A flexibility muscle is the most important thing to have on a boat.

Having left the marina for a planned short sail to the Tobago Cays, a couple of surprise mechanical issues forced us to rethink our plan.

First, the Genoa furler stopped working with the big headsail halfway out. We tried everything to wake up the electric furling motor but no joy. This happened previously (an episode so bad it didn’t make it into print) so at least this time I had the right adapter for the 18V drill and was able to manually get the Genoa furled properly.

Once this was temporarily resolved, we were motor sailing with the mainsail up when I noticed the Volvo engine warning light was on – possible water in the diesel fuel. Yikes!

No point trying to motor to the Tobago Cays with these issues, so Navigator Susan located Salt Whistle Bay on Mayreau, a small island with one settlement and maybe 300 inhabitants.

Picked up a mooring ball, resumed the rocking and rolling, and got the two mechanical issues resolved. So the next day we went for a walk across the island.

When the enhanced trade winds blow 20+ knots for nine straight weeks, the seas state becomes, shall we say, noticeable. Even in what look like protected anchorages the swell still wraps around the corner and comes back into the harbor. This means the wind and wind chop are on the bow and the swell is off the stern quarter.

Translated – less than comfortable when the boat is rocking and rolling at anchor.

Solution – read the cruising guide, find one of the few marinas in the area, and spend two nights tied up to a dock. Smooth Jazz.

We found the Sandy Lane Marina on Canouan – calm and quality sleep at last.

Bonus was their restaurant on the beach with a swimming pool and lounge chairs overlooking the Tobago Cays in the distance.

But enough relaxation- Dragonfly is for exploring, so off to the Tobago Cays!

If Bequai is the Real Caribbean, then Mustique is, well, the polar opposite.

A private island with 190 villas (code speak for huge mansions on manicured grounds), it was first developed in the 1940’s and quickly discovered by the international jet set crowd. Today villas here are owned by the likes of Mick Jagger, Brian Adams, Tommy Hilfiger – you get the picture.

While the island itself is beautiful, it was not blessed with anything resembling a natural harbor. And so all these folks vacation here, but the only private craft owned by a local was a 30 year old Sunfish. At least the owner was out sailing it while we were there visiting.

Though none of the locals are boaters, they seem to like the ambiance created at their private island when there’s 15-20 yachts and super yachts moored off the beach. Cruisers are welcome to come to shore, visit the village and enjoy the shops and restaurants. We can walk the beach, but to go anywhere else on the island one must take a taxi (there are 3 on the island). To wander off on your own will most certainly result in being permanently escorted off the island – they take their security serious here.

It takes a small army of workers to run an island, especially since some of the larger villas have full time staff of 12-15. There is a small village where 150 inhabitants live; these are the workers on the island who have been here for the better part of their entire lives.

We hired Johnny, one of the three taxi drivers, for a tour of the island. He explained that the modest homes they live in are theirs though they do not have equity in the traditional sense. Possession of the home he now lives in passes to his daughter upon his death. The company that manages the island (it’s owned by the 190 villas owners) provides the workers homes and even pays the utility bills.

Workers qualify for retirement at 65, and the company will hire a healthcare caregiver when it’s necessary. They also pay the cost for burial. I asked what most folks did once they retired, and he said they’re capable of continuing to work, and since that’s all anybody has known most folks just keep working.

Johnny also commented that every single person on the island had a job, nobody was idle, they had full employment.

As we traversed the rolling hills and beach lands Johnny walked us through the concepts of triple B and triple M that were pertinent on Mustique.

Triple B: Buy, Break, Build. This is what the new arrivals would do – buy an existing home (no more undeveloped lots remaining), break it as in tear it down, then spend a few years building anew. They were now seeing triple B applied to villas as new as 5 years.

Triple M: Make More Money. This is why the villa owners tell Johnny they’re leaving paradise as he’s driving them in his taxi to their charter flight home.

We enjoyed meeting Ali and Heidi at the local coffee shop. Ali arrived 31 years ago as a baker from France and has stayed ever since, marrying and raising kids (school is available through sixth grade then the kiddos go to Saint Vincent for secondary education). Ali arises at midnight to start making pastries, croissants, quiche, loaves of bread, cookies, etc. Open from 6 am he serves everyone on the island with a big smile and lots of happy energy.

