Elliottt!

March 22^nd

Our brand new grandson Elliott Wells Roberts. Mommy, Daddy & baby are all doing well!

BVI

March 17-29, 2015

On to the BVI

With guests Ken and Carol we hop across Francis Drake Passage to Soper's Hole, West End BVI. Here we clear customs then head out to Little Jost Van Dyke. Beautiful anchorage off of Green Cay until in the middle of the night the tide

came in and brought large swells in through the cut. ROLLY! We had not planned on that! After a nearly sleepless night we pick up and head to North Sound, Virgin Gorda. What a relief to be out of that.

From North sound we enjoy an island tour with Joseph (Joe) George. The Baths, “caves”, old copper mine historical site (very interesting for me), Spanish Town, “Hog Heaven” (must do, great ribs, BBQ pork and what a view!).

USVI

March 6-16, 2015

Our US Cruising License made our arrival in the US Virgin Islands a simple phone call to customs. Easy. Ken & Carol had already cleared in in Puerto Rico so no one needed to appear at immigration. Great!

We picked up a mooring at Caneel Bay. Endless ferry wake and being rocked constantly prompted us to move on to Francis Bay the next day, just around the corner. It's a busy spot but very nice with a small but good beach, some hiking, and best of all, no ferry wake!

Hiking, USVI

Guest Ken & Ken walked from Francis Bay to Coral Harbor via the Francis Trail then down the road to the Lienster Bay trail. At Waterlemon Bay we pick up the John Horn Trail. Yes, a steep section but really with good shoes not too difficult. Take your time, stop catch your breath and carry on.

The sign kinda says it all.

Waterlemon Bay, the best anchorage (mooring) we have found so far in St. John, USVI.  Wow, mega wow. It reminds us of Georgian Bay. It's  intimate and it's sheltered. We swim to the beach and there's good snorkeling. Great hiking trails too! We have lunch at Skinny Legs in Coral Harbor then walk to the grocery store about a mile or so away. A good hike for sure.  Loving St. John. Loving this spot, loving life!

Even better IMO than Waterlemon is Lameshure Bay. Good snorkeling right off the boat. You can hike the entire Island from here on well marked trails that vary from old roads (200+ years) to walking paths. We highly recommend a few days here.

Enjoyed St. John USVI. Cruz Bay with it's nice shops and restaurants, good moorings in beautiful bays, snorkeling, hiking, a day at the beach. Then Coral Bay, Skinny Legs, cool little bars and restaurants.

K Smooooth, Carol & us at "Skinny Legs" Coral Bay, St. John

How do you eat these things?

Bumpy Ride

March 6, 2015

Bumpy Ride!

The wind has been relentless for weeks 20-25kts 6-8' seas for the last few weeks. A short “break' appears to be on the horizon. We decide to make the short crossing to the USVI. As soon as we were out of the lee we encountered very rough seas combined with current to give us the infamous “washing machine” effect. 5-7' with sets of larger waves on a 5 second interval made for an uncomfortable ride. The boat was impressive once again, we just slowed it down to about 4kts and let her ride up and down, took quite a bit of spray but no pounding, no green water on deck although a few times I was sure we were going to “bury the anchors”. Nope, so much buoyancy forward along with that nice high bow does it once again. Sorry Ken & Carol, we did not do that on purpose, honest!

East Coast Puerto Rico and the Spanish Virgins.

Feb 14-March 6, 20015

We had a great time in Puerto Rico, after the south west coast we moved on to Palmas del Mar. Met up with Seamantha and Ann Louise. Had the first ever "PR Krogen Breaksast. Enjoyed meeting Gordon on "Sea Horse" a 55' Cat that he and his wife sailed over from South Africa, 55 days at sea. We meet all kinds of fun adventuresome people. Capitan's Chris and Dave (who we meet again in Virgin Gorda), Juan the marina manager who was wonderful. He really made us all feel very welcome, hosted a dock party for us and set up our "breakfast" table and chairs. It would have been easy to stay here.

We took a side trip to Vieques in the Spanish Virgins travelled over with  Ann Louise. Bill hooks a huge fish (tuna?) fights it for an hour and a half, then it is gone. Luckily on our boat we hooked a much more manageable mahi so at least there was some fresh fish. Bill and Ann travel on to Culebra we stayed on in Vieques for a few days, loved it, Esperanza, Isabel Segunda, fun little cafe's & bars, secluded anchorages, fresh caught mutton snapper.

