Why are you sailing southward back to Guadeloupe, Dominica and Martinique?

Well, most people our age have difficulty admitting (and accepting to say the least) that they are getting older and signs of that aging are beginning to make themselves felt.  “You are only as old as you feel” so the saying goes.  Both Carsten and I feel us much younger than the number on our birth certificates but, unfortunately, we have to admit that our physical decline has started.  We’ve reached the “need of repair age”.  That is difficult to accept.

No need for all the gory details – the short version is that neither Carsten nor I feel “fit for fight” for the long passage west to east over the Atlantic.  We simply don’t feel physically up to such a strenuous passage and have therefore made the difficult decision to have Capri freighted over the Atlantic on a ship.

So, if everything goes according to plan, Capri will be loaded on a Seven Star freighter at Le Marin, Martinique on May 21 and get a ride to Europe.

On our way south to Martinique, we make a Pit Stop at Isle de Saintes a group of five small French islands just south of Guadeloupe.  We had to pass these islands by on our way northward as we were pressed for time.  We had to pick up Torben and Kirsten on Guadeloupe when we came this way last.  If you want to be anywhere near the town, you have to take a mooring ball.  The few anchorages are far away.  Carsten and I normally never take a mooring ball, but this time we made an exception.  We moored just outside Bourg des Saintes, the main town on the island group’s largest island, Terre d’ en Haute.  These islands are probably the only islands in the Caribbean that have never known slavery.  Despite that, most of the population is of African descent-although they came here voluntarily.

Bourg des Saintes is a small charming town with older well-maintained houses sporting gingerbread facades.  They look a bit like overgrown dollhouses.

The ferry from Point a´´Pitre runs many times per day so there are lots of same day tourists.  There are few, if any, hotels or Air B&Bs.    There are many cruising sailors here.  A number of them are anchored by the neighboring islands, Cabril or Terre a´en Bas.  It is a short dinghy between the islands.  There are no restaurants or stores on the other islands so all the cruisers come here to shop.

Flemming and Isabel are here also so, just like the other tourists, we rented an oversized golf cart and toured the island.  It was a nice trip although it started wet.  A heavy squall passed over just as we got the golf cart.  Vinni, Carsten and Isabel duck into the nearest store while Flemming has to take a test drive with the rental agent.  The deluge continues for an hour and Flemming still hasn’t returned.  Isabel is beginning to get nervous.  She thinks Flemming has gotten lost, “Pathfinder he isn’t she says”.  Finally we can see him come flying down the street as fast as the golf cart will go.  It turns out that virtually all the streets are one-way, so Flemming has been most of the way around the island already.  The island is pretty and the lunch afterwards good.

We have a date in Le Marin on May 21 and we need to go south.  A week before the tentative load date, we dropped Capri’s anchor in Le Marin’s bay.  Out timing is perfect it turns out.  The morning after we arrive, a freighter sneaks into the bay.  We’re astounded.  We’ve anchored here any number of times and never seen a freighter come into the bay.  Freighters normally sail to Fort de France.  Looking closer, we can see a number of boats standing on the freighters deck.  That wakes us up, especially as the Captain drops his anchor not far from Capri.  During the day, the freighter loads eight sailboats.  We follow the procedure closely as we know that next week it will be our turn.

One of the last evenings, we have dinner with Isabel and Flemming.  Their adventure is just beginning (they will spend another season in the Caribbean, then sail into the Pacific and eventually end on either New Zealand or Australia) our adventure is coming to a close. 

We’ve done everything we need to do for Capri to be shipped.  We have taken down the sails, and lashed everything that can possibly move down tight.  Below we packed everything, emptied the refrigerator and pickled the watermaker.  We’ve rented an air B&B for the last nights before loading Capri and flying out.  Thank God we don’t have far to crawl after our dinner with Isabel and Flemming.  We had a bit too much – the margaritas were good.  Perhaps we should not have had that last drink.  The next morning, I’m destroyed and suffering from my “sins” of the night before.  Carsten, who never gets a hangover (damn him) is bright-eyed and chipper (sometimes I hate him).