Basil’s was a fun place to hang out – it had perfected that relaxed beach bar atmosphere with just the right touch of class and elegance. It all made sense when we learned that Basil’s had been reimagined in 2015 by Philippe Starck. Go figure.

Very welcoming people, amazing beaches, excellent snorkeling along the reef, beautiful scenery and fun times eating and dancing at Basil’s. Everything needed to forget the anchorage was so rolly from the Atlantic swell coming around the corner that Susan had to sleep on her stomach with both arms out to keep her on the bed.

Bequai is one of the islands in the Grenadines. The Grenadines are separate and distinct from Grenada. The Grenadines also include the Tobago Cays, and these are separate and distinct from Tobago which is part of Trinidad and Tobago. 

The point of this is that it’s nearly impossible to figure all this out without coming here, reading the charts, navigating the passages, dropping the anchor and exploring each island. 

Our first stop in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines was Bequai, a small, sailboat friendly island with one town that fortunately includes a Customs and Immigration office.

After Martinique we were now in the Real Caribbean – reggae music, Rasta hats, beach shacks with Carib beer and grilled chicken, clear turquoise waters and long sandy beaches.

The Pitons of Saint Lucia are famous among Caribbean sailors and many make the stop in Soufrierre to anchor in their shadow.

After our close friends Nicole and Mark left, we were ready to buy provisions, take our covid tests and clear out of customs so we could leave Martinique and head south. But NO, not so fast.

The tests came back positive so we certainly weren’t going to another country yet.

We isolated on anchor for several days and then retested negative. Whew. Now we can leave Martinique and head for Saint Lucia.

The winds and seas were up but Dragonfly handled everything easily. It was good for us to feel 6-8’ seas and learn how the boat kept it relatively comfortable.

Forty miles later and we were picking up a mooring ball in the shadow of the Pitons.

The yellow quarantine flag stayed up as we dropped the mooring ball in the morning for a 52 mile sail south to our next destination: Bequai in the Grenadines.

I didn’t pick Martinique, she picked me. Rather, we came to Martinique because that is where Aora was located, and Aora soon became Dragonfly.

Once before I’d been to Martinique, though I really hadn’t. A week at Club Med in 1988 is really time at a French hotel, restaurant and beach bar, but there’s no way to learn just how vibrant and welcoming an island and its people are.

The history of all Caribbean islands is familiar: colonized by European powers to develop sugar, rum and coffee crops by exploiting the indigenous population as well as enslaved Africans. Post WW2 many of these islands achieved independence and self rule, whilst a few remain wholly part of their European country or as a commonwealth protectorate.

Spending two months in Martinique was a good primer on the adage that governance matters. Martinique is simply a province of France, just as all the mainland provinces are. And so they benefit from the rule of law, quality education, decent infrastructure (roads, power, drinking water, etc.) and overall a quite good standard of living. The downside is that wages are universally low, the cost of living is quite high, and the global inflation that we’re seeing puts a real strain on the average resident.

But it’s the people that make it such a special place. A mix of black and white, young and old, workers, business owners and retirees. Universally friendly, every single time we walked down a sidewalk we were greeted with Bonjour and a smile. People get along here on this island and we never sensed tension and certainly never felt our safety was at risk. It was common to walk from Dragonfly to the marine store and greet 5-6 people by name.

The food was excellent and we only had good meals. A couple of our best meals were at a beachfront restaurant with sand on the floor and every guest wearing a swimsuit. Most memorable were the sauces, not spicy, just packed with flavor to enhance the locally caught seafood Being French, there were as many stylish, beautiful people here as we saw in Paris.

A friend observed that Martinique is more European than Caribbean – all the benefits of France right in the middle of the Caribbean Sea.

Au revoir mon ami, see you soon.

He does what any prudent captain would do – send the crew up the mast.

We have a large deck light mounted about 2 meters above the lower spreaders. When out sailing a couple days ago we looked up to see the 4 inch diameter bulb hanging outside its mounting bracket and swinging freely, held on by the positive and negative wires.

Once back at the dock it was time to don the bosuns chair. With our dock neighbor Terje of Norway on the safety line, the captain winched Susan up the mast.

The repairs were successful and we were told the view was amazing.

