At 0800 Meermin and Veranda pulled anchor and left Flamingo Cay. It was to be a 30 mile trip south to Buenavista Cay. We’d chosen Buenavista Cay as our destination as it should provide the best protection from a northerly front that’s due in 2 days.
That’s the biggest drawback to the Jumentos, there are really very few options for riding out a front. So being close enough to Buenavista made it the logical choice.
We were able to sail for the first 13 miles, then it was 6 miles of motor sailing and we had to finish it up with an 11 mile motor directly into the wind. It wasn’t so bad but the winds were building as the day went on, so it was good to get there when we did.
About ten miles from our destination Meermin called us on the VHF and said that they had hit something, and had a terrible vibration in their starboard engine. Meermin is a Great Harbor N37 trawler with twin engines. We advised him to shut it down and run on one engine until we could drop the hook and dive on the prop later in the day. We had been about 1 mile behind, but were able to quickly catch up now that they were down to one engine.
Once we were a half mile in front of them we slowed down so they could keep up with us. They hailed us to apologize for being so slow….welcome to our world! We decided to anchor along the western shore of the cay for the night and move into the protection of the bight in the morning. The wind was from the east so this would enable them to shut down their engine an hour sooner and get under the boat to inspect for damage.
After diving under the boat, Art found that he had an abandoned fishing net wrapped around his starboard propeller. He was able to untangle it and was back in business as far as the 2 engine thing goes.
The girls spent an hour and a half doing some beachcombing and then it was back to our respective boats to enjoy the evening.
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