I think I spoke too soon about the good luck we’ve been having concerning boat repairs. Sometimes just saying how lucky one is, seem to make things bite you in the butt. It’s our pesky generator this time. This piece of equipment re-powers the batteries, which in turn, run all the electrical systems on the boat. Fortunately, most boats have redundant sources of power and ours is no exception. We have two powerful alternators on each primary engine, as well as the faulty generator. The down side to using these optional sources is that the main engines must be started (or at least one of them) to produce power to re-charge the batteries. These much larger motors consume much more fuel and provide considerably less power for the energy consumed. So, although running the mains to re-charge the battery bank is an option, it is not the most efficient way to supply electricity to your power supply.
Before going further into the generator issue, let’s back up and review our experiences at Rodney Bay, St. Lucia. Rodney Bay is a major cruisers stopover spot, complete with major repair facilities, a huge marina with multiple slips for boats to dock, and lots of shopping opportunities for all things boaters need. Upon our approach to the anchorage, Suz mentioned that she was concerned that somehow part of one of her teeth had either broken off or a larger filing had come out as there was a definite missing part in her mouth. Concerns like this do not go lightly in the cruising community as dental assistance on some of the islands must be pretty primitive. We, however, were soon to be in a large city where a dentist should certainly be available. We checked our cruising guide and found a dentist advertised in the town we were to anchor, and planned on heading that way first thing in the morning to check it out.
When we arrived at the address, we found a modern office building, and a neat and clean dental reception area with receptionists who spoke flawless English, even though this was a French-speaking island. They were just opening the office for the day as we arrived and our inquiries about the availability of an examination were greeted with a “no problem” response. They would simply call the dentist and she would come immediately to the office to see Suz. No waiting, no appointment. Once the dentist arrived, Suz was escorted into the examination room where… oh well… I’ll let Suz tell the rest of the story…
A very efficient dental assistant sat me in the chair and explained that I had lost a part of my tooth. By this time, the dentist had arrived. She was a very well spoken St. Lucian who had studied both in Cuba and the US(FL and CA). I was very curious about this as we had high hopes of somehow visiting Cuba while out at sea but looks like that will have to wait. At any rate, she felt she had gotten the best of both worlds. In Cuba, she felt that she had gotten a lot of training as the locals were more than ready to be available for any medical help they could get asap as it is socialized medicine and there are long waits. So, even though she was a novice, they didn’t seem to be bothered by the fact. In the US, she had more technical training. This seemed like a well rounded education to me. She went into more detail than the assistant saying that my filling was large and, of course, old and making sure I understood exactly what my options were going to be. One option was to get a crown and I wish we were going to be there long enough to do that as it is half to one third the cost of the same ordeal in the US. And, I felt she was very capable of doing the crown. But, we were not going to be in St. Lucia long enough. Within fifteen minutes she did a bonding procedure and I was out the door. I was very impressed with the professionalism of the office and the dentist. It was a very pleasant experience.
We had completed a beautiful sail from Rodney Bay to the south coast of Martinique to the port town of Le Marin where we had decided to stay for a night or two to explore the southern coast of this beautiful French island. All of our traveling companion boats had done this passage together and had settled into the congested anchorage at Le Marin on Friday night. Depending on changes in the weather and what we found ashore to delay our northern path, we all decided to stay at least one night to see what the port town had to offer us cruisers. We went ashore to look around, found a very nice internet connection spot conveniently located inside the local pub, and several large marine stores, a couple of very large grocery discount stores, and a few trendy boutiques; something for everyone.
We shopped a bit for groceries to re-provision the pantry and re-stocked the beer closet (always an important responsibility! That night we had cocktail hour at a new friend’s boat, Boadventura. These folks are another Brit couple whom we met at the Grenada Marina and stayed at the same hotel in Grenada awaiting our boats being re-launched upon our arrival in early November. A very nice couple who had recently retired from the wine business after 40 years as a wine merchant in England. When we returned to our boat to make ourselves some supper, we decided to watch the sunset from our elevated back cockpit seat. We decided to run the gen-set to up the battery bank’s charge while we enjoyed our “sundowners” (this is a common boating phrase meaning: “happy hour cocktails”). As we were sitting there, Suz noticed an unusual smell of hot or burning rubber. We walked up to the front of the boat to check on the generator and found it smoking badly from the exhaust ports. Quickly heading for the cabin to shut it down, we arrived at the switch just in time to witness the automatic overheating shut-off switch go into action. Upon opening the Generator hatch for further inspection, we discovered the engine had run itself out of coolant water, blown the radiator cap and split a connecting hose down the side from the excessive heat; not a good sight. Since by now it was nearly dark, we deferred further inspection for morning light and retired to the inside to imagine the worst for the generator engine.
In the morning, our friends Dave and Tim arrived to assist in diagnostics of our mechanical situation. With these two very mechanically adept mariners assisting, we prepared a list of parts which needed to be replaced in an attempt to get it going again. Being Saturday, we weren’t too optimistic about the availabilities of these various hoses and such. But lo and behold, I was able to find all but one of the parts right at the harbor where we were anchored. Returning to the boat, Dave did most of the re-installing (he actually ENJOYS! doing this stuff) as I watched and learned. After the final part was installed we cranked it up and thankfully, she ran, sounded like it, should but was not drawing cooling water from the sea. We further inspected the water pump and such and determined it was fine but somehow the feed line wasn’t pulling water into the engine. After a long exhausting day, we decided she needed professional help and that would have to come further up the chain of islands. I got on the phone and found that Antigua has a several solid repair yards available and, since we had already decided to spend a good deal of time on this our favorite island of the entire Caribbean, we would wait for our arrival there to engage the services of a repair technician.
