Sailing to Bequia

With a great weather forecast for ESE winds, we left Grenada on Dec 24th heading for Bequia with a planned stop on Union Island in Chatham Bay. The sail north was fantastic, and like always, we bashed thru the currents and waves at the north end of Grenada. This being our second run past here, we are learning how the winds and currents accelerate at the north ends or south ends of the Caribbean Islands. The winds are compressed and bent around the islands and then accelerate as they compress to make it up or down and around the end of the islands. It can be 30% more wind as you come out from behind the islands, so we always have a double reef in the mainsail.

Caribbean Sailing is fantastic.

Island Packets love 20-25 knots of wind and they really like this on the beam or downwind. On this leg, since we are in the Windward Islands, our sailing course is north or south on an east wind! That means beam reaching or close reaching and the sailing is great. Here are some sailing photos, please enjoy.

Rainbow, our first for this 2019-2020 season

It rains nearly every day for 5-15 minutes and that presents a rainbow as well. Here is a photo enhanced rainbow as seen on our first sail of the season. What a joy, this was actually a full rainbow, but my panoramic did not work out, so here is the closest end of the rainbow

On anchor off Union Island, Chatham Bay

Union Island, Chatham Bay was a great place to drop the anchor close and off the beach. We immediately jumped in for a Christmas Eve snorkel and swim along the reef. We saw our first “Snake Eel”  and a moray eel along with many colorful fish. Welcome to the Caribbean where the water is about 78 degrees and when you jump in, you try to decide if it is cold or not. 🙂 The next day, Christmas Morning, we up anchored and headed out for more sailing to Bequia. Our first Christmas Day Sail.

Sailing Christmas Day

What an unusual way to spend Christmas Day. Sailing! Our destination being Bequia where we arrived around 1100 with time to check in with customs and immigration. After checking in, we were off to the FIG TREE where the cruisers were having a pot luck gathering. Everyone brought a dish to share and your own meat to grill. Our hosts had the grills running and all the tables set up and we brought in our filet mignon and homemade iced pumpkin bars  to share.

Thank you John and Darcy and Lafayette

The Fig Tree has become the cruisers place to hang out because the owners, Sheryl and Lafayette, have made it so inviting to the boaters. This mother-daughter team opens their space for cruisers to come in and hang out for Christmas Day. Boat Buddies, John and Darcy, who got marrids here on Bequia, hosted and organized the pot luck. Tons of work for 80 cruisers to all have a place to sit and to have a buffet table and to share. What a great Christmas Day with everyone. We really enjoyed this.

Fun times on Bequia

We have now been here 5 days and we are really enjoying this island. Bequia has been a cruising favorite of ours since out first stop here in 1992. That was on a charter boat and like all charter boats, you only stay one day at a place because you only have one week and you want to see it all, so you move, move, move. Its so different cruising on your own boat. No schedule, no timeframe, so we can stay as long as we like an any location. That is what is so wonderful about cruising. So, we are hiking, walking, swimming, snorkeling the reef and visiting. Welcome to the simple peaceful life.

Up Next, Hiking…

We will write next about our wonderful three days of hiking Bequia where we have seen some amazing views. Thanks to our buddies on IP38 DreamCatcher, Dean and Kim, for organizing the hike. Here are a few teaser photos…..

Thank you all for following along. Radeen and I really enjoy sharing our sailing wit you. Your comments are emailed directly to us and we try to respond to them all. Thank you!