When a year comes to an end, we celebrate with fireworks and champagne. If a sailing season comes to an end, that’s also a reason to celebrate. After all, our boat is still afloat and neither Alex threw me nor I him overboard, even if we sometimes came close. We want to spend the rest of the hurricane season in the Rio Dulce, and so we are sailing from Mexico to Guatemala. However, we don’t feel like celebrating during the last days of our first sailing season. The blame lies with a sandbar, a tiny creature called Cyclospora cayetan, and our drone. In other words, our season is coming to an end with a crisis in several acts. To anticipate: We survived, so did Mabul, only the drone, it’s dead.
Continue reading →Mystery Mexico
After more than three days of crossing, exhausted and satisfied, we drop anchor in the bay on the northwest side of Isla Mujeres. The anchorage is calm with a light breeze. Here we want to clear in to continue sailing south in Mexico later. We go ashore and first of all have dinner in a marina. The island is a tourist hell, but after Cuba Mexico seems to us like a gourmet temple: guacamole and tacos, fresh fruit juices and juicy meat.
Continue reading →Sailing Log: Cuba to Mexico
As we leave Cayo Largo and Cuba, we are not alone. El Russo, the employee of the turtle center, has given us twenty freshly hatched turtles. We pack them in a Tupperware and carry them back to Mabul. We cast off and finally we are sailing from Cuba to Mexico. One by one we drop the tiny ones into the sea near the coast. May they have an exciting, long life without shark encounters!
Continue reading →Cuba’s wild south coast
As we approach Cuba on an early morning in May, after three days and three nights on the open sea, we immediately realize that everything is different here. In the bay off Santiago de Cuba, on the eastern edge of the big island, men drift across the water on truck tubes, a paddle in one hand and a fishing line in the other. The sailing itself should also be somewhat unusual here in Cuba.
Continue reading →The finite story of the engine 2
After I was able to fix the acute problems of the engine in the BVIs, we set off for the Dominican Republic in good spirits. It is our longest and most beautiful passage so far. Once there, the engine reports back after a short time and screams for attention. I reach my limits and reluctantly agree to get a mechanic on board.
Continue reading →The finite story of the engine 1
We are struggling with persistent engine problems. In retrospect, it has to be said, actually ever since we set out with Mabul in September 2022. Only we hadn’t really noticed it yet and I kept fighting symptoms but never found the causes. In this and the following blog, the failures, misfortunes and breakdowns of the engine will take us through our journey from St. Maarten to the BVIs to the south of the Dominican Republic.
Continue reading →Paradise found and lost
Our journey from Antigua via Barbuda to St. Maarten.
On the morning of January 21, we leave Montserrat and set course for the neighboring island of Antigua. The distance to Jolly Harbor would be 22 nautical miles by direct route, but we have to tack upwind and that takes time. The waves are high and the ride is rough. We have one reef in the mainsail and initially one in the genua. Mabul rides the waves up and down so that the seawater flows over the bow and deck into the cockpit and from there back into the sea.
Continue reading →Montserrat’s disasters
A small, at first glance inconspicuous, island in the Caribbean away from charter tourism catches our attention: Montserrat. Two natural disasters have struck the island in the past 30 years, and now almost two-thirds of the entire island is off-limits.
Continue reading →Guadeloupe: Rhum and carnival
«Ten, nine, eight…..one! Happy New Year! Welcome 2023!»
A new year, a new life, a new island. We celebrate the turn of the year on SV Take 5 of Suzi and Emmanuel, together with our Dutch-Indian friends.
Dominica: Nature paradise
Finally, the real Caribbean again! That’s my first thought as we drop anchor in Prince Rupert Bay in the northwest of Dominica. We are immediately greeted by local fishermen offering buoys, fish, vegetables and everything else.
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