I was nervous and a fraction scared. I’m always nervous and a fraction scared before a trip on my floating home, my 44 foot sailboat Solitude. After nearly two months on stilts in Curaçao Marine, lots and lots of paint, vanish, sweat and repairs she was ready to hit the high seas again. The night before I didn’t sleep to good caused by too many mosquitoes and I guess just being excited that Solitude was going back in her right element and me being able to use the toilet on Solitude again. There is a holding tank in the bilge where the used food is going into but to flush it into this anti-paradise, you need to pump sea water in the toilet and when you are not surrounded by the wet element, you have to use the toilets in a nearby building like the rest of the boatyard. I’m not very picky about using a toilet others have been on but when you come in, close the door and put the seat down and find the seat a bit to warm heated by another butt, you don’t really want to pull the newspaper out and enjoy yourself. I couldn’t wait to take a dumb on my own toilet.
I talked to the owners of the boatyard and they could launch Solitude within an hour. Perfect! Mark and Suzy, my good friends, owners of The Dive Bus and last year crew on the trip from Curaçao to The British Virgin Islands, were very excited when I phoned them and told the good news. They would help me sail from Curaçao Marine to Spanish Water, the main anchorage on Curaçao. An hour later the tractor had taken Solitude from the stilts and into The Caribbean Sea and was tied up in the launch slip. I jump onboard with a big grin on my face, it was nice to be back in the water.
A month before I got very bad news that my grandmother had passed away and I lost the feeling for traveling. I just wanted to go home to my family in Copenhagen and never go travel again. For a few weeks I thought about not putting Solitude back in the water, lock her up and get a plane ticket home but now I was the happiest man alive and I could feel my grandmother watching me proudly from somewhere beyond.
I started the Perkins 4.236 engine and first try it started with some water that was not very environmental good coming out of the exhaust pipe but after a minute the bad water was gone and clean sea water was running through the engines cooling system. The door to Mr. Perkins was opened and I kissed it. An expection of everything revealed a leak from the cooling system so I had to take off a part of the exhaust system and reseal it.
Mark and Suzy brought lunch and after an hour drying time for the seal we were ready to go. The adrenaline was pumping through my holster some call a body. To starboard (right) side was a diving boat and to port (left) was a huge high priced motor yacht that I could not afford to hit. That’s why I was nervous and a fraction scared. The lines were pulled off and we were free of the dock. The adrenaline was still present. I putt Solitude in reverse and pulled the rudder to port (left) to go straight because the propeller pulls to starboard (right). She moved very slowly away from the dock and pulled to port (left) getting very close the yacht I could not afford to hit. The bow (front) swung around helped by the wind and I set Solitude in forward gear, it was a perfect departure and I got Solitude under control. Mark and Suzy were impressed with my handling of my floating home, I didn’t tell them that I was scared out of my pants but it is like that every time I go sailing. I have talked to many very experienced sailors around bars and places in the Caribbean area, at first they will not admit it but after a few beers under the west they are all nervous and a fraction scared before a journey, that’s just the way it is. I do think though that when you are nervous you are so much more alert about things onboard so in a way I guess it a good thing.
We called Fort Nassau, the guys that controls all traffic in the harbor, on the VHF to get them to open the Queen Emma Floating Bridge and after half an hour we sailed past the beautiful old colorful buildings of Willemstad with tourists taking photos of us, Mark and Suzy was stoked, it was great and in the mouth of the St. Anna Bay we opened a well deserved beer.
Punda side of Willemstad and skipper to the right.
The Queen Emma Floating Bridge and skipper to the left.
The waves where not very big but the wind was against us so we motored all the way without sails. Past The Dive Bus hut with Ellie and Crowley, two dive instructors waving their arms off. The trip to Spanish Water took around an hour and a half after a short stop at Curaçao Yacht Club for refueling and I was back at anchor, life is great.
I was nervous and a fraction scared again. After a week in Spanish Water it was time to set sails bound for Aruba. I had never been there and my friend Crowley, instructor at The Dive Bus wanted to come sailing, something he had never done before and his visa for Curaçao was about to expire so why not help a friend… my visa wasn’t any good either and even worse, Solitude had been too long in Curaçao. A sailboat can only stay in Curaçao for six months without paying tax and Solitude had been there nine months, we had to go.
I didn’t sleep very well that night. Again. During the day I got things ready, bought food and beer and gasoline for the dinghy. I picked up Crowley in the dinghy at the little local fisherman harbor five o’clock. We had some food I had prepared during the day and took the anchor up and left 17.30. There had been a lot of wind the past two weeks but as soon as we came out of Spanish Water the wind dropped. We looked at each other and laughed, so typical when sailing on Solitude. The wind came back after twenty minutes coming from north east with a speed around fifteen knots, it was perfect. We opened a beer when the sun was about to set and sailed on with the autopilot, Otto running. Every time I go sailing I’m amazed how many stars there are, it is one of the most beautiful things when you are out there. The night went on without any great things, only a few tankers passed us and when we got free of Curaçao the waves picked up but nothing serious. In the distance we could see the lights from Aruba. We were tired but I had to stay up during the night in case something happened, Crowley slept a couple of hours. Aruba got closer and closer. On the sea chart I could see we were about 5 miles off the coast and no reefs surrounded Aruba this far out. We passed the oil refinery and sailed the last 12 miles towards Oranjestad, the capital of Aruba. The sail was reduced as we got closer to Oranjestad, now we just needed a bit of light. The light came with an amazing sunrise, the whole sky was orange but I was too tired to find my camera. All of a sudden I saw a fin about fifty meters from Solitude but it disappeared again. Two minutes later we had 4 dolphins cruising the bow and us standing with a smile on our lips. What a way to come to Aruba. The dolphins stayed with us for ten minutes. When they were gone we rolled in the sail and wanted to start Mr. Perkins but he refused to do anything and my adrenaline was back. I tried different things but realized that for some unknown reason the engine was in gear. Mr. Perkins started when I put the gear in neutral and looked at Crowley saying, I was never nervous… we laughed! On the VHF we were guided south to another harbor called Barcadera because immigration and customs were very busy with cruise ships. From Curaçao to Aruba had taken us fourteen and a half hour with an average of 6 knots (12 km/t) which is very slow if you are doing anything but sailing.
Not like a lot of islands in the Caribbean Sea, the immigration officer and customs were very friendly and it only took around half an hour. We motored back to Oranjestad and put down the anchor south of the town. My watch read ten o’clock, I had been awake for 30 hours now and passed out as soon my head felt my pillow and we had finished our anchor beer.
