Distracted By Spanish Virgins

Well when I made my last post I was thinking we’d be in Puerto Rico by now…yet I type from a bay in Vieques. Despite the ticking clock we have really found it hard to stop somewhere for just a few nights!

We were thinking of a bit of time in Culebra and then off to the main island….

Well the weather was amazing so after a few days in Culebra (and checking in which was a 2-day process) we went to Culebrita….and stayed for 5 days.

Then we went back to Culebra for a few groceries and some cell service….and stayed for 3 more days.

Then we decided to check out Vieques for a night or two…that was 6 days ago.

Now we are realizing that renting a car is tricky in Puerto Rico (and everywhere apparently since many car rental companies had to sell off part of their fleet to make it through COVID) so we are going to call today and see when we can get one and secure it for a week or two…so we might be here for a few more days :P

You might be wondering why we diverted to Vieques when I was pretty clear we have a timeline and many things to take care of before we head down to Bonaire (major provisioning, some gear for the boat, some lifestyle items for us and the kids, Liam’s COVID vax, laptop repair, and hopefully some exploring)…well you can blame the tiny glowing blue organisms that are WORLD FAMOUS in Vieques.

Greg really really wanted to see the bio-bay here (actually called Mosquito Bay) which is (probably depending on the source) the worlds best location to see bioluminescence. It’s even in the Guinness Book of World Records (not sure if that is an authoritative source of information though hahaha). This bay was said to be so filled with bioluminescence that even on a full moon you could see the critters.

Which is good because we were going to be there for the giant blood moon eclipse situation that was May 26th….awesome timing LOL. I was honestly on the fence about going down to Vieques…I was feeling some anxiety about getting our chores done. And being down to one laptop really makes me nervous since I have work to do and not having a back-up could create a big problem for me and others. Also we were running fairly low on food (and still are) as we’ve not been in a good place to do a deep provision since St. Martin (which we left in March).

** By deep provision I mean canned / dry goods that are VERY heavy and we don’t usually buy in large quantities without a car because they are very hard to carry when you are walking miles to a store. We have been slowly working through our canned goods, like tomatoes and beans, over the last few months and are down to the dregs…random can of beets, random can of mackerel. Proximity to the boat is one factor, another is cost. St. Martin was really awesome for groceries; huge selection and great prices. USVI also had a fairly ok selection (not great but ok) but the prices are TERRIBLE. So in the USVI we just got what we needed (fresh stuff) and didn’t re-up on the other stuff. Puerto Rico will be an excellent place, and price, for a deep provision, especially since after that we are going to Bonaire where I expect a good selection but also high prices again. Honestly it makes a big difference, like 2x the $….and our kids eat SO MUCH FOOD. I know you think I am saying what all parents say, but we have literally had many parents on our boat, or feed our kids on their boats and they all comment (in shock a bit) about how much our kids eat….***

Anyway, back to the story here.

Despite me being lukewarm about going, it was clearly something Greg felt strongly about. Which is to say he casually and vaguely made reference to it a several times (which is about as direct as he gets :P)…so off to Vieques we bashed…yes bashed, upwind into BIG waves that spilled through the windshield and right into the cockpit! It was a fun / challenging sail regardless of the saltiness and sailing downwind once we turned the corner and coasting down the south side was lovely. All in all it was about 25 nautical miles from Culebra to Vieques.

And since we were going to stop in a new island we thought we’d check out a couple anchorages. Instead of heading right towards the bio-bay (which you can’t anchor in, you anchor in a bay adjacent and take your dingy over there). We decided to stop first at Ensenada Honda, where we had 360 protection, peaceful mangroves and giant turtles…oh ya and bombs.

Bombs? Ya that’s right. Freaking bombs.

We had read about the high number of unexploded ordinances in the islands around here as a result of many years of bombing practice by the US military (ceased in 2003). On the charts in Culebra and Vieques there are many notes here and there about the risk of anchoring give the old bombs laying around…awesome. Interesting as well since some of these spots are very popular anchorages…like Baie De Honda in Culebra where there is a note on the chart but easily 30 boats permanently on moorings there and during non-COVID times is a very popular location to access the town. So Liam and I held our breath at the bow every time we anchored waiting for disaster to strike. It didn’t. While we were getting coffee one day, a lovely older man told us about one exploding off the beach in the water in 2008 in Culebra and he made it sound like it never happens (hence his story being worth telling an interested stranger). You gotta trust the locals and we felt a bit more confident as we moved from place to place.

On our 2nd morning in Ensenada Honda in Vieques though, around 9:00am while finishing our coffee and rallying ourselves to dig into homeschool with the kiddos we heard, and felt (!!), two deep ‘booms’ quickly in succession. Greg and I looked at each other in shock and our first thoughts, which int he moment weren’t said outloud but we debriefed on later, was that the rig (mast, shrouds and all the stuff that holds the sails basically) was coming down…but in the next second we were both up in the cockpit (after getting Liam to get the EFF out of the way LOL) and saw two plumes of dust / smoke right on the shore. Clearly it was two unexploded ordinances that had just changed their Facebook status to exploded.

