Escape from the Hurricane Belt – Our 3 Day Sailing Passage from St Maarten to Grenada

We upped anchor at 8:30 AM to make sure no issues with being ready for the 9 AM bridge opening to exit the Simpson Bay lagoon at St Maarten on Sunday June 7, 2020 in the year of the ‘Rona. I was fully mentally ready to jump in the water and get to work if the anchor was stuck or something. Missing the opening would set us back until at least 2 PM and have some implications with the weather planning I had done. Plus there was another boat exiting we had communicated with to stay in radio contact during the passage. No problems so we began to motor around the other anchored boats and about 6 or so boats underway also waiting for the bridge. One of the other boats we had met at Customs and Immigration the day before was leaving to cross the Atlantic to Europe. A boat similar to Holiday with two people on board. The wind was gusty and up to the high teens making close quarter maneuvering a little touchy while I got used to the feel of the throttle and response of the new diesel engine that I had only ever driven in a straight line for about 15 minutes during the sea trial before now.

 
Within the first 5 minutes a loud beeping alarm that we had never heard before started. It had to be the new engine, and something was wrong. My first thought was water in the fuel. I had a sinking feeling like you wouldn’t believe. Should I immediately shut the engine down and drop anchor to inspect? Miss the bridge? We’re already checked out of the country. How will we handle that? The mental, physical, and provisioning preparation for the passage all down the drain? These and a million other thoughts went quickly through my head.

We frantically searched for where the alarm was coming from. It didn’t seem to be coming from the engine panel but from the engine compartment. Was it the computer controlling the common rail diesel injection? We called and texted urgent messages to our mechanic/installer, but it was Sunday.

I made the decision to stay underway and just make the bridge. If we had to we could anchor outside, deal with the problem, and then leave without a bridge schedule.

 
This was not the way we wanted the passage to start. We were pretty frightened (quite possibly terrified) to begin with, and now we were back to worrying about the engine. I couldn’t believe it.

After about 5 more minutes that seemed like an eternity, I had the palm slaps forehead moment. The alarm was coming from our chart plotter. It was the new collision alarm from Navionics going off because all the boats around. What makes this so dumb is that I had even had a conversation with another friend about his same alarm going off when it just came out and him frantically trying to figure out what it was. But, I’ll take all the feeling dumb in the world when it is paired with my relief that nothing is wrong with that new diesel (that I’m in love with). We laughed at ourselves and felt huge relief.

At 9 am we motored under the bridge, and Holiday hit open water for the first time in three months. Right away Lindy took the helm while I went forward to the mast to raise the mainsail. At anchor I had already set the main up for one reef (which makes the sail smaller and less powerful) to make sure the beginning of the passage was comfortable.

 
As I raised the main, Lindy also dropped the center board which gives us a 7’9″ draft and turns Holiday into a sailing into the wind machine. And, that’s what we would be doing. Close hauled sailing into the wind and waves for 3 days.

With the main up, I returned to the cockpit as Holiday began to heel. Next we rolled out the head sail also reefed in a little. The winds were in the mid teens and at about 60-70 degrees off the nose for our course. The seas were choppy and a few feet but coming from the side enough that we weren’t launching over them and bashing the bow into the next one. In other words, smooth sailing.

With the sails set, I took the helm, killed the diesel, and flipped on the auto pilot to hold our course. Then I wedged myself in to ride with the lurching and heeling of a sailboat being pushed in every direction by the gusting wind above and the heaving seas below. Lindy headed to her usual spot on whichever cockpit seat side is getting the best shade and wedged herself in too.

I could see that our buddy boat, Second Spray an Island Packet 40, was settled with her sails up so I hailed them on the radio. Due to Corona virus restrictions, we had never met them in person and only communicated electronically before now. They seemed very nice on the radio, and it was a great comfort to know there was someone else out here with us.

  
We were headed between St Eustachius and Saba which we could see in the distance. Saba, especially, is a stunning looking island. It’s a huge rock of a mountain rising sheer up out of the sea, intimidating cliff lined coast all the way around, and sparsely populated.

