Resolute Empowered

It was as though we had never been away.  We felt we had to keep reminding ourselves and telling others importantly that we had certainly not been in Power Boats marina and boatyard for the whole of the Hurricane season….no, we had sailed south (against wind and current, don’t you know) to South America!  Yet, despite all our courageous talk here we were again amongst the thousands of other boats in the numerous yards, ashore and afloat which line Chaguaramas Bay.  Not the most glamorous place to be; purely functional with scant regard for niceties.  Our allotted berth did not help the dismal outlook, moored as we were (in the only available berth) right next to the boat hoist which lifted boats out and into the water incessantly throughout the working day with great gusto, noise and fumes.  There was no getting away from the fact that Power Boats Yard was not a place to linger unnecessarily but a place in which to get things done.  Everywhere there was a buzz of activity and business and we had come to join the throngs in busy boaty occupation too for the decision had been made:  solar panels were the way forward for Resolute’s power deficit problems.

Perhaps I should explain a little about power on board a 41 foot boat to put you in the picture.  Our diesel engine is our means of propulsion when there is no wind and our primary source of power generation for charging the batteries via 2 large alternators.  The battery bank itself has been more than doubled in size since leaving Norway (from three to seven) but still struggles to keep up with our everyday usage when we are not in a marina and plugged directly into a power source.  At anchor or on a mooring buoy (which is where we are the majority of the time) we need to run the massive engine at least twice a day to keep up with demand from the fridge, freezer, instrumentation, lights etc.  We get some augmentation from Dervish (our wind turbine) but he has problems – not least that he is very noisy which deters us from having him on all the time  – especially at night where he is oft blamed for keeping Gilly awake with his hysterical, screechy hurricane-come-thither manic turns.  Despite being extremely mindful of Resolute’s seemingly insatiable appetite for power it is a constant headache for Skipper who feels the need to check the amps being made and spent on the instruments…..you see the problem?  Of course the answer is nearly always in evidence in the sky hereabouts.  Harness the power from that there sun!  You cannot be in the Caribbean for very long without noticing the ingenious contraptions people have dreamt up on which to secure their solar panels:  arches, canopies, atop of biminies and sun shades and most popular of all, on their guard rails.  The latter idea was the one we were opting for.  Appropriately armed with complicated calculations including dimensions, angle of swivel and energy intake to size ratios….not to mention our meagre budget, we set forth into the chandlery and thence into the complicated morass of information and statistics that solar panel choice and ownership demands.  In actuality we needed very little from this mine of information as thankfully our choices were narrowed considerably by stock issues….to be precise the one and only chandlery only had one pair in stock of the same size…..decision made then!  After haggling about the price and various discounts we made our purchase of two 195 amp big boys.  Help!  We left the shop rather nervously, worrying that in our enthusiasm we had bought two far too ginormous panels which would either not fit in the available space on the already crowded stern rails or would require major reinforcement of the rails on which to secure them.

The answer to our concerns lay with Mervyn (Merv to his friends…and we were soon getting into Merv territory).  He is a welder of some renown in Power Boats, running his own little welding shop out of a couple of corrugated iron lean-to’s  His youth and rather shy demeanour betray his wealth of ideas and flare for anything that needs welding to anything else, alongside his eye for knowing how his creations should be best supported and their load best spread.  Merv though has a problem….he hates being on boats –  beginning to appear green and anxious as soon as he sets foot aboard.  He alone was grateful then, that Resolute was alongside the concrete-railed travel hoist, thus enabling him to lend his expertise to our aft guard rails and solar panel conundrum without setting foot on board.  In Merv’s unquestionable opinion all would be well.  Phew! His little team would weld a frame for the panels which would be secured here and here with supports here and here.  No problem…have it done in a few days.  True to his word the frames were made for a pittance and secured as required, just leaving Skipper and Mate to manhandle the panels into place.  Bish Bosh!     Looking the business as they did, it was easy to forget their purpose in life for which it was necessary to wire them into the boat’s power systems.  Cables had to be fed through impossible spaces at the back of lockers and head-linings to find their way with sweaty cursing and groaning to the Smart Box (which was actually more expensive than the panels themselves).  Once the potential for power had been established it was just a matter of positioning the massive panels to the sun to see if they actually worked.  To enable this Skipper had devised a supporting pole which would hold the panels at right angles and clip in to the toe rail.  After many adjustments and holding jobs by Gilly, not to mention numerous jubilee clips, cable ties and yards of self-amalgamating tape (the whole boat seems to be held together with those three essentials) the panels were able to hold themselves at right angles as required, making Resolute look as though she was preparing to take flight.

