15 April 2013 Cayo Manuel Gomez to Cayo Chocolate, Cuba
It was another airless night and we didn’t sleep well again. We motored over to Cayo Algodon Grande and tried to anchor off the reef to the west of the cay, but we couldn't find any sand patches big enough in which to anchor, so we gave up. There were four boats in the proper anchorage, so we decided that it was overcrowded and went down to Cayo Chocolate, which was only 15 miles away.
"Siga Siga" had told us that this was a nice anchorage, so we had great expectations and was hoping to stay for a couple of days because on the charts it looked like there was plenty of coral around. What a huge disappointment. The water was murky and we had to anchorage least 100 metres from the cay. There was no protection except from the east and we felt like we were anchoring in the middle of the ocean. We didn't see any reef at all - we stayed on the boat and sulked.
At least there was a nice breeze out in the middle of nowhere and it was cool in the evening. After five days of remorseless attack by mosquitos, we had a bite-free evening.
16 April 2013 Cayo Chocolate to Cayo Granada, Cuba
We were up early and left the godforsaken anchorage at half past seven. Typically, wind had picked up from the east during the morning, so we motor-sailed directly into it for three hours. Just before we arrived at our waypoint to sail south-east through the Cayos Drihuela, the wind (of course) veered and headed us, so we had to motor sail for another two hours. Finally, once clear of the buoyed Canal Racho Viejo, we could head south towards our destination and finally managed to sail, albeit only for 30 minutes.
The entrance into Cayo Granada is quite narrow and passes between two shoal areas. There’s also a shallow patch of reef in the centre of the channel which we skirted around – not sure how deep it is. The anchorage itself is a huge semi-circular bay edged by mangroves, but is pretty and much, much better than Cayo Chocolate.
We went snorkelling on the reef next to the entrance, which had coral heads covered with a light dusting of silt. The water was also very cloudy, but I managed to snare a nice 4lb lobster for dinner. We decided to stay here tomorrow.
17 April 2013 Cayo Granada, Cuba
It was lovely breezy night and we both slept well. Glenys checked her provisions this morning and we’re running out of lots of things – we have one knob of butter, no mayonnaise, 1 onion, 1 litre of orange juice, 1 litre of milk and, worst of all, only four beers left. We’ve spent nearly two weeks in theses off-lying cays and it’s time to move on to Jamaica.
I downloaded a GRIB file and the weather looks good to sail across to Montego Bay tomorrow – 15 knots from the east. It’s 130 miles from here, so we’ll be sailing overnight and hopefully arriving at dawn. The plan is to try to sail east to Cabo Cruz (in Cuba) tomorrow during the day and then we’ll be able to sail more or less south overnight to Jamaica.
I ran the watermaker and, although we have an oil leak on the generator, we’re not losing a huge amount of oil and it’s fairly well contained by the oil absorbent pads that I’ve packed around the generator.
Glenys used our aft toilet and found that it wouldn’t pump. I quickly deduced that the output pipework was blocked somewhere and it turned into a three hour marathon repair job to find the blockage, remove the guilty valve, unblock it and put it all back together. Basically it was all furred up, I should have removed the valve when I de-furred the hoses a few weeks ago.
Although it was awkward to remove the valve assembly, I have to admire the thought that Hallberg Rassy have put into their boats – it would appear that everything has been installed with the intention that it will have to be removed at some point in time. This is a totally different philosophy to some of the mass production boat builders who seem to install everything and then lower the deck on top making it impossible to remove some equipment.
After I’d finished the odious toilet repair, we went snorkelling on a small wreck at the east end of the anchorage. It’s only in 5 metres of water, but it was good fun swimming through the holds and there are an incredible number of fish milling about.
We put the dinghy on deck, prepared the boat to go to sea tomorrow and then collapsed with the last of our beers.
18 April 2013 Cayo Granada, Cuba
The wind was blowing hard for most of the night and, when I got out of bed at seven o’clock, our wind instruments were showing 20-25 knots from the east. That’s 5-10 knots more than shown on our GRIB file yesterday. We decided that we would get hammered if we tried to sail today, so we resigned ourselves to staying here today.
It’s Thursday today and we’ve heard that it’s a pain to try to clear into Jamaica outside normal office hours from Monday to Friday. That means that we can’t really leave Cuba until Sunday, so we’ve got another three days and nights to kill. The GRIB files show the wind dropping substantially at the weekend, so that fits in well. There’s another good looking anchorage about 20 miles to the east of us, so we’ll probably go there either tomorrow or Saturday for a change of scenery.
We chilled out for the morning and another boat came in to the anchorage - first we’ve seen for a few days. We went to say hello, but they have to be in Cienfuegos in two day's time so won't be hanging around.