This first stretch was about 30 miles and would take 5 to 6 hours. We were flying along at around 6 knots, and it was over all a comfortable point of sail even though open ocean sailing to windward is always a bit sporty even in the best conditions. I had definitely prepared myself mentally for much worse conditions. We were pulling away from Second Spray a little so I rolled in a tad more of the head sail which sat us up a tad more and slowed us down a tad, but we were still flying along in comfort.

To put this in perspective, I am saying that sitting wedged in is relatively comfortable without many pounding jolts or extreme leans back and forth. If all we had to do was sit, you would call this first 5 to 6 hours a dream sail, and I would call it that. The sun was bright, the sea was blue, and we were in the Caribbean Sea. St Maarten behind us, St Barths to port and Statia (St Eustachius) and Saba ahead. But we weren’t just out for a leisure day sail, and moving around the boat is still an athletic event. Trimming the sails, grabbing this or that out of a cabinet or off a shelf, getting food, going to the bathroom, etc, are all difficult in these near perfect conditions. Plus, night is always coming. And, conditions can change over the span of 3 days and 369 nautical miles.

From 9 AM to 2 PM on that first day, we didn’t have to adjust a line, a sail, or the course. We just sat back and enjoyed finally being out sailing again.

Around 2 we were about 3 miles off Statia and made our turn toward Grenada, 340 miles away. We found that we could point more east toward the wind and still sail along the coast of Statia as well. Why? Any miles made east are good. The wind was coming from the east, and you can’t sail directly into the wind. With a slight change to south east wind forecast, the further east we could get, the less motor sailing we would have to do later as we turned more south toward Grenada. Plus, it’s comforting to sail near a coast instead of heading away from land to the open ocean. And, we had about 35 miles of possible coast line ahead of us with St Kitts and then Nevis in a line past Statia.

The next 2 hours sailing along Statia’s southern coast weren’t great because the waves were different on this side of the island. Instead of consistent non steep waves from the side, we were taking steeper waves from non consistent directions closer to our bow. This means our bow would climb a wave, jump off the top, and then bash down into the next approaching wave. They weren’t dead on the nose, which is the worst, but it was definitely less comfy. Also, the non consistency in the direction would sometimes put us into what we call “the washing machine” motion.

In between Statia and St Kitts, the wind suddenly died. It was so sudden that before I could make all the needed adjustments the auto pilot spun us in a circle. I’m sure Second Spray, who was a little behind us, was thinking “What in the world are they doing?”

 
Islands and the spaces between them affect, change, and bend the wind. It was time to head offshore and find consistent wind and hopefully better seas.

At around 4PM, we turned on the motor and headed away from Statia and St Kitts in dead air.

About an hour away from the islands we found the wind again, turned off the engine, and started sailing. At first the wind was 12-15 knots with nice conditions similar to the beginning of our sail. Over the next couple of hours as we got further offshore, the winds were building to the high teens gusting 20 with associated building seas. We were flying, and the boat was well heeled over. Not terribly uncomfortable but not great either. Something else was happening over those next couple of hours: the sun was setting.

Double reefing the main hadn’t even crossed my mind earlier as the winds were forecast to stay the same or diminish. Now though, I realized I had missed any chance to do it. On Holiday, our reefing control lines are forward at the mast. The motion and heeling were enough that it would have been dangerous to attempt with the setting sun. We could turn into the wind and waves to do it, but even that didn’t seem prudent at the time.

So, our main control of the power of the sails through the night would be rolling the head sail in and out, which is done in the safety of the cockpit. For the first time, we realized that our safest most versatile sail configuration would have been a double reefed main with the ability to put our powerful head sail all the way out if the winds got light or trim it way in if conditions worsened.

As it got completely dark, making lots of miles suddenly seemed unimportant. Comfort and safety for the 9 hours when the glow in the west disappears to when the glow in the east begins to appear were the only things on our minds.

The beginning of night time is the worst part of any passage. It is the time when it seems like it will be dark forever. It is when we question why in the world we would do something so dangerous as this. Have we lost our minds to put ourselves in this kind of perilous position? If we ever make it to land, we tell ourselves, we will never do this again. Gloom, despair, guilt, fright, maybe even terror. Maybe I’m being a little dramatic here. But, maybe not. I can tell you that when I see the look of worry on Lindy’s face and hear it in her voice, there aren’t many things in life that have ever made me feel that bad.