Being on our tight mooring we were unable to give the panels a proper trial so decided to take a long-weekend trip to our favourite Trinidadian anchorage at Chacachacare.  With some relief we left the madding crowds at Chaguaramas and found ourselves an hour or so later in the peace and tranquillity of the huge deserted bay at Chacachacare.  The weather then played a blinder, deciding to blow and rain for the next 24 hours, thus preventing us from testing the panels in typical Caribbean conditions already described whilst the batteries slowly drained.  At last on day three….ta-dah!  Glorious sunshine made glorious amps and Resolute’s Skipper was a Very Happy Man!  I am pleased to report that all expectations from the panels have been met and 3 days into our experiment we have not had to run the engine at all.  Result!  An unexpected (by Gilly anyway) consequence, however:  no hot water.  The engine makes our water hot….ergo   no engine running=no hot water……a small price to pay I suppose, but once the experiment has been written up and the excited Skipper has stopped peering lovingly at his Smart Box every two minutes, we may well be allowed to indulge ourselves by turning on the engine for a while to once again have water akin to warm in which to wash dishes, clothes and selves.

We have mentioned Chacachacare in previous blogs…it was a former leper colony run by Dominican nuns.  On previous visits we had anchored near the Doctor’s houses which, like all other buildings, are just sat there on the hillsides, rotting away with only their marvellous views across the bay and back to the mainland still intact.  We were anchored in another part of the bay this time and went ashore to explore the Nun’s side of the island: their living quarters, the hospital itself, chapel and, most poignantly, their little grave yard.  Wandering round these atmospheric ruins, populated these days only with sinister vultures, on

Resolute (pre-solar panels) in Chacachacare Bay.

Vulture on railings of ruined hospital building, Chacachacare, Trinidad.

Plague in Nuns’ Graveyard, Chacachacare

View from Convent, Chacachacare.

Solar panels out…ready for take-off!

e can easily imagine how life was both for those nuns and for the patients themselves.  To walk the corridors of the hospital and to stand in the chapel is to step back in time and marvel.  The saving grace of what must have been a grim and heart wrenching caring challenge would have been the amazing venue in which they all lived and worked – those incredible views from every aspect must surely have made their wounded hearts soar.

Our other consideration whilst in Trinidad is our plan for the sailing season ahead.  Sailing seasons here begin at the end of the hurricane season which is at the end of November and run until the end of May when the hurricane risk is deemed too great (by boat insurers at least) to be lingering north of Grenada and south of Cape Heterras in the United States.  Our plan for the 14/15 season had been ambitious:  to sail hurriedly north from Grenada to Puerto Rico; explore the north Caribbean (Dominican Republic, Turks and Caicos and perhaps a little bit of Cuba) then head for the Bahamas, then Florida and up the Eastern seaboard of the US ending up north of Cape Heterras in Chesapeake Bay for the summer but safely out of the Hurricane Zone.  This plan was scuppered however from a most unexpected quarter – our UK health/travel insurance provider.  When we renewed our policy and outlined our plans they shocked us by saying they would only give us medical cover for 89 days in the United States.  They further explained that this was due to the new Obamacare legislation which insisted all non-immigrant visa holders (we had already equipped ourselves with 10 year non-immigrant visas) must move onto the Obamacare system after 89 days – providing only the bare bones of treatment options and definitely no repatriation back to Blighty.  After doing much more research into the legislation and demanding more answers from our insurers we had to admit defeat.  We simply could not risk going to the States without adequate medical cover in place and therefore decided with much regret to change our plans.  Thus our revised plan for 14/15 could best be described as a bimble….bimbling back up the Caribbean chain in slow time; visiting places we missed the first time and re-visiting places we loved.  To enrich the new plan we have had much interest from friends and family to meet us along the way which will ensure that wherever we are there will be much merriment ….and the giving and receiving of merriment is, after all, what this Caribbean idyll is supposed to be all about.

Ruined chapel, Chacachacare, Trinidad.

Goodbye To All That

Careless sunburn….”scorched”!

Baganara Resort, British Guyana

Resolute at anchor, Baganara River Resort, British Guyana

The sub-title of our blog, you may have noticed, is ‘cutting loose’. Nereid’s Rally having finished, leaving us in French Ghiana, we were keen to ‘cut loose’ and find ourselves again.  Of course that meant we had to make decisions about where we wanted to head next and those of you who know us understand that decision making is not our strongest suit.  The first suggestion was from Skipper who suggested we should head further south to windward to Brazil a suggestion which swiftly got kicked into the long grass!  Good thing then that some of our fellow ralliers had a clear idea of how their trip back into the Caribbean should play out and we eventually decided to tag along with our American catamaran ralliers (called Aces 4 ) back to British Guyana, but this time heading up the Essequibo a bit further than Bartica – to the Baganara resort.  We had briefly visited Baganara when we had flown up for our day trip to the Kaieteur Falls.  Our little plane had touched down on the resort’s landing strip and we were rather overwhelmed by the welcome we had there considering we were only in transit – being met by a speed boat to take us back to their rival Hurakabra resort.  We had then been invited to return to the anchorage off the resort but time and other pressures during the rally had not permitted this indulgence….perhaps now was the time to reply in person to that gracious invitation.  Some of our other ralliers aboard Orion 1 had got stuck in Surinam after the water pump in their engine failed.  They too had agreed Baganara was a good idea so we were looking forward to rendez-vousing with them there too.

