Wow, how can I explain the last few days. Amazing! Yup, that's the word.
On Wednesday morning, we could finally see land. Land ho! Immediately, we started calculating how long it would take to get there if we sailed (against the wind) or motored. When we were about 55 miles north of Tortola, we decided to 'just get there'. We were that close to the finish line! Woohoo! We could be at Nanny Cay by mid-afternoon. So, we turned on the engine and motored. Unfortunately, the winds were right on the nose (of course), and we were pounding straight into the waves. Thump, thump, thump, crash! Thump, thump, thump, crash! And repeat. That can't be good for the boat and we both cringed every time we crashed hard into a wave. The waves and the wind were making us go much slower than we wanted, too, so that it seemed every time I calculated our time of arrival, it was later! Not good. If we kept going like that we were going to use up all of our fuel quickly and arrive in the dark anyway and that's not good in an unknown marina. Eventually we deemed Mother Nature the winner (again) and decided to work with her instead of against her. We turned off the engine, put up both sails (reefed), and planned on tacking back and forth all night until sunrise and then we could reassess the situation. It turned out to be the best decision. I stayed up almost all night by myself and had the most beautiful Zen-like sail. The wind was just right, the moon was bright and making the water glimmer, and the air felt like a warm caress against my skin. Ahhhhh, we were sailing in the Caribbean. No rush to reach the finish line now. We had already arrived where we wanted to be. Just enjoy the moment. BE in the moment. Whenever I needed to tack, Carey would get up to help, then go back to bed. (Yes, we can both tack by ourselves, but we had decided from the first that we would always do any sail or direction changes with the other person. Tacking in the dark is a little trickier because you can't see your sails or sheet lines as well, so it's just safer to take your time and work together.).
At one point, we had the option of taking a shortcut near Jost Van Dyke around the other side of Tortola instead of going for the finish line. We decided to do it right, though, even though it meant sailing another night. So glad we did. (The boat just ahead of us did that. They got in a day ahead of us, but they were disqualified from the prizes.). Jean, from Caffe Latte, thought we must have been out of fuel so he was thinking about getting a group together to bring some out to us! Haha. No one could understand why we weren't rushing in!
On Thursday morning, we were a bit closer, but we still didn't turn on the engine until we had tacked into Sir Francis Drake Channel and around to the south side of the island of Tortola. There are sailboats everywhere. This is charter heaven, because it's such an easy area to sail. Here, you can use eyeball navigation--you can see your next destination in the distance. After seeing none for the past 11 days, it was a little odd to see other boats in all directions.
By 9 am, we were on our last tack before turning up the channel. The formal finish line is between Scrub Island and The Dogs Islands. We had a beautiful sail coming in and crossed the finish line at 12:25 pm. We arrived at the marina around 2:00. Before we had even navigated the entrance buoys we could here hooting and yelling, and saw the ARC team running along the beach and waving their arms. What a happy welcome. When we radioed in to get our slip assignment, we had been told that we would be docked beside Yankee Lady. Great! That was the young family that we had watched swinging on their rigging at an anchorage up in Oxford on the Chesapeake.
When we got to our slip, the dock was full of our rally friends. Wow, what a reception! Everyone was clapping, hooting, and smiling. We couldn't have had a more exuberant welcome. A rum punch was thrust into our hands before we had even turned off the engine, and many people came up to
offer hugs and handshakes. I can't explain how special it was. We were just thrilled to be here. We had another wonderful surprise when we docked here at Nanny Cay Marina--John Kretschmer (author and sailing legend) was docked right beside us in Quetzal! So nice to see him when he was the one to help prepare us for this adventure. (We had sailed with John on Quetzal in January.). Such a coincidence.
This is Little Peg Leg.
I still hadn't slept yet, but I was so pumped from the arrival, that I just kept going. We had a
Hollywood shower (ahhhhhhhhh) and wandered over to the Happy Hour with the ARC Rally gang at Gulligan's. We didn't stay long; just long enough to make an appearance and chat with a few people.
Finally, it was time for bed. Ten hours of oblivion. Felt great.
On Friday, we had to go to Customs and Immigration. Boy, are they grouchy! They mumble, they roll their eyes, they don't make eye contact, they yawn, they walk away without giving you a clue what they're doing or if they'll be back. Sheesh! We had been warned, so we came with lots of patience and polite smiles. In the end, we won. We got in AND Carey even made one guy laugh. Woohoo! He was all friendly after that.
The Awards Banquet was on Friday night. They award all of the racers, and then they acknowledge any other boats that were outstanding in any way. We won Most Enthusiastic Sailors. They were so impressed that double-handers (only 2 crew) didn't rush to get in. They were tracking us and could see we were still tacking back and forth out there even when we were that close. We won two beautiful hand-made pottery mugs.
During the ceremony, they told us that this is the first time that all boats made it to the destination; previous years, boats have had to divert to Bermuda or the Bahamas or turn back due to mechanical issues. Several sailors indicated that this was one of the most challenging passages you can do because of the uncertainty of the weather at this time of year. (It is still hurricane season until November 30.). Apparently, we had much rougher conditions than many were expecting. Just as well we didn't know all that. We just assumed this was normal for ocean passages. Sometimes, ignorance is bliss. LOL. After experiencing what was considered a tough passage, we feel pretty good about being able to handle other passages. No, we're not planning any right now, but it's always an option for the way home.
At the dinner, we sat at an all-Canadian table. Jean and Yolene from Montreal, Merrill, Maryse, and Jean from Montreal, Kathleen and Matthew from Ottawa and us. We had a great time!
On Saturday, Cameron McColl, owner of Nanny Cay Marina, invited us on a private tour of his motor yacht, Jura, and his new marina development. We had met Cameron in Portsmouth and the three of us really hit it off. Both his boat and the new marina development are very impressive. Cameron is extremely knowledgeable and interesting so we had a really nice time. We talked and toured for two hours! Jura is quite luxurious. We told him we'd be happy to crew for him if he was doing other passages. Haha.
Many of our new friends are leaving to go out cruising the Caribbean. We bid farewell to Yarona, Kinship, and Ambition. Sad to see them go, but I'm sure we'll bump into them along the way.
Now, we're transitioning from passage making to cruising. So much reorganizing to do! We worked for the rest of the day on Saturday and all day Sunday, installing the new anchor, cleaning and stowing, doing laundry, cleaning the fridge--again, etc. It's so hot here that we have to keep taking breaks to jump in the pool! (I know, that's rough. Haha.). We're almost there. Today, Monday, we're going into Road Town for provisions and a cell phone plan, and then we'll inflate the dinghy. I think we'll be ready to go out cruising tomorrow. Yippee!
Alberto, from One Mart, came to pick us up at 10:00. It's a free shuttle service he offers at his grocery store. What a great guy! He dropped us off downtown, so we could go to all three mobile phone service stores to compare plans. Later, after we chose Digicel, he picked us up and took us to One Mart. Whoa!!! Sticker shock. We were prepared for high prices, but eleven dollars for a pound of bacon?! Hmmm, no bacon for us for the next few months. Actually, we may become vegetarians. Oh, no, that's right, the produce is not really very good (unless we can find fresh markets wherever we go). We learned that we have to be there the day the boat comes in with fresh food or it gets picked over very quickly. I'm so glad I stocked up on canned food and paper products before we left. It'll take a while, but we'll get used to what we can get and we'll work around it.
Tonight, we've been invited over to Caffe Latte (with Jean and Yolene) for pre-dinner drinks. Looking forward to it!
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