Monday May 6

After a false start from Guanica hbr, which is home port, (I had such a dirty bottom that I couldn't make reasonable windway) I doubled back and came into Puerto Real, on the west end of PR to get hauled, and bottom painted. No problem, they said a fat month ago. We can take you any time within a day or two. No reservation was made. I showed on Friday evening a week and three days ago. Nope, it'll be a week. Then Wed the lift broke down - part coming every day of course. Promised land or land of promises?

I'm a doubter so I found a diving fisherman who'd clean the bottom for me. I can get down there, but very little breath left to work with and very little resistance to the cold. The limbo of the hoist continued as I gradually cleaned up all the chores I'd promised myself to do before I left. Of course they are never all done. but the important ones are. There are still leaks that I can't find - all small and relatively unimportant, but still there. I haven't been able to get my refridge going again either. And since arriving here my fatho has packed it up. Don't need the fridge to travel, but it's a big help with the diet, and all but the last few miles of this journey will be in water too deep for my fatho to read. It would be nice to have its temperature sensor working, since that will give me a clue to Gulf Stream location and meanders of or from it. All the rest seems to be go. So there's no sense waiting for the hoist. OK GO GO GO.

Last shopping and money from Visa in Cabo Rojo today. Bread, potatoes and onions in the corner store here. Big drying out from the rain of last Saturday - which caught me with all ports and hatches open - I got beds out into sum & breeze of a gorgeous day - took off to town in a publico. Clouded over. Threatened rain. Nothing I could do. Publico back as soon as I'd done my city work, hurried out to the boat as a sprinkle set in - very gently, but with the authority of a big deep black cloud sneaking in from the east. Sprinkle I got. not bad though, beds and dry clothes got in under cover, with at least a minute to spare. Then button it all up because it came down like a dumped bucket for twenty minutes - an inch of water within an hour. Tapered off, but never really stopped til after dark, so that all my last minute shenanigans were done in a bathing suit & rain jacket - cold and wet. OK. Done

Peaceful deep calm in the harbor now. I've built a monster chicken stew for the next coupla three days. Bought vitamin C and I'm ready to take off as soon as I tie the dinghy down.

Maybe what I'm best at is false starts - I got about eighteen hours away, which is not too far, upwind and up current, when the jib halyard parted. Out of sight of land, eighteen to twenty of easterly coming right in from the Azores so it was pushing a substantial sea. Not too hard to sail with, but rather a lot more than I'm willing to climb the mast with. Tossed that around - I couldn't see anything but back to the nearest sheltered water. No way I'd ever make Bermuda, or any place else without a jib. Could I expect a calm in the deep ocean? Hardly.

Turn and power back, sails drawing. Aguadilla Bay - first shelter, not without some surge, but smooth enough. Arrived about noon. Hot lunch and rig a new halyard. I have the stuff - it was chafed through where it rested normally in the shiv at the top of the mast. OK, done - tired & wet so I dried out a little. Big supper and a drink. Sacked out at sundown and slept the sleep of the blessed right through sunup - about 5:30.

Time to think of all the things I forgot - flashlight (I had only one working), lime juice (helps when the water gets stale), and what I'm shooting for now is a straight run with no stop at BDA - the $30 departure fee seems pretty steep to me. But I won't burn my bridges yet. So I stayed long enough to dingy in in the AM for diesel, few groceries, top off my water tank, telephone PK.

Off again not very dry but well rested in the early evening. Single reefed main. Whole jib and mizzen. On the wind, boisterous, good way, but an evil one and a half knot current east to west across my bow. I have to win a fat hundred miles against it to get into BDA. Not at all sure I'll need to get in, or even want to, but it's prudent to be able to. So here I am, bouncing across the Porto Rico trench - one of the great deeps in the world - 5 or 6 miles if I remember right (I haven't measured it recently). Less wind than two days ago, and less sea too. Wing may well pick up in the PM so I won't shake out the reef yet. 60 miles on the road already, and all is well (and wet).

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