S/V L'ORIENT

We were sitting on L'ORIENT enjoying a nice sunset here in Gustavia Harbor, St. Barths when our zen was interrupted by of all things, a red signal fare. For those of you who don't sail a lot, pyrotechnics at sunset might sound like good fun.........unless the boat you're on has all sorts of flammable fabrics and fuel on it. To our surprise, the culprit (let's call him yellowbeard to give you a visual) was sailing a zig-zag course through the harbor's paying guests, blowing some kind of plastic horn and yelling incoherently. Let's give him an "A" for multi-tasking and an "F" for sanity. But in our neighborhood, the bar is pretty high to be noticed. Just ahead of us is "the Rasta". His boat is festooned with streamers (clearly the monks of Nepal were engaged for the exterior design work). It's only about 28 ft and doesn't look seaworthy enough to travel very far. The Rasta plays the drums at all hours of the day and oh, yeah...

One of the pastimes in St. Maarten's Simpson Bay is to watch the yachts traverse the Simpson Bay Lagoon Bridge. The bridge opens three times a day and has a maximum width of 56 feet. Fortunately for us, the St. Maarten Yacht Club and their happy hour is perfectly timed for the 5:30 PM opening. Sailors crowd onto the patio and prepare the cheer the boats coming in and going out, as mega-yachts often have mere inches of clearance on each side. To see what happens when the wind picks up unexpectedly at this moment, go on You Tube and look for "Azteca hits Simpson Bay Bridge". Poor, poor Azteca. I think the captain waits tables now. Most of the boats that go in and out are your typical sailboats but then occasionally, something truly amazing happens. As the bridge closed we went back to our drinks, a bit disappointed by the evening show. Suddenly at 6:00pm the bridge starts to open (at a cost of $1,000 to the boat owner - the equivalent of a toll to them), and in comes "...

 This is one of our bucket list items. Sailing into Gustavia harbor on our Amel. I had the chills as we anchored and went ashore. Kirstin and I have been to St. Barths every year since 2003 when we came here on our honeymoon. We'd rent a villa for a week or ten days, enjoy the restaurants, beaches, etc. It was the best week of the year, and we always went on our anniversary week in November. The problem with coming to a place you love for just a week is that it takes a day to unwind from the travel, the last day is ruined when you are flying back home, and you are constantly thinking about how short the time is. Tick. Tick. Tick. But this is weird. When we checked in, we asked the immigration guy how long we could stay. He told us we could stay as long as we want. It's about $20 per day to anchor in Gustavia. It's strange being here with a completely open end as far as departure. We're thinking at least 4 weeks.........maybe 6. We will have to cook more aboard because...

Today was the big day......our Prodeco electric bikes made landfall in Anguilla. Nice flat island, no wind, great dinghy dock..........all the ingredients for a nice day (or so we thought). After repeatedly forgetting all the regalia required for this adventure..........bike keys (yes, electric bikes have keys), batteries, helmets, etc., we got everything we needed to shore in two very overloaded trips. Then the ceremony of the assembly. Various allen wrench tightenings, bike unfoldings, etc. The amused customs and immigration staff (two lovely ladies) watched in disbelief as we slowly got ready to ride......without pedaling. We left Road Bay in and created a mini dust-storm as our bikes sped away. As always, I just follow Kirstin as she rides faster than I do. So far, so good (or so we thought). Kirstin saw a seaside resort type place on the right, so we turned off the major road........and the road got progressively smaller, then unpaved, then unpaved and rocky.............and th...

Sometimes being wrong is just so good - and tasty. We checked out of St. Martin this morning after eight days with a completely new appreciation for this island (well, the French side at least). Our plan initially had been to spend  two days at the very most visiting - just enough time to check out the marine store and get some sleep after our overnight passage from Virgin Gorda in the BVI. In the spirit of people with all the time in the world, two days became eight and could have easily been longer... Tintamarre Island Here is what we learned to love in eight days: 1) Lolos - let us reiterate again how good Creole food tastes when made outside over charcoal and eaten communally overlooking the beach with a beer in hand. We developed a two time a day habit and are already going into withdrawal.  2) Patisseries - The French know how to eat and we are quick learners. The spots here have an incredible selection of breads, sweets, quiches, etc. You eat leisurely outside wa...

We arrived safely in Marigot, St. Martin and are officially in the French Caribbean. Our  passage was wonderful at a brisk 7 knots on a course that is notorious for being a motor right into the wind, despite almost being run down by the cruise ship "Norwegian Epic". We also saw whales only 7 miles off the coast of St. Martin. It made us misty eyed to run the French tricolors up our mast..........when we bought our boat we dreamed of this day. We are within sight of St. Barts and Saba. But wait.........not so fast. St. Martin for us normally invokes the worst of the Caribbean - Burger King, Duty Free shopping and traffic jams so bad we might as well be in DC. Well, that was the Dutch side. The French side we checked into has really been a pleasant surprise. The restaurants in Marigot and Grand Case are amazing. Little family owned restaurants called Lolos are everywhere and serve a mean shrimp creole with beans and rice for about $7. We have had some amazing nights out in ...

   Norman Island, BVI We're spending our last days in the BVI and leaving for St. Maarten/St. Barths/Anguilla on Monday. Just an 80 mile sail but we're excited nevertheless about getting closer to the "real Caribbean". Can't believe L'ORIENT will be soon in L'Orient, St. Barths (we named the boat after our honeymoon destination - the name means "place of dreams" in colloquial French). Our front yard - Jost Van Dyke BVI was fun but expensive.........a bag of Tostitos retails for $9 in the tourist grocery store and entrees at the most average restaurant start at $35. We set a new Tom and Kirstin record by not stepping foot in a restaurant for four straight days! We are looking forward to getting far enough southeast to have street food like we did in the Grenadines and Guadaloupe. We will also be locking the dinghy more regularly as well. But next stop is St. Barths and Anguilla, where we will be the riff-raff. Looking forward to coming up...

L'ORIENT is a big sailboat.........technically based on its length, it qualifies as a yacht. In the Port Annapolis Marina, it even stuck out into Back Creek because it didn't fit into a regular slip. But in the BVI, L'ORIENT is a minnow among whales. Pictured at left is just one of our mega-yacht neighbors here in Virgin Gorda. The sailboat in the background (not L'ORIENT) is 42 ft, to give you some perspective. The boom of this boat is about 4 ft wide, and it has 5 spreaders on the main mast. Not sure how many crew are required to sail this boat, but it's more than 3. But at least it's a sailboat. Some of the motor yachts are larger, and look like hotels floating on their sides.  Today we horrified our mega-yacht neighbors by doing laundry and hanging it out to dry all over the boat. We looked like a hillbillies to be sure, but hey.......this isn't our weekend toy; we live on this boat.  Tonight, while they eat caviar served by uniformed crew, we will be d...

Keeping Time in the BVI Kirstin and I were conventional souls in DC. We both worked hard during the day. Travel permitting, we met at the gym at 7:00 PM, and then dined together at some sensible ethnic restaurant where the lighting was too dark to see the menu. The overarching factor was that our lives ran according to a schedule. Airports, commutes, meetings.......time ruled everything. 7:15 was not the same as 7:30. Irrespective of where we found ourselves, you couldn't get away from the time. Your phone, TV, car, even IPOD told you what time it was, and thus- how little time you had before "the next thing". What a difference a month makes. This past Sunday, I found myself pondering with Kirstin if the stock market was up or down, thinking it was Friday. We wake up now when the sun is high enough to reach our faces in the aft cabin. Dinner time is a while after the sun goes down. We rarely know what time it is and usually have to think hard about what day it is...