A new freighter, Stadiongracht, has arrived and Seven Star has moved our load date up one day so May 20 is the big day.  We are both melancholy since this really is the defining day for the end of our nine-year adventure.  My eyes tear up as I think back over the past nine years and all the wonderful people we have met and thigs we have seen and done.  Of course, I’m looking forward to coming home to family and friends and starting a new chapter in our senior lives, but right here and now, imagining what that will turn out to be is beyond me.  What will life as a landlubber be like?

We were supposed to load midafternoon, but the loadmaster has moved us up a couple of hours.  We’ve left the marina in very good time, so an hour and half before we are supposed to load, we are lying ahull a hundred meters from the ship watching them load two other sailboats.  We pay special attention to how the crews get back off the ship.

The loadmaster waves us over to the ship and Carsten lays Capri neatly against the two huge fenders hanging from the ship.  We’ve set all nine of our own fenders on the starboard side (against the ship).  As I wrote, Carsten laid Capri neatly alongside, but things, of course, don’t go as planned.  >One fo the crew throws a gigantic line down to me, but he has forgotten to tie it on at the ship end so now the entire pile fo rope is lying on Capri’s foredeck.  Carsten is having difficulty keeping Capri neatly alongside, as the wind and current keep pushing Capri away.  He yells, “What the hell is going on?”   After a few more tries, we manage to get both a fore and after line attached.  I should mention here that the lines are no ropes they are enormous belts.

Now the loadmaster yells down for us to release the belts and sail away from the ship.  What the F***?  It seems they need to turn the last sailboat they loaded, which they will do with the crane and the boat in slings out over the water.  They don’t want Capri under just in case the boat falls. 

Finallyu, they wave us back alongside and it is “same procedure as last time”.  This time, I’m at the helm and Carsten takes the lines, which he manages to grab and make fast first time around.  The loadmaster and other crew climb down the rope ladder and get ready to get the slings under Capri.  We have already removed our afterstay and the lazy lines on our lazybag.

The crane lowers the slings and the loadmaster gives directions to the two divers who go underneath Capri and make sure the slings are both where they ae supposed to be and tight.  Everything is now ready.

We are still on board with the loadmaster and crew. Slowly the crane lifts Capri.  When we get to the ship’s railing, Carsten and I will go from Capri to the ship.  Needless to say, we are now high above the water.  The loadmaster instructs me on how to climb over our own railing, over onto a rope ladder and from there onto a board 10 centimeters wide.  I grip the rope ladder like it is life itself (which it is) while noting that the ropes look rather frayed (believe me, I can get nervous over many little things).  I get a foot on the miniature board and look down.  Now everyone knows that when you are high up you shouldn’t look down.  I did and my pulse immediately doubled.  The loadmaster grabs my hand and hauls me aboard.  Whew!  Carsten comes nonchalantly over as if he has been doing this all his life (damn him).  We stand there in the deck watching as Capri is hoisted even higher and finally brought inboard and set down.

We never like to see Capri hanging in the air and we are happy it is well over.

Capri is immediately surrounded by at least ten crew who begin to set supports, weld the supports to the deck, release the slings etc etc.  Organized chaos, but it looks very professional.  Everyone seems to know exactly what is expected of them and they know exactly what to do.  A crewmember brings a ladder and we can go aboard Capri to reconnect the afterstay and get our backpacks.

We end up waiting an hour for the pilot boat to come get us and bring us ashore.  The pilot comes on board, we disembark and even before we are off the ladder down, we can feel the ship weighing anchor.

How in the world am I going to get down the long ladder to the pilot boat?  I’m not a pilot used to doing this and I’m not used to jumping from a ladder onto a bobbing pilot boat laying alongside a big ship.  My legs are simply too short to go from the ladder to the boat easily.  The ladder ends two meters above the water, the pilot boat is bobbing around, the ship is weighing anchor and we can both hearand feel the engines throbbing louder and louder.  Carsten decides to jump over first, turn around and  lift me over.  No man or woman overboard.  Thank goodness.

From the pilot boat, we wave to Capri and wish her a good crossing.  It is a strange feeling that she will be making an ocean passage without us.  We tell Capri that we will be waiting on the pier Wednesday June 4 in Southampton (UK) to welcome her.  From there we will sail directly to Denmark.

Our plan is to make landfall in Lynetten harbor August 30, 2025 at exactly 12:00 o’clock.  We hope that family friends and our blogreaders will be there to welcome us home after nine years at sea.