DR Heading West
Saturday 6 April – Saturday 13 April
We depart our anchorage in Salinas at
10 Saturday morning, Ultra had already left at 8:30. We have
a slow rolly sail, winds are light and seas have good long rollers
but we are able to sail. By 2 we finally put the motor on for the
last hour and are anchored by 3 next to Ultra in the small
basin at Barahona. As we are anchoring we hear a guy yelling over at
Ultra, who are doing their best to ignore him. We are pretty
sure he is one of the “officials” we need to check in with but he
just needs to wait a few minutes to let us get anchored, settled in
and put the dinghies down. At one point he looks like he is telling
us to bring the big boats up to this “dock” which neither of us
would fit into. By 3:30 Bill & JoAnne come by to pick up Steve
and they go over to check in. The guy in the red pants that had been
yelling to us is with immigration and he and 2 other officials along
with a local that speaks better English all go over to Ultra.
Yes it was a full dinghy. Ultra gets cleared in then they come
to our boat to clear us in. We let them know we need our
international despacho to leave the country, as this is the last port
to do that at. We need to go to the main office to get our passports
stamped. Bill drops off all 3 customs guys at the nearby dock, and
comes back to our boat with JoAnne & the the
interpreter to pick up Steve & I. We go
over to the government dock, which is a big concrete dock NOT made
for dinghies. The locals are looking at us like it's OK to leave
your dinghy here, but they don't understand that it would shred the
dinghy. So we climb out using a fishing boat and Bill takes the
dinghy down to another vessel tied up to ask the captain if we could
tie to his boat. It is a research vessel exploring sunken ships and
he kindly says yes. Next we pile 6 people into a tiny car to go to
the immigration office. Get our passports stamped and will have our
despacho the following morning. Car ride back towards the docks we
see some stores are open so get out and stock up on a few more
provisions. Dinner on Ocean
Star that evening.
Sunday
Bill, JoAnne & Steve go over to the nearby dock to get our
despacho but learn via the translator they have to go to the main
office. They go back over to the government dock and tie up to the
research vessel again and this time walk to the immigration office.
Some how the walk up was shorter than the car ride the day before.
Back to the boats and we are cleared to leave the DR even though we
have several more stops to make. We all go over to Ultra
and spend the afternoon planing and making routes for our upcoming
passages, then finish with dinner on Ultra.
Bill brings us back to our boat (our dinghy is still raised up on
the arch) and we climb aboard, as Steve is unlocking the companion
way I hear some one talking. It is in Spanish so I am looking around
in the water for either someone swimming or in a boat. Then I see a
young man sitting down behind our starboard side steering wheel, and
yell to Steve that someone is on our boat. He yells at the guy,
asking what are you doing. I yell for Bill to come back with the
dinghy. Not sure what he wanted, he was NOT threatening if anything
he was afraid of us and rightly so. The boat had been locked up and
it did not appear that he even tried to get in, all the items in the
cockpit (shoes, cushions, towels) were not moved. You could see the
blue paint from the bottom of our boat that had come off on his feet
and the paint was just by the aft section where he was crouched down.
Think that is why he started talking, to let us know he was there.
He tried to say something in Spanish about home but we did not
understand and did not want any part of whatever he thought he was
doing. Bill took him to the near by shore even though he wanted to
go a little further, but Bill was not going for that. Guess we will
now also keep a look out for stowaways.
Monday we are underway to Isla Beata by 7:30, Ultra having departed earlier, we both have great sails over. Anchored by 3 off a beautiful beach in turquoise water with a little fishing camp and a Marina de Guerra outpost. Just relax on the boats that evening and enjoy the quiet, and a sky full of stars at night. Tuesday after lunch we go “check in” just stop by the guard house to let him know we have our papers. They are making soup with an enormous lobster, easily 5 lbs, and allow us to take some photos. We walk the beach in both directions when it ends it goes to jagged iron rock, which we walk along for a while also. The NE end being a lot more jagged. Back to the boats to get our snorkeling gear and head over to the headland to snorkel and explore some caves. After the hot walk the cool clear water feels wonderful. Back to the boats to clean off and watch another beautiful sunset followed by dinner on Ocean Star.
Wednesday
underway by 11:30, Ultra
left at 10, to head over to Bahia de las Aguilas (Bay of eagles). We
have a great sail over with full sails doing 8.5 to 9.5 knots
downwind. With a lunch stop along the way in a bay that looked like
it might be good for snorkeling BUT was NOT good anchoring as holding
was terrible. On to Bahia de las Aguilas where at 4 PM we find GREAT
holding in sand & turtle grass (no turtles or conch) and a
BEAUTIFUL ISLOLATED beach ! One of those extraordinary rare spots
that you just imagine what sailing is all about. Breath taking even
to us after 3+ years of sailing and anchoring in many beautiful
spots. Sunset and dinner on Ultra
as we admire our surroundings.
Thursday
late morning JoAnne & I go in to walk the beach. Run into a
couple of locals who speak English and are so friendly and happy and
surprised to see us. This is even a remote spot for locals, who come
from Barahona about 70 miles away by land. Back to boats at 1:30 for
a swim & lunch. Bill & JoAnne go out in the dinghy to see if
there is any good snorkeling, but just grass. Stop back at our boat
for an afternoon drink then a boat of fishermen come by to sell us
lobster. The negotiation on price went on for some time with some
pretty funny interpretation before we finally settled on an agreed
price. We had them break off the heads so they could keep them and
they cleaned the tails for us also. Dinner on Ultra of grilled
lobster tails & Steve made carrots & rice & a cucumber
salad to go with it.
Friday
underway at 8:30 to go 5 miles to Cabo Rojo to see if we can get last
minute internet, NOT a very pretty anchorage, an Alcoa mine creating
a lot of dirt in the air. We worked our way in to anchor up wind of
this and the beach is supposed to be pretty but with the industry
around it no longer is. That and as I was up on the bow coming in
watching for sand to anchor in I saw a LOT of jelly fish !!!!! We
are anchored by 10:30 and YES we have internet.
We
were just going to stop for a few hours and rest before doing our
overnight to Ile A Vache. Ultra left at 2:30 then an hour
later they called and said they were coming back. A wind gust of 35
K broke their main sail baton, and when they got in discovered the
main sail was pulling away from the sail slugs. These downwind runs
can be hard on a rig also. They got things repaired and we all had a
restful night changing plans to depart the following day on Saturday.
No comments:
Post a Comment