Moondancerx's BIG adventure

Landfall in the Dominican Republic Not where we expected to be, but once again making the best of our situation; ie. Strong winds and big seas hampering our progress. Its April 23rd and we are anchored at a beautiful island called Isla Beata, which is the first Point or Cape in the Dominican Republic after the Haitian border. We first pulled into Bahia de las Aguila (bay of eagles) at 11.30am April 20th having spent the night motor/sailing, tacking back and forth trying to reach the shore (a very long night), during which time we used up way too much fuel. We were fortunate to find a free cruising guide on the Dominican Republic on noon-site which was absolutely accurate about the beauty of this bay. The waters are as torquoise and clear as Grand Cayman, but the shore is much more interesting, with what looks like low sandstone rock cliffs with red mineral streaks throughout and what appears to be a small fishing village built into the caves which have been carved out of the underside ...

Good Friday – 10th April – Still in Grand Cayman Since our attempt to leave Grand Cayman 3 days ago the luster has certainly worn off this jewel of an island for us. Its not Grand Cayman’s fault, its just not much fun being here now. We’ve been on a roller coaster of changing emotions. It seems that whenever we think this ordeal is over it isn’t. We got around the corner into North Sound on Wednesday, sailing most of the way but needing to be pushed in the last half mile into a very calm beautiful anchorage and marina in Governors Creek, which is a partly natural and partly man-made creek in what used to be just a mangrove swamp until it has recently been developed into very upscale homes with water front. The marina called Cayman Island Yacht Club was also very upscale until hurricane Ivan messed it up about 4 years ago. So we came in with 2 dinghies tied along either side of us with 2 fifteen hp motors pushing us along at about 3 – 4 knots (Thanks for John of Four Aces and Andrew of ...

Still on Grand Cayman- Tuesday 7th April I guess we were just having too much fun! And there’s always a price for that. Yesterday morning after we enjoyed our lattes, which we can’t have on passages, we started our preparations for the next 10 dayer. Securing everything that isn’t needed topsides under the dinghy which we deflate and turn upside down on the cabin top, then cover and lash it down. Outboards are stowed on the back pushpit and covered. Fuel and water jerry cans are also covered and stowed – tied behind a plank on either side of the stern cabin top. We called into Port Security to ask permission to go over to the dock to fill up our water tanks and check out. We put out our docking lines and fenders and Tony started up the engine – that’s when our bad day started. The engine turned over but wouldn’t stop turning over, so Tony ran down below to disconnect the battery terminals. That didn’t stop it from turning over either – Agh!! Now sparks and smoke and the engine fi...

Last Day in Grand Cayman April 6th Last post before heading for Dominican Republic which may take about 10 days or so. Just wanted to add to our good days in Grand Cayman. We started our day yesterday with the best dive I have been on yet. We dove not too far from the boat in an area where the fish are probably fed by the dive charters when they go out. The fish were all gathering around our dinghy when we were tied up to the dive site mooring ball. They were a bit disappointed when we finally got in the water as we had nothing for them. We dove on coral which has lots of little gulleys and caves and overhangs. When we went under the overhangs we were in beautiful colourful caves with light shining through various openings above and fish swimming around us, plus all sorts of life forms on the coral opening and closing. For awhile we had a few Tarpin swimming with us. These are very big fish – about 4 feet – who again are used to humans providing them with food. It was a beautiful dive ...

Grand Cayman – April 5th Its 0600 Sunday morning, our second Sunday here – where does that time all go? I guess I’ll answer that then, each day since our arrival we have worked on Moondancer, and every time we go ashore we are walking to places that we don’t know the location of until we find them. To fill our propane tank we first walked about 20 minutes to the office where you pay for the propane – 20lb tank $33 Cayman ($40), then walked another 40 minutes to the place where they fill up the tank. Then back again. Well that just about does the day in, walking these distances in the hot sun lugging a propane tank really wears one out. Especially when we got back to the downtown Georgetown area where the 4 – 5 cruiseship loads of people are all milling about, weaving and dodging through those crowds pulling a propane cylinder really works up a beer appetite. We have really liked Georgetown, the anchorage is a bit rolly, and we’ve been woken a few nights at about 0300 with the boat rock...