We went snorkelling towards the north side of the island - there were plenty of coral outcrops, but again the visibility was very poor. On the plus side, I caught three lobsters and a small Hogfish, so it's lobster for dinner.
Yesterday, while I was fixing the toilet, I’d dived under the boat to check that the sea cock was clear and, to my surprise, I spotted a two foot long Remora lurking under the boat. When we got back from snorkelling, Glenys jumped in the water to clean off some persistent barnacles from the water line and the Remora was still lurking about. Later on in the evening, she threw some food overboard while making dinner and it shot out to eat the scraps. It obviously thinks that Alba is a huge whale or something - we’ve called it Ronnie Remora.
19 April 2013 Cayo Granada, Cuba
I did some admin in the morning, anticipating that we'll get an internet connection in Jamaica. Glenys read up some more about Panama and Ecuador.
In afternoon, we went snorkelling towards the south side of the island. Again, the water was very murky, but there were some nice coral heads and lots of fish. I took my spear gun on its first outing rather than using my small pole spear, but the rubber tube was perished with old age and snapped before I could use it - another thing to buy in Jamaica. All was not lost because I'd taken my camera, which kept me amused for an hour. We saw some large Atlantic Spadefish, which are only normally seen on exposed reefs.
When we got back to Alba, Ronnie the Remora still lurking under the hull. I eventually got a half decent photograph of him, but he was a little shy and the silt in the water made it a challenge.
There were huge clouds building up during the day and it looked ominous as night fell.
20 April 2013 Cayo Granada to Cayo Media Luna, Cuba
It was a horrible night. Just after midnight, we had torrential rain, so I jumped out of bed to close our hatch and then check that all other hatches were closed. Half an hour later, we started to hear thunder, then flashes of lightning, so I had to get up again. I’m paranoid about getting a lightning strike - with some justification because our 65 foot mast must be the tallest thing for 50 miles. If we get struck by lightning all of our electrical equipment will be damaged – electronics, motors, pumps, engine, generator, fridge compressors, computers, etc, etc. My only plan of action is to put our laptop, chart plotter, iPad and satellite phone in to the oven because I think that it will act as a Faraday Cage and protect the equipment inside.
When the storm had passed an hour later, I got up again to open the hatch and let some breeze in. Unfortunately, I think that I also let in a mosquito, so I was bitten an hour later and had to get up again to spray myself with DEET. I was knackered by the time it was morning.
There was only 5 knots of wind from the east, so we motored around to Cayo Media Luna. It was 30 miles and the seas were flat calm, so I lurked below working on my computer trying out work out the chords for a couple of new songs to play on my guitar. Glenys did a sterling job of navigating us through the reefs to the anchorage and making lunch as well.
Cayo Media Luna is a one mile wide, semi-circular, mangrove island with 10 metre deep water in the middle. It’s not the most interesting anchorage in the world, but it’s a safe enough place with protection from the north through east to south.
On the passage here, we could see huge cumulo-nimbus clouds building to the east of us. By four o’clock, we were feeling the effects of the huge thunder clouds because the wind veered around to the west and increased to fifteen knots as air was being sucked up into these systems. Sure enough, by seven o’clock, we had torrential rain, but fortunately not much lightning or wind.
This bay (Golfo de Guacanayabo) has a bad reputation of producing very intense thunderstorms in the summer months with winds up to 60 miles per hour, so we were a little anxious when we went to bed.
21 April 2013 Cayo Media Luna to Montego Bay, Jamaica (Day 1)
We had a very peaceful night – no more thunder storms or mosquitos. Glenys was forced to make scrambled egg and bacon for breakfast because we’ve now run out of milk, so our normal breakfast of cereal was not possible. We’ve also run out of bread, orange juice, coca cola, garlic, beer, wine, etc, etc – definitely time to go.
We ran the water maker for an hour and then left at half past nine - the oil leak on the generator doesn't appear to be getting any worse.
The wind was 10 knots from the east, so we were on a broad reach as we headed south west to the Canal de Cuatro to get through the fringing reef. I was expecting light winds for this passage, so I dragged out our asymmetrical spinnaker and sorted it out on the front deck ready to hoist. Unfortunately, the wind picked up a little and we were able to sail at five knots without it, so I had to pack my toy away.
By eleven o'clock, we were heading south towards Montego Bay, but the damn wind had come around to the south east and dropped to less than 5 knots, so we had to turn on the engine. To compensate, we caught a nice 2-3 lb Barracuda. We've been throwing these back for the past four months because of the danger of ciguatera, but the agriculture officer in Cayo Largo said that the south coast of Cuba is safe, so we're going to risk it – they’re so good to eat.
Later in the afternoon, the wind picked up a little bit more, but had veered even more and was straight on the nose - typical afternoon on the south coast of Cuba. However, it was very pleasant motoring in the relatively calm seas until dark.