Through that first night, the wind never relented. We hadn’t done any resting during the day like we should have, and I didn’t want Lindy to have to control the mostly out of control Holiday as we heeled heavily and lurched from one wave to the next. We rolled the head sail in until there was just a small scrap out and made the best of it.

 
Lindy tried to sleep some in the cockpit so I could get some rest if exhaustion became too much. It would have been more comfortable on the downhill settee down below, but neither of us wanted to be away from the other’s side.

The stars were beautiful though, and not long after darkness a nearly full moon rose. I can’t tell you how much of a difference that makes on the open ocean. With no moon, even when your eyes adjust, you can’t see much. Once a big moon is up, you can see and prepare for approaching waves and just in general see everything around as in the day.

Second Spray has radar and could watch for squalls to avoid and also any vessels not showing on the AIS. We chatted on the radio about the bad conditions and how he was glad he put a second reef in his main. Ahhhrggg!

Eventually, I needed to take a break. Lindy had managed maybe 30 minutes of sleep, and she took over. I think she saw the worst of the winds as it was above 20 gusting to 25 during her watch. It seems to always happen that way.

We didn’t really do any sail adjusting through the night. Just bore off the wind some to try and depower the boat. When the winds died for brief periods, we kept the same sail configuration and just sailed slower, thankful for the brief comfort. We passed by Montserrat unvisible in the distance. I managed maybe 30 minutes of interrupted sleep before giving up and taking back over some time in the middle of the night. We had only done light snacking since we left with no appetites.

Around 4:30 AM, I was glad to see the faintest glow in the eastern sky. We were out of sight of any land, about 50 miles offshore of Guadeloupe. It was awesome that we had sailed without the motor for all of the first 19 hours with the exception of getting away from the dead air between Statia and St Kitts. We had had some rough conditions, but the boat and crew had made it through the first night in one piece.

In the same way that the sun going away brings us as sailors despair, it brings joy and hope when it comes back up again. It was a beautiful morning on Holiday. We even saw some small dolphins. We called them mini dolphins. I’ve been meaning to look up what species they were.

As the sun rose, the wind began to die, and the sea flattened out. For the first time on our passage, we would need the motor to make our forward progress for a long way. We fired up the brand new diesel engine and continued on. There were only 2 hours on the new hour meter. It is so much quieter than the old diesel which is very nice.

The only problem is we were still in our break in period and needed to run the engine at a specific RPM. We already knew that we were a little under propped. Add to that that Holiday was overloaded with supplies for our coming quarantine in Grenada, and we were moving very slowly. Since the engine was brand new, we had no idea ahead of time what our speed would be like out in ocean conditions. At 4 knots, it would take us most of 4 days to get to Grenada instead of 3 if we ended up needing to motor most of the way with no wind in the sails. Not likely, but a possibility. At the time, I was also under the misunderstanding that I needed to keep that same RPM for the first 50 hours.

We talked to Second Spray on the radio and decided they should continue on at a normal speed. Holiday is a faster sailing boat, and we could possibly catch up later if the winds became favorable again. At sailboat speeds, it would also be most of that day until they were out of sight and radio range.

We continued motor sailing in the wind shadow that the large island of Guadeloupe creates. At times we were going 4 knots with no wind, at times high 4s to 5 with a little help from the wind motor sailing, and even a few times sailing with the motor off at 5 to 6 plus knots. But, the sea conditions were equally benign, and we were glad to have some comfort after a pretty terrible night. Again, we still weren’t forcing ourselves to take turns resting during the day.

 
Lindy did “remind” me (the quotes indicate it may have been something stronger than a reminder) to go forward to the mast and put a second reef in the main during one particularly calm time. I disagreed with the decision. It seems counter-intuitive to reef so heavily when there is no wind. It’s probably why most would make the mistake of not doing it. But most don’t have Lindy around to help make smart decisions as you will see later.

For much of the day we could see Guadeloupe in the distance. Guadeloupe was one of the islands we had really been excited to visit but were unable due to Corona virus shutting down all the borders. As we watched it go by, we thought about next season when we would be able to sail back and cruise there.