Sometimes you get lucky. A friend in the Amel fleet knew we were buying an Amel in Martinique so he introduced us to the great folks at Caraibe Marine. Dragonfly just spent the past four days cruising the west coast of Martinique and the only way we were able to do this was because of the amazing work and dedication from so many folks at Caraibe Marine

In the late 1980s Philippe Leconte raced in the mini transat single handed regatta in a 21 foot sailboat like the one below – France to Martinique non stop. Crazy!

When he arrived in Martinique he did not have enough money for a plane ticket home. So he stayed on the island and started doing rigging work. Over the past 30+ years Philippe has grown his business to be one of the premiere repair and refit shops, with many customers sailing for two weeks just to have work done by them. Caraibe Marine now has seven divisions and over 50 employees.

Given all the work Dragonfly needed I was fortunate to get to know many of the employees, and it was a little sad to say au revoir.

There were so many other quality folks: Sabine, Bruno, Aurore and Tom in the Chandlery, Pilo and Mavrik at the Metal shop, Hugo in Electronics, and Marcus, Marco and Gerald in Rigging.

Merci beaucoup!

A collection of images from street and boat life around Martinique

It is said that cruising is the art of maintaining your sailboat in exotic locations.

Some folks are more committed to maintenance than others.

Every captain’s nightmare so you better do a project everyday before putting your feet up.

Here are some of the boat projects undertaken over the past 3 weeks while Susan was in Park City.

“I wasn’t upset that I lost my mast crossing the Atlantic Ocean because I gained a girlfriend.”

Now this is a Masterclass in positive thinking. Renault was captaining his Grand Soleil 48 sloop from Gibraltar to Martinique with four additional crew onboard. He was down below on day 5 when there was a very loud bang – racing up the companionway steps he finds a broken mast, sails and rigging everywhere on deck, and fortunately no injured crew.

It’s customary in these situations to get out the electric angle grinder or oversized bolt cutters and sever all of the mast attachment points, sending it all to Davey Jones locker. Goodbye mast, boom, sails, rigging, electronics, insurance deductible, and planned 14 day crossing.

The next step is to jury rig a sail with the whisker poke and any small sails that were not lost overboard. Ration food and water and start a good book.

When they finally made it to the dock in Martinique they were greeted by girlfriends and friends. Crew#1 wasn’t doing so well with his girlfriend at the time but he really hit it off with Crew#2’s girlfriend and off they went never to be seen again. Crew#1’s girlfriend hung around the docks for awhile, got to know Renault the capitaine and now they’re a couple. As he said, if my mast hadn’t broken I’d have never met this wonderful woman.

Obviously the point of the love story is do not wait too long to replace the wires (shrouds) that hold up your masts.

And that is how Dragonfly spent the last two weeks. My Laser had no shrouds, the Snipe 3, the J22 4, the Beneteau 39 6, and Dragonfly 16. So we had lots of time to hear stories of love and woe.

Caraibe Marine Rigging has a well deserved reputation as one of the premiere, most qualified rigging shops in this part of the world. Some boats have been known to sail down from New England just for this project and then turn around and go home

The Saloon A/C wasn’t working when we bought Dragonfly so the seller committed to fixing it.  His local refrigeration guy is named Quentin, and he is beyond impossible to get in contact with.  No email goes responded.  But he finally showed up one day after being relentlessly badgered by the broker. Quentin said he had recently bought a repo’d Open 40 racing sailboat on Guadeloupe and would be gone for about a week to get the boat and start the refitting process.

When I was cleaning out the aft lazarette I came across on old gennaker that had significant UV damage on the leech.  Apparently the prior owner had it on a furler and left it furled for an entire season with no UV protection.  Touching the sailcloth along the leech resulted in tears and more holes.  But the rest of the sail was in good shape, so I offered to give it to Quentin as maybe a cut down gennaker would fit his boat.  He was excited – surely he would be over soon to pick it up.  Well, at least he was consistent: on our fifth planned time for pick up he arrived with a smile.

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Everybody wants roads but nobody wants road construction. Everybody wants lush green hillsides but nobody wants rain. Well, a rainforest island like Martinique sees rain nearly every day and night. Usually it’s a light to medium rainfall that goes on for about 5-10 minutes then blows through; 15 minutes later it’s dry and sunny. But every now and then the skies literally open – the old Texas saying of it’s raining like a cow peeing on a flat rock comes to mind. Well one night after dinner it was a deluge. After running around and closing all of the hatches I managed to get this picture from the companionway hatch.

