Long Island to the Windward Passage

Layla and dad early morning watch.

It took us a couple of days to sail from Long Island, Bahamas down through the Windward Passage (between Cuba and Haiti) to the South Coast of Cuba, making sure we hit the Windward passage with good weather.  Our last crossing of the this passage 7 years ago was rather rough and we didn't want a repeat of that if we could help it!  Swell crumbling over and into the stern of our cat and surfing down waves at 17 knots…

Mom's got the chocolate, hmmm..... please mom, please.  Chocolate in the middle of nowhere never tasted soo good!

Layla being creative, making an 'ice cream sundae', dreaming of ice cream more like it!

  Sailing across these deep sea beds is great for fishing, so naturally we put a line out, my turn to catch a fish… how do you like THEM apples?!  We had barbecue of delicious Mahi Mahi.

We stopped for the night off South Point with our friends aboard SY Sunrise and I took some shots of a wreck .

T R I B E and Sunrise anchored in the background.

As we approached the entrance to the Windward Passage in dead calm, we sailed through a pod of Pilot Whales, about 30 of them, just hanging around, so we stopped and hung with them for and hour, Chris jumped in to try and get some footage on the GoPro, but they were too shy, moving away.  What a privilege to just 'BE' with them, listening to them breathe through their blowholes, one after the other and spotting the babies with their mommies, all around our boat. Such a treat!

Sky appreciating the oceans inhabitants 

Chris jumping in to swim with them.

Bill, Lara and Isobel aboard Sunrise saying good bye.

Cruising along the Southern Coast of Cuba we inhaled the fresh smell of earth and rain, lovely.  The coastline is very different from the Bahamas, where all the islands are flat. Cuba has high cliffs dropping straight off into thousands of feet of deep blue ocean.  Guarda Frontera posts are situated in positions of view and shortly after sailing past one we were hailed on the VHF  "Catamaran, Catamaran, Catamaran, Guarda Frontera"  Of course the Cubans speak spanish and very fast spanish at that.  They were trying to establish where we came from, boat registration, number of people on board and what our destination was (asking all this in Spanish).  Neither of us speak Spanish, so there Chris and I were, trying to look up words in the Spanish Dictionary, (they weren't very patient) while simultaneously making up 'Spanish words' to hail back as they kept asking and we were desperately trying to answer them, aaah if only they spoke FRENCH!  We were all in fits of laughter as Chris spoke his 'fluent Spanish' funagalore.  Finally, they either got what they wanted or at least performed their duty in trying to get the info, either way, we will find out otherwise when we check in in Santiago de Cuba, which is where we are heading.  Hope they have internet there!


Warm Welcome to readers in Jamaica and the Cayman Islands!