The Beginning of the End

It’s the beginning of the end. We’re in the process of leaving Cuba. Big provisioning runs. Goodbye parties. Boatwork. More boatwork. Diesel. Gas. Propane. Rum. New crew.

Leaving Cuba

I decided our route the other day: Cuba, Grand Cayman, Hobbies, Providencia, San Andres, Bocas Del Torro and then through the Panama Canal. A likely longer stop in Bocas for some boatwork.

The thing is – we found a rum that we really like and it’s relatively cheap. Cayman, Hobbies, Providencia and San Andres are all difficult, expensive or impossible to procure rum.

So this happened.

Havana Club

I can explain.

Since it’s difficult/expensive to get rum in the first part of our run – we need to have enough rum to last us over a month. When we really started figuring how much rum that would be – well… It’s a lot.

We bought one store out of rum, then started on the second store.

Add in a couple of cheap wines for sangria and some white rum for mixing. Then the mixers. Then a bit of beer. Suddenly you are sleeping with rum bottles surrounding your bed every night.

Anyways, onward. We are leaving as soon as the wind turns East enough, long enough. That looks like a couple of days away. We’re very ready, so sooner is better.

Moving on means getting all the “that can wait, but it needs to happen before the next sail” projects (which have been piling up) out of the way. Replacing the boom topping lift. Fixing the lifelines. New belts on the engines. Check fluid levels. Fill up fuel. Run the watermaker. Get ice, stockpile a bit of fish. Put things away (it’s amazing how everything seems to migrate out of it’s place and begins to slowly cover any horizontal plane). Tighten it all down.

I’ll be happy to be underway.

The first stop (Cayman) isn’t all that far. Then we’ll stop and reprovision and wait on weather. Than a longer hop to the Hobbies, where there is rumored to be excellent fishing. Then a blind (weather) run to Providencia, possibly with the wind in our face. That’s the most worrisome part of the trip – Hobbies to Providencia – as we will have limited access to weather reports (unless I get the SSB working and can pick up Chris Parker – fingers crossed).   But all in all – relatively short passages, relatively close to land. Much more like island-hopping than our crazy ride from Panama direct to Cayman.

So there it is.

The next time you’ll hear from me will likely be in Cayman, heading to the Hobbies (and then it’ll be radio silence for a bit again, until Providencia).

The Beginning of the End