Back to Palmas del Mar to pick up our custom flange then on to Culebra where we hope to catch up with John & Paullette "Seamantha" and Ann Louise.  We arrive in Culebra, no fish on this short crossing and anchor behind Ann Louise at Dakity Reef. Culebra is very cruiser friendly, enjoyed the hospitality, dinning at the Dingy Dock, Zacos Tacos and beach food at Flamenco Beach. Our guests Ken & Carol arrive, we enjoy the island, rent a Jeep, move to a beautiful anchorage in Bahia de Almodovar before heading to the USVI.

The WirieAP WiFi Blues

Very challenging to get WiFi, hence the lack of updates here. We installed a WirieAP last November but have yet to get the thing to work reliably. Wirie Tech Support has been very responsive but so far the results have been disappointing. We can locate and find WiFi hot spots, the Wirie connects, all looks good but there is virtually no data transmission. Most of the time we cannot even load Google's home page. We either have a set up issue (everything seems to be correct according to Wirie) a hardware issue or these things just don't perform as advertised. Has anybody else used these with success? We are told our 4 month old unit has been replaced with an “improved” model and we could replace ours for something like $500. (the new hardware cannot be added to our model). I don't think so. We can still get txt and email on our cell phones so the internet will just have to wait.

Bullhead Marine Steelhead Crane Install, Part 2

OK we through bolt the boat deck flange and have a “flange” fabricated for the cockpit sole/standpipe. The first version had some issues but the fab shop had no problem taking it back for some rework. Now the flange is also through bolted as it should have been from the beginning. looking good working well.

Bullhead Marine Inc. Steelhead Yacht Crane Installation

Yeah, six years later is when you really find out how well your crane was installed. Dennis Speck the self proclaimed "Yacht Crane Specialist" President of  Bullhead Marine installed our Steelhead Crane/Davit in 2009. We had serious issues on the original install, the crane was located so that it was almost impossible to use. After some rather tense discussions Dennis agreed to move the crane but refused to pay for the teak and fiberglass repairs, cost to us an extra $2,200.

Fast forward to 2015. The davit has performed very well, support from Steelhead with some early issues was top notch even through the ownership change (Thanks Brent, Russ!). We use our davit a lot, we tend to anchor out weeks, months at a time, moving about every three to four days. We also use it frequently to launch our water toys, the kayaks. After 6 years it is not surprising that we need to service the crane, Brian at Steelhead was very helpful, new cable, install drawings etc. After leaving the US for the Caribbean we thought all was good, then......I noticed that the step flange in the cockpit was rotating and the fasteners were coming loose from the deck. Not good. Brian at Steelhead sends us detailed drawings and we discover that the step flange was not installed according to Steelheads's manual. The fasteners should be through bolted, ours are not. The only way to access the fasteners is to lift the standpipe, should be straight forward right? Well it might have been had Bullhead followed the install instructions and used TefGel as directed. No TefGel was used, and everything is corroded and seized including the step flange and the set screw. So now there is no way to uninstall the crane without damaging the teak deck in the cockpit. What to do?? We decide it will be easier to have an external flange fabricated locally to fit over the standpipe and through bolt it to the cockpit sole. (more on this as things develop). Then we decide to look at the mounting on the boat deck, I am concerned. At first glance it looks OK, but then I read the install manual, red flags, it is not through bolted as directed. I decide to at least remove the bolts, there are six holding the mounting flange, again , lots of corrosion, no TefGel. The bolts are glued in only, not threaded in at all, once removed we realized that they were only glued in place with 3M 5200!  Very scary, I am not sure of all the forces involved but our tender weighs in at 900 lbs, the entire davit is only glued to the deck by a relatively small flange! Eventually 5200 will fail, can you imagine the risk to those operating the crane should that happen? See the video below.

See the video here

 

Parguera Anchorage

What a finish to a great day. At anchor. Parguera, PR. Fresh caught Mutton Snapper "Veracruz", Shiraz, moonlit night.  Looking forward to our twelve hour passage tomorrow night. Light trades, night lee, full moon. Should be a beautiful passage.  Fingers crossed,  touch wood.

Boqueron, PR

Nice here.  Low tonight 72 F. Comfortable sleeping.  High tomorrow 85F. Perfect.