Also, around the middle of the day, Lindy told me to reread the engine manual and make sure I had the engine break in instructions right. She thought it was different. I bet you can guess who knew what they were talking about. Turns out it was only the first 10 hours at the slow RPMs. From 10-50 hours, it’s a much higher RPM with some periods of wide open throttle! That afternoon, we were back to normal speeds even without the wind.

Speaking of the wind, we were soon approaching the gap between Guadeloupe and Dominica. We had read that close to the islands the winds and waves really funnel through the gap and increase dramatically. Sailors close to the islands have to be prepared because it happens instantly. We weren’t sure if it would apply 40 miles offshore but were hoping for some wind so we could turn the engine off.

Well, it turns out that it’s not much different way offshore. We wanted wind, and we got it. A lot of it. It went from mostly around 0-5 knots to 15 plus. Suddenly, we were galloping across the tops of decent sized waves with the motor off. We were heeled over pretty far, and the waves were enough on the nose to make it a little bouncy. It didn’t seem as bad as the previous day off Statia, but it may be because I was just getting used to it.

By early afternoon, we were behind Dominica. The waves settled down, but we were still mostly sailing in good winds with some motor sailing during lulls. Guadeloupe was the last island we could see as the islands of Dominica and Martinique curve away from our track, and we were about 50 miles offshore.

Between Dominica and Martinique the funneling happened again, and this time it was even more pronounced with higher winds and seas. We were now about 34 hours into our passage.

And, can you guess what time of day it’s getting to? That’s right! Sunset. I was so thankful Lindy “encouraged” me to put in that second reef. There would have not been an easy, safe way to do it at this point. Once it happens, it’s too late. Problem is that you don’t know when it’s going to happen. Before, I had thought that I would just do it right before sunset, and that had worked in our past overnighters.

We also decided to have our first hot meal of the passage. Neither of us was really hungry, but I just wanted something that felt fun. Lindy popped in the oven a couple of giant chicken burritos stuffed with the works that she had premade. Chipotle? Moe’s? Ha! I say “Welcome to Lindy’s!!!” These giant tortillas stuffed with goodness were amazing. I didn’t think I was hungry, but I found myself scarfing mine down to Chinatown.

Since we were both pretty tired, we decided Lindy would take a turn at the helm, and I would try to sleep while there was still a little bit of light left. I didn’t have much success, and somewhere between 8 and 9 PM Lindy got me up to tell me she was starting to nod off at the wheel. Uh oh. I immediately recognized this as the beginning of many stories I have read about disasters at sea. We knew better than to not be forcing ourselves to lay down with our eyes closed on a regular schedule since the start of the trip. We just hadn’t done it. No excuses.

So, here is the situation. Lindy definitely is past being able to be on watch. I haven’t slept much for about 36 hours, and the same will very likely happen to me in an uncertain amount of time. It is now imperative that Lindy gets some real sleep, and putting pressure on yourself to sleep isn’t always the easiest way to make it happen. Also, the gap between Dominica and Martinique with the higher winds and rougher seas will make sleep more difficult and require more effort and concentration.

It isn’t nodding off at the wheel and running into something or steering the wrong way that is the main danger with our current situation. If we were both to fall asleep, the auto pilot would keep the boat going where we want, and the chances of a collision are extremely low. Obviously, you stand watch to ensure it doesn’t happen though.

The real danger with the situation is that exhausted sailors make poor decisions. Most disasters at sea aren’t from one catastrophic event or failure. They can usually be traced to a string of smaller poor decisions, one leading to the next in a chain reaction. There are so many little things and variables that can go wrong with different boat systems or forces of nature. We had put ourselves in the position where any little thing might start the chain reaction that leads to disaster. Make no mistake, sailing offshore in a small boat like we do is life or death at all times. To not look at it with that respect invites the worst.

With that, Lindy laid down on the settee down below in the cabin, and I began to sail. On the positive side, the sailing was amazing. I had more options with powering and depowering the boat with the head sail and double reefed main. The winds were 15-18 about 50 degrees off the nose, and the seas were 3-4 feet but consistent. I spent a while getting just the right amount of sail out for comfort, safety, and speed then wedged myself on the high side of the helm seat, feet toward the low side. The big moon rose, a little later this night than the first, and I had the most magical time there with the boat, the wind, the seas, and my thoughts.

