Fajardo, Puerto Rico, Preparation for Hurricane Season 2016

Although it was only 22 miles from Culebra to Fajardo, we didn’t want to make our last passage of the season in rough weather, so we left for Fajardo a week earlier than planned.  We are glad that we did, as we were able to accomplish many cleaning maintenance projects.  The weather is very hot and humid here with little breeze in the marina, so our working day is sometimes short.  We are storing Silent Dream on land at Puerto Del Rey Marina, and like other marinas, there are rules.  All the sails, canvas, and all items on deck have to be taken down and removed.  The dinghy needs to be covered with a tarp and secured to the deck.  The boat must be secured with tie down straps to the concrete pads in the hurricane tie down land storage area.  Silent Dream was hauled out with a 70 Ton Travelift and then transferred to a hydraulic boat lift and backed into the land storage area very close to the other boats.  We had to hire a crane to remove the mast so that the mast foundation inside the boat can be rebuilt.  During this time we will have all of our standing rigging replaced, after all, it is 33 years old!  Silent Dream is now securely on land waiting for her makeover and repairs.  We are now in the States and are very excited to see our family and friends!  Come back to our Blog in the Fall when we return to our home, Silent Dream.

Culebra, Spanish Virgin Islands

We spent two weeks in St. Thomas, provisioning, repairing and cleaning getting ready to sail to Culebra.  We sailed to Culebra on June 5, 2016, one of two main islands called the Spanish Virgin Islands, part of Puerto Rico.  Silent Dream dropped anchor in Ensenada Harbor near the main town of Dewey.  Culebra is a very quiet, beautiful island with many beaches, although most beaches are approached best by water and not by land.  In 1939, the U.S. Navy began to use the Culebra Archipelago as a gunnery and bombing practice site. This was done in preparation for the United States involvement in World War II and used in this manner until 1975.  Flamenco Beach is considered one of the most beautiful beaches in the world and also the site of two rusting Sherman Tanks left by the U.S. Navy in 1975, decorated by the locals with graffiti.  We rented a golf cart for the day and toured the entire island after spending time at Flamenco Beach.  Our self-guided tour included Tamarindo Beach, Museo Historico de Culebra (built in 1905 by the U.S. Navy and used as a munitions warehouse), cemetery built in 1894, a drawbridge built for two fishing boats that no longer exist, and several good restaurants including Mamacitas, Zacos Tacos, and Dinghy Dock Restaurant.  Hector Protector, a recycled wood sculpture on the dock throwing rocks at polluting boats was built in 2014 for an art festival in Culebra.  We stayed almost two weeks in Culebra before heading to Puerto Rico, 22 miles to the west.

St. John, An Underwater Paradise

We enjoyed St. John so much our first time through we had to stop again.  We checked into immigration in Cruz Bay on May 16, 2016 and stayed that night on a mooring ball in Caneel Bay.  Most of the bays in St. John are part of the U.S. National Parks and a mooring ball is required to protect the reef.  Our favorite spot is in Francis Bay, a protected bay except from the west with fantastic snorkeling.  We tried to snorkel as much as possible which was easy, all we had to do was jump in the water off the back of our boat and head towards shore.  We have a new waterproof camera and took some great pictures and videos.  We hope you will enjoy these as much as we enjoyed the beauty of this underwater paradise.   We wanted to stay longer, but a part on the refrigerator stopped working which forced us to head for St. Thomas earlier than desired.  We were able, however, to spend seven wonderful days here exploring life underwater.  We saw sea fans, huge staghorn coral, fire coral, star coral, brain coral, Christmas tree worms, pillar coral, and elkhorn coral.  There were stingrays, large parrotfish, hawksbill turtles, remoras, French angelfish, trumpetfish, triggerfish, bigeyes, schools of 1,000 jackfish and many fish we could not identify.  The reef is full of unbelievable colors and shapes making the reef a never-to-forget experience.

Turn up your speakers, there is music with the videos!

Unfortunately, the videos do not display on an iPad.