Commodore
March 21, 2020

The Caribbean is joining the world’s lockdown!

We had a very leisurely morning getting up, not the greatest sleep as the surge makes our ropes squeak and groan right where our heads are. We had a few boat chores to sort out and I needed to do a bit of much needed to tidy up the boat. The laundromat was open so I went and dropped all our laundry and bedding off, run by two very cheerful men. Bliss to just leave it and come back 3 hours later with it all done.

Then the big debate, we really do not want to spend any more time in this marina and the winds die down tomorrow. Leaving means we have to be ‘dispatched’ by the Navy, and we can’t set foot on Dom Rep land at least for another 12 days. Its quite a big distance from here to Puerto Rico, and we think we could just chance it anchoring overnight and not go on land. Rowan is looking at various sites and blogs but the information seems to vary so much. He finally got hold of Puerto Rican customs and they are following the US line, that you have to have a visa to get in, which we do not have. The same applies to the US Virgin islands, the BVI is out, so our choices are narrowing. Plus things seem to change every couple of days. Rowan phoned Bob at the marina at Southside, Turks & Caicos, and he said they the country was open until midnight Monday, and he could reserve a berth for us.

We keep going round and round as it feels so depressing heading backwards, and not seeing my nephew Lovat and our Norfolk friends sitting it out in the US Virgin Islands with their US visas. Lucky them.

We finally decided we really did not want to stay here any longer so back to T & C it is. They also have direct flights to the UK there with BA. Whether they will still have flights is another question, but somehow it feels a bit closer to home. We liked the Marina, it was wonderfully calm in there and we know we will sleep well there. As we have two days to get there we will, stop off on the way back at Big Sand Cay as we had originally intended. It all seems a bit panicky but we both agree it’s most probably not wise at this stage to break the law! At least we know what we are doing now.

Rowan had invited the only other yachtie crowd to join us for a drink in the evening. He thought they were a little non committal. By 6pm there was no sign of them so just as R decided to get cooking they arrived! We had a very good evening sharing sailing horror stories as they seem equally inexperienced as us. They sold up everything in Washington, USA and moved into their boat with their little terrier dog. I was rather sad they left him behind, I was looking forward to a little doggy company. They had been on the marina over a week, shortly after they arrived they went out one day and came back to find their boat had rammed into the dock, a rope had snapped. They had to get it all fixed and re fibreglassed. They are moving onto Puerto Rico and USVI which of course is open to them and they will sit out their lock down there.