It should be noted that most boats would have full sails up in these conditions, especially if out for a day sail or in protected waters. Maybe a single reef in one sail. But, we had a double reefed main and the jib rolled down to less than 100%. Why? Tartan 37s are fast boats. They are a little light for their size and also tender (respond to every gust with movement and heeling). Holiday’s crew are also tender (respond to every gust with horror and cursing). We go for comfort and safety, always. Also, as a fast boat, if we are making over 5.5 knots with a sail configuration, we figure that’s fast enough. No need to try to go 7 plus knots at the expense of comfort and safety.

Luckily, nothing happened that required the attention and efforts of the exhausted captain other than watching the boat sail itself through the night waters with a grin on his face. By midnight, Lindy had woken back up and felt rested. I was near nodding off so we prepared to switch. I helped roll in the head sail an extra few turns to make things a little less intense but even then knew that Lindy was about to go through a challenging watch. We had made it behind the island of Martinique, but this far offshore we didn’t find any wind shadow. The winds were in the upper teens.

What I call magical sailing, Lindy might refer to as torture outlawed by the Geneva Convention. And, that’s during the day, in sight of land, with me at the helm, and her just watching. She was about to have to endure conditions that she doesn’t like while making all helm decisions: course changes, sail trim changes, rolling the head sail in or out (which is hard work for two people, much less one), start or stop the engine, monitor changes in wind/waves, watch for boats, watch for squalls, watch for pirates (just joking), manage fears of the unknown by herself while doing all these things in a tiny boat 50 miles away from land at midnight.

 
Normally, I would be at her disposal for most any little thing during her night watch, but it was now imperative that I rest and only get woken in an emergency. I laid down on the cockpit seat, my head facing the helm, and was immediately out cold.

I have small vague memories of awakeness over the next hours. My eyes would open, and I would see Lindy at the helm sailing. Really sailing. A true captain. With the boat lurching and heeling, she was confidently making adjustments to lines and to the course. She was rolling out sail if the wind lightened and pulling it back in when it went back up. Anything that needed done, she did while I dozed in and out of sleep. She never once asked for help or advice.

At some point in the night I slept hard. I awoke from the hard sleep at around 4 AM. I was sleeping so hard that I was even confused as to where I was momentarily when I got up. After I got my wits about me, I realized Lindy had let me sleep an extra hour, allowing me to wake up on my own instead of waking me up at 3. She later confessed she had gotten a little sleepy but was doing bizarre dance moves at the helm to keep herself awake.

Lindy laid down on the cockpit seat and was asleep right away as I began to sail. The sky began to glow within the hour, and I knew we had made it through our second night. The next few hours I watched a beautiful sunrise. Remembering my visions of Lindy at the helm in the dark that night and seeing her asleep from exhaustion now, I was overcome with emotions. We were now between Martinique and Saint Lucia.

By about the 48 hour mark since the beginning of the passage, we were behind St Lucia motor sailing in winds too close to the nose to make good progress toward Grenada, but in general comfort, and a little more rested. I think morale was lowest during that second 24 hours. We had just come off the worst conditions of the trip which came during the first night. There was still so far to go. We were dreading another night which ended up being really tough and exhausting. Basically, we would have rather been anywhere other than where we were doing what we were doing. Now, going into the final 24 hour or so period I was getting my second wind. It was easier to think positive as the island chain now curved back toward us to meet us in Grenada, and we knew we only had one more night to endure.

During the third day there was a lot more of the motor sailing with the wind too close to the nose. At times, I would decide that it would probably be that way the rest of the 24 hours to Grenada. We had plenty of fuel so it wouldn’t be a problem. It was also mostly a good motor sailing angle of over 30 degrees that really made for fast speed with the sails and motor combined, but it sure would be nice to do some pure sailing with the motor off. Sure enough, any time I had almost given up completely, the wind would shift, and we would get another few hours of good sailing. Lindy would probably give you a different take since to her motor sailing is ideal with usually lower seas and less heeling.

We also committed to a more regimented watch schedule during the day so we would be better rested for our night watches. At one watch change midday in between St Lucia and St Vincent, I was just about to give the helm to Lindy and go rest when I decided to have her wait a minute. It was during a period when I had been sailing with the motor off, and I had been monitoring building squally looking clouds in the distance. To this point we had only been in clear sky weather. The clouds I had been watching had blossomed into a big anvil shaped cumulus cloud with a flat bottom growing darker and darker. We seemed to be on an intersect course with it.

