twist for us introverts, I think we’ve done too much social stuff lately. Looking at the “to do” list this AM, we realised it is still frighteningly long, especially when considering the boat is scheduled for haul out exactly one week from today! So, we decided to make a big pot of coffee and hunker down on board for the day to work through as much as possible. We pretty much collapsed about 5pm, but made enough of a dent that I think we’re back on track. In our continuing quest to use up all the random food we’ve accumulated in the last 18 months, I made a quasi-chilli for dinner based on chickpeas and some of the leftover spices at the back of the cupboard (turmeric, caraway… why not?) that actually turned out to be delicious.

19th June: Such a dreary day – it rained and rained and rained. To make matters worse, our window leak has continued to expand lately, despite that gargantuan effort to fix it a few months ago, and we are back to buckets and towels to catch all the ingress. Nevermind. In the few dry moments, we did our on-deck inspections to prep for the passage to Trinidad tomorrow. A positive of the weather is it dampened the wind, so my trip up the mast was one of the most relaxed I’ve had this year! By late afternoon we were ready for a pick-me-up; some of the cruisers on our convoy had invited us back to the Brewery for its music night and this was a welcome reward for our efforts. Pretty much everyone we know in Grenada showed up, so it was an amazing opportunity to share a few last laughs and say goodbye to all the wonderful people we’ve met here. Other highlights of the evening included amazing pizzas for only £6.50 a pop and an exceptionally good Irish harmonica player owning the stage (how he ended up in Grenada, we still don’t know!).

20th June: Convoy day! We weren’t scheduled to leave until 5:30pm, so I spent the day basically nervously pacing the boat. Though we had clear skies, the wind was blustery, and tension was high when we finally hoisted sails and headed towards the meet up waypoint. As we settled into our pace (fast – 7 to 8 knots!), I could feel how stable and balanced Serenity was and so started to relax. All boats arrived at the waypoint precisely on time and we promptly turned south towards the big oil rigs that marked our route. Alec and I decided to both stay up all night on this passage, since there was too much to do between convoy organisation and sailing for one-person watches. So, we made a huge pot of coffee and settled down to our task.

21st June:  In the early morning hours, the convoy started to drift too far apart, so we had to call around to get people to form up, which was a little nerve-racking (would they listen to me? would people get annoyed?). Despite the sleep deprivation, everyone responded positively and promptly, and within an hour we were all back on track.  Luckily, this coincided with the wind easing, so there was less to do on the sailing side for the rest of the night. As we entered Trinidad waters (12nm off shore) a Coast Guard boat arrived to escort us the rest of the way in, which was pretty cool! The current at the entrance to the coast, called the Boca, was strong–2 or 3 knots against us at times–but before too long we made it into Chaguaramas bay, where Alec had to execute a hell of a park in a strong cross wind and cross current. By the time we were properly tied up, we were ready to collapse, but Trinidad requires you to go immediately to customs and immigration to check in. This of course turned out to be a multi-hour ordeal, with the most paperwork I’ve ever seen in my life. It was after 3pm before we were allowed some lunch and a nap! Though our meal out at a nearby cafe was actually a bit disappointing, we had a solid sleep after and the yard had the most amazing brand new air-conditioned showers EVER.

22nd June: Alec and I slept all the sleep, only really getting going around 9:30 or so. We’d decided to take it easy given we were still recovering from the passage, but also because we weren’t quite ready to face boat work just yet. Eventually, we figured we should at least make a list of all the things we needed to do to prepare for haul out, and filled the whiteboard with tomorrow’s work plan. To reward ourselves for all this effort, we headed down to the Wheel House Pub, where we met up with the convoy crew for a celebratory drink. To our surprise, the local cruising association, which coordinates the convoy process, had bought us all a round of drinks and even gave Alec and I a free meal! Turns out leading a convoy has its perks!!

23rd-27th June: As we got into our task list the next morning, we realised we hadn’t given ourselves nearly enough time to do everything needed before our flight home. So, neither of us managed to write any log entries! It was a crazy intense week, but I admit we squeezed in a bit of fun as well :). A few highlights:

That Sunday, Christian and Catherine from Matafo 4 (a brand new Leopard 45 catamaran that had come on the convoy) invited Alec and I over for accra, lobster and to sample wine they’d imported from their home in France (!) – a meal that couldn’t be beat. We also had a great time nosing around their beautiful boat, which even had a deep fat fryer!

Serenity was finally hauled out of the sea, and the boat yard’s chief of power washing, Nigel, spent 45 minutes carefully removing 18 months of growth from the bottom (partly to the chagrin of his co-workers; we get the sense that he is an artist who won’t be rushed, even if it makes people have to stay late!).

Our friends aboard Joy hosted an impromptu pool party one evening at the fancy marina across the bay. They’d amassed impressive haul of leftover bubbly and snacks, which we were happy to lend a hand in finishing :). We learned while there that Roxy, from Windward Lady (a convoy boat), grew up about five minutes away from Alec. Crazy! It was a welcome break from the backbreaking work of shutting up the boat for the summer, and a really nice way to say goodbye to such a great group of people. Hopefully we’ll see most of them in the autumn again!

Bye for now!

After 15 months afloat and 18 away from home, hurricane season provides a welcome opportunity to take a break from the water and see our family and friends. We’ll be between the UK and US for July-September, after which we’ll return to Serenity and turn our focus towards the second half of our great sailing adventure – the Pacific! The blog will be on pause during this break, but we’ll be back to share new adventures in the autumn. Until then, have a great summer all!