That night, we entertained Dave and Donna for supper aboard our boat as a thank you for Dave’s sweaty work performance in the forward hatch. We BBQ’d some chicken and ribs and Suz made some good old fashioned potato salad. Everyone enjoyed a fine meal and headed off to bed before too long.
Sunday morning we decided to “yank the anc” and head off to another spot. We moved on up the island to Fort d’France, the capitol city of Martinique. We anchored under the former French fort and enjoyed a couple of days in this large island town, spending one day searching out additional parts for another unsuccessful attempt at fixing the generator problem ourselves. We also spent a night wandering the town seeing their holiday lighting and watching the town come alive as the sun went further into the sea. We were all becoming somewhat restless after a couple of days in this large city and we, being actually “allergic to cities”, made the decision to pull up again and head off to the top of this beautiful island to the town of St. Pierre. This is the city which was destroyed in the volcanic eruption early in the 1900’s. We had visited here on our trip south and it really was an interesting stopover this time, as well.
We only stayed one night at St. Pierre as the weather looked promising for the jump across to Iles d’ Saintes, off of Guadeloupe, the next northerly island. This too was a favorite place last season and we hoped to spend a few days or a week there. We found the small anchorage we so enjoyed last season very untenable due to swells so we had to anchor at a different bay which was just OK. We did enjoy fresh baguettes from the local bakery each morning, remembering how good they are fresh from the oven. After two days, three of the five traveling companion boats (us included) decided to take advantage of a short weather opportunity to continue north toward Antigua. It would take two days of sailing but if the weather forecast was accurate, we would have a descent sail in mid-sized seas (6-9 ft. waves.)
We left early the next morning and headed out under a promising blue sky dawn in light winds. Rounding the point of the island we found, as expected, a more brisk wind and larger seas. The sailing was superb all day and we made terrific time across the passage to Guadeloupe and up the western coastline to a small anchorage half-way up. We all settled in for the night without checking in with customs. Since were not leaving our boats or going ashore, we didn’t have the legal need to clear in/out of customs. During the day, we all received, independently, new weather reports, which showed deteriorating weather for l’Saintes islands. Upon arrival that night, we invited the other two boats over to ours for a Margarita night to celebrate our wisdom in leaving when we did, as the two boats who opted to stay just a “few more days” appeared to be stuck for maybe a week or two.
First light the next morning, we pulled anchors and headed on across the passage between Guadeloupe and Antigua. Again, it was one of the best sailing days we’d had all season and although the seas were taller (9-12ft) they were well spaced so it felt more like a roll than a smash as we passed through them. We averaged over 7kts for the 6 hour leg and arrived happily into Antigua a couple of hours ahead of our ETA. We anchored at English Harbour and cleared customs at once and were snug at anchorage by 4pm, just in time to enjoy another gorgeous Caribbean sunset. Are they ever NOT glorious?!?!
The next day was Sunday, so we couldn’t do any generator repair arranging, but we made all the plans to do so early on Monday. We did, however, attend a weekly celebration at an old British outpost way up on top of the harbor called Shirley Heights. This is a party for tourists and locals alike which features a steel drum band in the afternoon and an electric Reggae band after dark. A big BBQ is offered along with the usual refreshments. The six of us (Dave and Donna, Tim and Linda and us) chose to take the “shortcut route” up a long, very steep path through some rather thick vegetation, rather than spend cash for a taxi. It took us about a half hour to get up there, but we were rewarded with some spectacular sights along the walk. Once there, we all enjoyed the music and food and then decided to return down the same path in the dark! Not the easiest route, nor perhaps the wisest decision we ever made, but no injuries were had.
Early Monday, we moved the boat around the corner of the island to Falmouth Harbor to connect with the mechanics for the needed repairs. We needed to dock the boat at a marina so that the mechanics could easily come aboard and assess the situation. We were lucky to find a space on a dock as the previous week had been the big Super Yacht Regatta where gazillion dollar boats come into Antigua for a “race”. The opulance of these yachts was something to behold. It was interesting to consider the fact that these vessels were simply their owner’s boats or toys. We wondered aloud about their other “toys”, and what their primary residences, let alone their second, third and how many other homes they may have.
The mechanics were efficient and we decided to remove the generator form the forward hold to allow them to do the work in their shop. After a few hours of preparing to remove the engine from the boat, we hoisted it out with our main halyard (the rope which lifts the main sail) and placed it on a cart on the dock. This was done with no fewer than six of us doing various duties to insure safe and secure removal from the tight-fitting hold. The engine is now in their hands and once they diagnose and identify a parts list, I will need to get on-line and source these replacement parts, have them air shipped via FED-X to the island and they will do the repairs. Then, we will need to put everything back where it was in the boat and hope it all works. I will be heading over the repair place in a few minutes to see what they’ve discovered and then hopefully be able to begin the sourcing process.
Since we have intended to stay here through Christmas, hopefully with our other cruising friends catching up with us by then, the timing for the repairs should work out fine, if all goes as expected. We just returned from the repair facility and they have reassembled the generator and have it ready to re-install in the morning. We will then fire it up and if all goes well, we'll be making electricity in no time at all. If not... well, let's just go with "it should be ready to go in the morning!" Keep you fingers crossed!