As we sailed along trying to decide if we should adjust course to miss it or if it would move fast enough to go in front of us, I went ahead and had Lindy heavily roll in the head sail and still with the double reef in the main. The boat can take extremely high winds in this configuration so I wasn’t too worried, but a storm offshore is unpredictable and scary. Soon it became evident that we would be going through the large squall. The winds were building quickly, and we couldn’t see through the wall of water ahead of us. I had Lindy take the mainsheet off the cleat and have it in her hand so she could “spill” it if the winds got too high. I “pinched in” to less than 45 degrees to the wind to slow the boat to a crawl as we met the squall, and the winds rose past 20, 25, 30, and then to 35 knots with rain taking visibility to nothing.

My plan A was if the wind got us out of control or seemed like it might knock us on our side that I would turn through the wind and “heave to”. If that didn’t work due to having out too little sail and already sailing too slowly to make it through the wind, plan B would be to fall off and sail with the wind (away from Grenada) until we could get away from the squall or it died.

Luckily, 35 knots was the peak of the wind, and I was able to just stay pinched in, sailing slowly until the squall passed over us. We have very little experience with heavy weather sailing. We are so picky with our sailing weather windows that this was our first time underway in a squall over 30 knots in 4 years of cruising. I have no idea if my plans A and B above are the best practices. It’s just what I came up with at the moment based on my limited knowledge of sailing and some books I’ve read.

With a good fresh water bath for Holiday and crew, I went below for rest while Lindy took the helm. The afternoon brought more of the mix of sailing and motor sailing as we passed Saint Vincent. We spent some time in the cockpit together in between watch changes and saw some more of those mini dolphins. We also saw our first other boats since Second Spray had disappeared from sight on day two. One was a sailboat not too far off that we slowly passed. It seemed to be heading to Grenada as well. We also saw our first commercial boat since some we had seen off Statia. The AIS showed it was a huge 1000 foot long freighter on it’s way to Malaysia. By sunset, we were offshore of the Grenadines and only had 12 or so more hours to go! We still hadn’t been able to see any land since Guadeloupe went out of sight in the first half of the second day.

I took the first night watch from 8 PM to 11 PM while Lindy slept down below on the settee. It was still cloudy, and I was nervous about running into a squall in the dark. On this third night, my watch would be nearly over before the moon rose and increased my visibility. One dark line of clouds ahead had my eyes glued for about an hour, and I even took in most of the head sail just in case. But, it turned out to be benign with no change in wind and only a misting of rain. I watched my third awesome moon rise then swapped with Lindy and went below to sleep on the settee.

We had sailing wind through the night, and Lindy was able to sail without the motor for her entire watch from 11 PM to 2 AM. Unlike the previous night, though, this was nice easy sailing in lighter winds. The waters behind the Grenadines were also relatively smooth from other areas.

When I awoke for my final night watch, we were within 30 miles of our destination of St George’s in the south of Grenada. I saw my first signs of land as I picked out the lights of Carriacou. We were still sailing as the sun began to rise. What an awesome sight to see the island of Grenada emerging with the growing light! By 6 AM we were motor sailing along the coast of Grenada in light winds and flat seas.

At around 7:30 AM we hailed Port Louis Marina on the radio and pulled up to the dock at St George’s just before 8 AM, 71 hours since we passed under the bridge at St Maarten. Just in front of us on the dock was Second Spray who had also arrived safely. We saw them in person for the first time and congratulated each other on our successful passages. Next the Grenadians directed us to our health screening, took our temperature, and gave us a temporary entry permit. There was a long line of cruisers who had just finished their 14 day quarantine also there waiting to take their Corona virus test.

After that, we headed back out on Holiday and dropped anchor in the quarantine anchorage where we will have to stay on the boat isolated for 14 days and then take a Corona virus test before being allowed to move freely around the country. There are about 100 other boats in the quarantine anchorage. Each week about 50 will leave to take their Corona virus test and another 50 will be allowed to enter for isolation.

That’s where we sit now. Still recovering from our long passage and extremely thankful to be in Grenada for hurricane season.