Ok, deep breath. Boat is fine. Ok, deep breath. Kids are fine (though freaked out). Ok, deep breath. That was probably planned…right? Greg and I talked about moving, and did a bit of reading online, and then decided that those explosions were probably intentional as part of the island clean-up that is going on and will be for the next 10+ years…when they find bombs, they explode them, that’s the process. And given that this was shortly after 9:00am we imagined it was someone’s start of their to-do list for the day’s work.

Something like this: “So we have a big day today team! First off we are going to head down the 4th quadrant of the zone, just north of where that boat is anchored, and detonate those two UXO we found yesterday. That will give them a bit of a shock, eh?”…ok they probably didn’t end with “eh” given that we aren’t in Canada.

Sooo…long story short, the bombs went off, we decided to stay there for a few more days, we went snorkelling and rowed through the mangroves and then headed over to Sun Bay for some glowing night-time fun.

Sun Bay has a HUGE beach and it is dotted with happy vacationers from Puerto Rico (mostly) who are enjoying a break from the heat on the main island. The bay is very big and open to the south, which in the summer tends to have a roll so we decided that, for the first time ever, we’d set a stern anchor to keep the swell on our aft and minimize the rocking of our house. There was the odd other boat here and there (not more than 4 at anytime in this giant space) so we had tons of room to work with. Also the bay is fairly shallow (3m) so it was much easier to set (and reset) the stern anchor than it would be in, say 10m. Liam and I had our snorkel gear on and could help set it into the weeds by hand as Greg pulled in the lack on the line to slowly shift Matriarch into the right position.

Picking up the stern anchor today as we prepare to move on…definitely a success in this bay!!

Worked like a charm!! On the 3rd night a strong squall came through and the stern anchor dragged (we woke up with the wind, debated with each other if it was going to hold, then felt the boat rolling and new it had not….but it was raining hard so we decided to go back to sleep and deal with it in the morning!). We reset the anchor in the morning with much more rode (6:1) and so far so good. It’s pretty cool to see the swell coming in and not feel the boat moving much at all. Why have we waited so long to use a stern anchor??? Oh ya, because usually we are in busier bays, closer to other boats, deeper water, and the stern anchor is stored in the very bottom of a very packed aft locker hahaha.

On our second night in this bay we decided that it was time to make the mile or so ride, out into open ocean, over to Mosquito Bay. We left around 7pm and it was still very bright out, overcast with a big (not quiet full) moon expected to make an appearance around 9pm. Liam gets super anxious about rocks and reefs so he navigated for us with Navionics on Greg’s phone, we had the handheld radio, full gas tank, our spotlight and headlamps and off we went! The waves were a bit sketch but we made it there in one piece and soon turned off the outboard to begin the long row into the bay. If you haven’t done it, rowing in an RIB (rigid inflatable dingy) is VERY hard to do…it’s heavy (250lbs with outboard and fuel), not designed for that purpose, and of course was filled with humans. Everyone took turns and the kids enjoyed it for the most part.

Eventually we found ourselves in the centre of the bay, in the dark and started to notice a faint blue glow, almost white, when we dipped the oars into the water…honestly I was a bit concerned that it was just us aerating the water and that we weren’t going to see much. But about 10 minutes later that white-blue turned BRIGHT ASS BLUE and the whole bay came alive to our eyes. It was freaking awesome. Like memory of a life-time awesome. Liam, who really did not want to go on this adventure, was so excited to see this phenomenon that he kept saying over and over how happy he was that he came (ha, like he had a choice, I would have never let him stay behind - hard no.)

Paddling produced a huge cloud of blue fire underwater that was easily 4x the size of the oar itself and lasted for several seconds before slowly fading out of sight. Feet and hands were dipped, wiggled and splashed. Fingers were examined just at the surface and exclamations of sparkling hands were made over and over. “Mom look at this” and “Mommy watch this” was so frequent I felt like I spend most of my time whipping my head back and forth to watch them enjoy the bay rather than actually look at the bay itself. But that’s ok…what a cool thing for them to see and experience and remember. I did seem to have a knack for pointing out to the 4 that were playing over the side of the dingy the large, faintly blue shapes moving around and under the boat (sharks!!) and the smaller brighter blue shapes darting to and fro (other fish). We talked about how cool it would be to see something jumping out of the water but also were glad the sharks weren’t too active hahaha…

This what we saw!!! Not our picture; photo by James Garlick on seriouslytravel.com

One the way back we braved the waves (and the drizzle which started on our arrival and didn’t let up the whole time but that didn’t impact us too much), tired and happy and more than a little amazed at the ecosystem that was thriving in the bay right beside the one we were anchored in. I had made dinner in advance (parsnip, sweet potato and white bean stew) so when we got back to Matriarch we changed out of our wet, salty clothes and had a hot meal. We debriefed a bit on and all said we’d go back again if the weather was good.

So tonight we are looking at a second trip over there - it’s a bit windier which should prove challenging for the rowing portion of the night but those amazing blue creatures are calling us and we know, that at some point in the near future, duty and weather compels us to move on to Puerto Rico…more specifically to Salinas.

Manatees are the intriguing creatures awaiting us there…and hopefully a rental car.

Much love,

M