Yesterday’s winds were supposed to be light and on the nose so when I got up at about 0700 and we had 9 knots from the NE there was another call of ‘we’re burning daylight’ and we set off. After a cup of tea, we put up the asymmetric which changed our speed from 2-6 knots and we carried this until I’d finished my blog by which time the wind had gone around to the North then NNW and died. We motored for about half an hour and then the wind picked up from the NW and was now as advertised in direction but blowing with a little oomph.
We put a couple of reefs in the main and started beating towards Cienfuegos. Closer to the shore, there was a bit of a lift so we stayed inshore and by mid afternoon the sea breeze had done it’s thing, backing the wind to South of West and we were able to fetch Cienfuegos. Our eta had varied from after 2000 to 1630 and we made the lagoon by about 1630 and to the marina by about 1730. We were told to go to anchor and row ashore for clearing in. The pontoons seem to be full of charter boats. There is an area for anchoring marked with 4 yellow posts and it’s quite crowded, we’d been met by the marina manager by now in a little dory who said he could take us ashore so we anchored out near the periphery and I went in with him. His engine wouldn’t start so we drifted initially towards the pontoons before being taken in tow by a friendly local in a tender.
Clearing in was simple enough and once done, the manager was going to take me back to Yemaya having changed the plugs in his outboard, but this plan didn’t work as although it was initially running it conked out as I jumped aboard and wouldn’t start again so I came out in another boat, a small, very wet tender because it was still blowing about 15 knots from seaward.
Arriving back at the boat, it appeared that water had run out whilst Sue was taking a shower. We had only been using the starboard tank, or so I thought, so I went to open the port tank only to find that I had forgotten to close it in St Martin when filling up there so we, in fact, had used all the water in the tanks. A bit of a woopsie on my part. I had a 5 ltr drum of water and 25 litre jerrycan in the lazarette, so these were fished out and the gas bottle sent ashore for filling and it was decided, with a couple of long faces from Christine and Sue, not to go ashore but to eat aboard.
As we’d planned on eating ashore, we had nothing fresh out so a tasty lentil casserole was quickly knocked up by Christine, some gin and tonics poured and our last bag of crisps (it being a Saturday) produced and devoured. A band ashore was playing covers, so music was enjoyed and an early-ish night indulged in. We’re hoping we’ll be able to get fuel and water today and anchor closer in so we can get on and off with the dinghy more easily. On Monday we’ll able to go alongside the pontoons, we think because all the charter boats will have pushed off for the week.
Slainte
Jock and the gang.