Thursday, December 4

Today is the big day we finally leave Chaguaramas for Prickly Bay in Granada. We listened to Chris Parker and the local net before we went to check out with customs and immigration. On the net a woman Inga was looking for a ride to Grenada so we got in contact to meet her. It turned out she was on a boat on the hard less than 75 feet from us. We decided to accept her help crewing on Changes for the crossing to Granada. Because we were picking up a crew person, we all had to go to immigration and customs including her skipper Jim who brought her to Trinidad. After many copies of all the necessary forms were filled out and the return of our flare gun, we were ready to cast off from our slip at Power Boats. We cast off just after 11AM and motored over to Scotland Bay and anchored. This is a lovely spot and the three of us enjoyed a very pleasant afternoon. Around 4PM we got the main sail up, pulled the anchor and headed north. The channel between Monos and Trinidad had a 2+ knot current helping us out going north. The downside is very rough going once we got out into the Atlantic Ocean. We motorsailed north until 5:30 when I unrolled some jib and the motor was turned off. The wind was 19 apparent as the speedo was not working. We were sailing mid 6’s on a close reach. We set up a watch system of three hour on six off with Inga Luce on the 6pm to 9p and three to six in the morning. This was a big help as we all had six hours off to sleep. The night went by and the set of the sails or course didn’t change much. At about 5:15AM and 1.1 mile from the way point, Inga woke me as we were potentially going into shallow water. I took over the helm and steered in to Prickly Bay. We got the main down then went in search of Jim’s mooring as he told Lorraine and Inga we should use it. Inga found it and in short order we were tied to the mooring. It was now after six. We rested as Customs and Immigration do not open until 9. We had scrambled eggs and toast for breakfast then got the dinghy in the water. Around 9 we piled in the dingy and went to see the officials. We had to use a computer to check in but the next island it will be quicker as the system is used by most of the Caribbean Nations. Of course the French have there own computer system. We said good by to Inga and went back to Changes. We called Shade Man aka Patrick, the taxi driver and got on his Friday shopping trip at 1135am.

Phil