So with feelings of regret for leaving our fellow  South American adventurers behind tinged with excitement for at last embarking on a passage that would ensure the wind and current behind us again, we departed from St. Laurent, heading back out to sea, contemplating  a trip of about 2.5 days or 260 nautical miles.  Back out into the clear blue waters, leaving the fairway buoy behind us it did indeed feel as though we were ‘cutting loose’ again.  Resolute loves having the wind aft of the beam and was soon pulling away from Aces 4 (much to their twin-hulled disgust!), well and truly into her and our comfort zones.

I won’t bore you with the ins and outs of a passage that was blissfully uneventful – our only concern being the fishing boats which as always teased us with their nets and lack of meaningful lights at night…we were becoming used to these escapades by now and just continued our course keeping a keen look out and remaining well-lit ourselves.  By late afternoon on the third day our course plotter told us we were nearing our destination; the river mouth of the Essequibo is actually indistinguishable from the rest of the ocean except for the brown tinge of the water and the accumulation of withy sticks on the horizon.  The river estuary is nearly 40 miles wide (third only to the Orinoco and the Amazon in South America) which means seeing the banks is impossible from the middle.  We wove our way through the fishing stakes which at first seems an impossibility as they are dense and seemingly impenetrable from a distance but trusting to the waypoints we had used when exiting the river we knew there must be a way through.  Eventually, as the sun was setting we reached a clearer area and found ourselves at last close to the bank.  Longing to free ourselves from the 4 hours watch system and have a decent night’s sleep we tucked ourselves well into a slight bay and illuminated ourselves brightly in the hope no-one would accidently ram us…..so ill-used are the Guyanians to visiting anchored  yachts littering their river…..and fell into a blissful sleep.

With no pressing deadlines, we had decided to take the trip up the river more slowly than we had on the Rally, giving us time to enjoy its wide, majestic extremities and have time to observe all the river-side habitations and activities which so epitomised normal, everyday Guyana.  We passed the ruins of the Dutch fortress which had provided the first Dutch settlers some security from river-bound invaders in the 1600’s.  Quite why this mighty fort had been so far up the river is rather a mystery but there it still stands brooding over the waters.  We moored for our first night a little way further up from Fort Island again tucking ourselves as close to the shore as we dared hoping we would be well out of the way of passing boats and barges.  There was a constant traffic of gravel and sand up the river – usually on huge metal platforms seemingly guided precariously by a separate tug boat alone.   The next day saw us continuing our upriver drift, waving at people on the shoreline who were going about their daily chores – washing or fishing on the water’s edge or speeding past us on the frequent water taxis.  All seemed pleased to see a tourist yacht in their midst.  According to our pilot book a good place for our second night at anchor in the river was Shanklands resort, dominated by an imposing colonnaded plantation house high on the hill overlooking the river and surrounded by green lawns.  Although currently closed the Shanklands beaches were too tempting for us not to take advantage of – even though the browny-tinged water looked a little unwelcoming.  It was a wonderful break in our journey – so good to get off the boat to swim and picnic.  Ill-used as we were to beach life, the sun was hot and all too soon we were hunting out some shade on the beach but not before Gilly had turned her now familiar shade of beetroot.  As promised in our guide book the holding was good.  With the pier to shelter us and and with a plethora of rocks near the shore which no-one in their right mind would venture near we settled down for the evening content that no vessels would come this close to Shanklands.

I did not feel the jolt, but was aware of Colin diving out of bed in panic.  When I followed the commotion I saw Colin on the dark deck shouting at someone and then realised that the someone he was shouting at was on a massive sand barge platform and fellow tug alongside our hull!  How the 50 foot plus vessel had managed to wedge himself between us and the rocks and pier off Shanklands we could not begin to understand.  When questioned, the nonchalant skipper said, cooly that he had lost steerage coming round the corner.  We could only think that must have been some miscalculation on his part.  Without further explanation he extricated himself off our side whilst we tried to examine our hull in the dark to see what damage he had done.  All we could see was a long horizontal gouge, but thankfully not too deep.  Colin immediately got on the radio and asked the skipper for his name, and got a rather abusive reply which did not contain the name of the vessel.  Barge skipper garbled that if there was no damage we had no reason to know his details.  Despite our pleadings that in the dark conditions we could not be sure there was no other damage we were given a stiff ignoring as the stern lights of the barge disappeared into the distance.  We were stunned and rather shaken.  How could this have happened again when we had taken every precaution possible?  There being no coastguard on hand or anyone who would respond to us in Guyana we instead sat up in turn on anchor watch until day break.  At dawn we examined the damage which was thankfully no more than the long scratch we had seen with our torch.  Suffice to say, in Guyana, Suriname and French Ghiana they are so unfamiliar with having visiting yachts in their midst that they show no caution.  The usual mast-head anchor light is far too high above their eye-level to be of any help, so contrary to all sailing protocols it is wise to have deck lights – possibly strobing – to make yourself as visible, at eye level as possible, to anything approaching along the rivers.

Cruising chute up!

Up with the Trinidadian courtesy flag again.

Ruined Dutch Fort, Fort Island, Guyana.

The Essequibo River

Local river taxi, Guyana