Friendship Bay, Preparing Lobster

We were enjoying Admiralty Bay but needed a change so we are now in Friendship Bay, Bequia. The forecast calls for large north swells, building to 7'+ and Admiralty looked to be seeing the early effects. There is a little swell here also, a bridle seems to have taken care of it.  As we arrived we were greeted by two local fishermen who had just come in from diving on the reef, lobsters, $15 EC a pound, that works out to about $7.50 CDN for the freshest lobster you can get. We bought one that was just shy of 4 lbs. The fishermen even asked us to weigh it before we settled on the amount owing, nice. Now that we have learned how to prepare these critters we are starting to grow fond of them, if they are overcooked they tend to be dry and tough. We learned to "par boil" them, that means depending on the size 8-10 minutes in boiling water then rinse in cold water, let stand for a few minutes, the legs will be cooked through as will the body meat. The tail will be about 3/4 of the way cooked. You can split the lobster to clean it, then prepare as you like, lots of options and you have total control over the "finishing".

Markets

So here I am thinking the blog needs to be in chronological order, right. I'm abandoning that OK? Here are some shots of the markets in Trini. The food sensations in the islands has been a highlight for us, real fusion, African, Indian, European with the influx of Caribbean fruits and vegetables and spices, add seafood, chicken and goat for the meat lovers.

Nice Day for Fishing

Yesterday was a nice day, conditions we have not seen in awhile, 10 kts of wind and 2' seas. We fish on our way from Petite Martinique to Bequia, caught a couple of  Blackfin Tuna, kept one for Sashimi.

Blogger for Android

Well blogging has not been easy, still cannot get Blogger to work on my Android phone. The problem seems to be that I cannot log into my account, when I switch Google accounts in Blogger to the account our blog is associated with and try to log in I get the error message "authentication failed, please try again". I have uninstalled Blogger, reinstalled the account etc, still no go. I can log into the email associated with the blogg, do all the other google stuff just cannot log in using Blogger. Anyway this am I spent a few hours on it, again not much luck but I was successful at getting my phone to tether with the laptop, now this is a very slow connection, not sure how it will deal with images but we will give it a try.

Christmas in Grenada

We spent about 11 days at Port St. Luis Marina with John & Paulette on Seamantha, we really had a great time. We toured Grenada inland, spices, cocoa, rain forest, Forts, with John & Paulette and Rita & Ralph on s/v Calypso. We had a wonderful Christmas lunch aboard Seamantha along with Ian, Wendy, and Ian's mom Sheila, Rita & Ralph and of course Paulette & John. Thanks for hosting!

Merry Christmas All!

Trinidad to Carriacou

We departed Crews Inn Marina, Chaguaramas after clearing outbound and collecting our duty free at 9:45 am, December 8th, 2015. Stopped to take on 1,000L diesel at Power Boats then out to sea we go. Once offshore the winds are 090@16-18kts, seas 4-6'. We are running at 1600 RPM, 2.1 GPH and making about 6.5kts. There is a current through here so we have a bit of a "head wind" component. We see several of the Venezuelan fishing boats, no pirogues though and we are happy about that. We run into numerous squalls in the afternoon, nothing serious just a good wash and some 20-30kt gusts. By 19:30 local time the wind and seas have kicked up pretty good, the current has also changed, this time in our favour, good thing otherwise it would be wind against current. With the wind now 100@22-25 kts and the seas? Can't see much, a very dark night but we are getting rolled around, the stabilizers cannot keep up and once in awhile we get caught by a good wave (7-8 feet?) at times it feels we are sliding sideways but I think it is just rolling a lot, no one gets any sleep in these conditions, luckily it is only another 2-3 hours before we are in the lee of Grenada. The rest of the trip was easier, a few lumps between Grenada and Carriacou, we stayed west of "Kick 'em Jenny" the active subsea volcano to avoid the worst of the currents. By 7:10 on the 9th we are anchored in Tyrell Bay Carriacou, right off the beach in front of DJ's Bar. Catch a short nap before we go into Customs & Immigration.

Ready to Cruise! Trinidad to Carriacou Here We Come.

Well it looks like tomorrow is the day, all the *** "Must Do" things on the list are done, the new BBQ bracket is installed and tested (yeah! we should now be able to, grill, blacken, despite 20kt trade winds!) and the weather report is 090-100 at 15-20kts, seas 4-5' with a 8-9 second interval. We have learned that means 15-25+kts  and higher seas, maybe 5-7' but the good news, beam seas with a long interval, the TRAC stabilizers will get a work out!  We have filed a float plan with John & Paulette on Seamantha, nice to know you have someone watching for your safe arrival. Our routing is east of the Poinsettia Gas Well, then NE to Grenada, north up the West Coast then on to Cirriacou.

Making posting easier

I really like how easy it is from my Android phone to view, post, comment on Facebook, but I cannot control Facebook, it takes over. Maybe I just don't know how to use it very well. I got frustrated with the Google Blogger App, horrible, again maybe I just don't know how to use it but Google has not built in any help menus at all. Tried setting up a Sylken Sea Facebook page with the intent of importing the blog. Nightmare, again, maybe just me.

So............I'm back to blogging from the laptop not my phone, bummer because we see so many cool things when we are out and about, would be nice to "click" - share- via - blog like we do with FB!

Anyone figured this out? If so please share the wealth!

OOP's

What do you do when you are replacing the duckbill valves in a poop pump, cleaning up the calcium deposits in a bucket of soapy water. BEFORE YOU DUMP THE WATER OVERBOARD CHECK TO MAKE SURE YOU HAVE REMOVED ALL THE PUMP PARTS! Otherwise you will be hiring a diver to go get them back.

Cheers all!

BTW, it is only a mistake if you don't learn from it.

Getting Ready to Cruise

Well Sylken Sea has been launched in Trinidad and is now berthed at CrewsInn Marina. We have been busy getting her ready for a season of cruising the Windward Islands, Grenada to Martinique. Gelcoat work, changed some hoses, watermaker rebuild and upgrade, Genny repairs and general maintenance. Peake Yacht Services completed some hull gelcoat repairs (Had an Ooop's last year before we left the states) and we had Lincoln and Ian from Chaguramas Metal make up a BBQ bracket and a bracket to modify our SPURS. Originally the SPURS holding block was only screwed to the fiberglass strut tube. First time we got something "heavy" in the spurs it tore off. now we have a serious bracket installed to hold the block. A few more days here and we should be ready to head north, we think Carriacou for a few weeks before visiting Grenada to spend Christmas and New Years with John & Paulette on Seamantha.