Later that night it was time for bed.  Ought Oh!  I missed a hatch!!  The one directly above my pillow!!!  Guess I won’t be sleeping here tonight.

An unplanned project was added to the list the next morning.  

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An experienced sailor friend once said that no matter how big your boat is, when the weather offshore is lousy you always wished you had a bigger boat. So just when I start wondering if 54 feet is big enough, a bunch of 32 -36 Junneau Sun Fast sailboats start showing up in our marina. Turns out it’s the Transquadra Regatta finishing in Martinique. I learn from a friend that they race every four years, and go from France to the Canary Islands, leave their boats there for a couple of months, then return in early February for the two week race to Martinique. There are classes for single-handers and double-handers. My friend does qualify her explanation by saying participation is limited as it’s for Old Sailors – you know, they have to be over 40.

One of the singlehanders led the entire two week race but was passed by a doublehanded boat just miles from the finish line.  Two Italians were approaching the cut south of Martinique, almost there, when they saw a squall behind them.  They figured if they kept the spinnaker up they could make it around the point and protection from the big breeze.  The squall hit before they cleared the point, knocking them down and laying them on their side for seven long minutes.  The finish line is just off the Club Med point, so there is some navigating to do for the last couple of miles due to shallow water and a few shoals.  After racing 24/7 for two weeks, one boat arrived in the middle of the night and continued up the channel only to get stuck on a reef.  Requiring assistance from a motorboat to get off the reef, sadly they were scored as Disqualified.

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Just when you think these boats are small to race across the Pond, you come across a 5.8 meter (19 feet!!!) class single-handed race boat anchored in the harbor. There is a reason the French and Kiwis are the best offshore, blue water sailors and racers – a little bit loco in la cabeza.

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Baked fresh without preservatives and stabilizers means the baguettes, croissants and pain au chocolates are really, really good. But it does require a daily stroll to the patisserie.

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Balsa is a very sweet dog. Huge! But very sweet. Hangs out on the aft deck of Django, the Amel 53 tied up next to us. He loves people but his relationship with the cat on the dock can best be described as peaceful but filled with much tension.

When I returned from the Weekend in the Boatyard, Balsa was not on deck.  Inquiring of his owner, it turns out the two of them had also been in the boatyard helping a friend paint his bateau.  They spilled a gallon of anti-fouling paint on the ground and kind of put off cleaning it up.  In the meantime, Balsa wandered over and lay down in it.  Yikes!  The copper and other biocides inflamed his skin under his arms and legs where there is not much hair, so he was still down below recuperating.

Update – two days later and he’s back on the aft deck keeping a watch out for the cat.

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Leaving the Boatyard and entering the main channel we saw this large catamaran aground on a reef. Notice the difference in color and texture of the water directly in front the cat. Every capitaine knows this could be them so it’s a good reminder that just because you See water does not mean there Is water.

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This is the family mini-van.

Just like the American suburbs, everyone has one. It’s used for everything – grocery shopping, exploring, beach trips. All of the cruising guides have the same advice: lift it or lock it or lose it. So every day when you go somewhere, rather than tying the boat off to the dock, we use chain and a padlock. And at night, we either lock it to the boat or lift it out of the water.

Power is really important even on a sailboat. We have 12 very large 100 amp batteries that allow us to run the lights, fridge and freezer, all kinds of pumps and everything else for day to day life. The batteries need to be charged daily and this can be done several ways: plugged in to shore power at the dock, by the main engine alternator when motoring- hopefully not too often, or by the generator when we’re sailing or at anchor.

Another solution is to have a stainless steel arch constructed on the back of the boat to hold solar panels.

The added benefit is we can have davits added to the arch to hold the dinghy.

Previously we add to empty the dinghy, lift the outboard motor off, then use a halyard to raise the dinghy onto the aft deck. We’d then flip it upside down, more of a controlled roll and drop, and then lash it to the deck. This takes close to an hour.

Hauling the dinghy out of the water with the davits takes about 3 minutes!

So off Dragonfly went to the boatyard for Caraibe Marine to do their magic.

The work spanned a weekend and it’s always fun to wander through a boatyard to see what’s going on.