Gales

Customs  to clear out of Statia were as laid back as at the weekend and arrived over an hour late. This wasn’t really as issue as were only to sail the short distance to neighbouring Saba. Like Statia, Saba is a tiny Dutch Antilles island with no tourism save a small number of diving pilgrims. Saba’s diving is possibly even more spectacular than Statia’s, with sheer underwater pinnacles plunging towards the abyss and home to huge numbers of animals. They even have an underwater snorkelling trail laid out near Diamond Rock. Also like Statia, the population is tiny and conists of mainly women and retirees as adult men have to emigrate to find work.

Diamond Rock off Saba's wild coast

The passage was uneventful and we reached the port of entry, Fort Baai, just after noon. The pilots had warned of lack of mooring space and poor conditions. The ‘bay’ was extremely exposed to heavy swell so we called the harbourmaster that we would continue round the corner to the Wells Bay anchorage and come back to clear in. Round the corner, conditions were even worse with the wind accelerating to over 40kts round the rock. A lone diving liveaboard was on a mooring and pitching violently. We needed another plan as stopping was untenable. James wanted to visit Sint Maarten for duty free fuel, so we reluctantly turned our head to the wind to fight our way the 25nm across.

The wind had increased and the sea had steepened. I made a simple lunch as Croix des Gardes plunged ahead slowly. Both children started to feel sick and progress was painfully slow into the large sea. Was it really worth all this just for cheaper fuel? We decided ‘no’ and bore away on plan C – to run for the Virgin Islands.

We hadn’t really planned this passage other than it was one of the longest on our trip and we wanted to start under darkness to arrive in good daylight to avoid the coral shoals. Now we were on a broard reach in a heavy sea, neither completely secured nor rested for a long sea passage and still towing the dinghy. The sea was already too high to try to rearrange items on deck and bring the rib alongside so she had to remain behind us, tugging violently at the painter and taking the brunt of many breakers. By mid afternoon, I had received the French forecast that spoke of 3m NE swells and force 6 winds. James went below to sleep and I reduced sail still further as gusty showers increased the wind to force 7 in driving rain. We tried the third reef but the lines jammed and the main was dropped completely before dark. We ran into the night under partially furled yankee only, having now lost the ensign and staff overboard and fearing for the rib. Both of us were regularly soaked through and cold. We dug out our wets and sou’wester, and remembered all those niggling deck leaks above our bunks.

I prepared dinner but that made me sick also and I spent a sad three hours below with James on watch and the children tired and ill. By 9pm I felt well enough to relieve James and stayed on watch through to 2am. The waters east of the BVIs were like Piccadilly Circus for shipping and I was glad of the AIS. James took us through the conservative passage between Tortola and Virgin Gorda and we tiptoed into the ship anchorage off Beef Island to finally drop the hook just before 6am. Less than two hours later the children awoke.