Wednesday, 14 Feb: Very loud banging in the aft cabin in the night, as small waves are hitting out the stern square-on. We couldn’t sleep so we both moved beds: Glen to middle cabin, Oana on the settee in salon.

A heavy shower threatens our plans of going to town, but soon clouds clear away, leaving behind a beautiful rainbow.

Valentines Day today, and Glen treats Oana to an English breakfast in the students “canteen” …. romantic eh? Then to a trip back to ACE hardware store and 2 supermarkets in search for fresh fruits. What a lovely day!

University bus was the preferred mean of transport both ways. In Excell plaza supermarket we find out there is a shortage of bananas on the island, and that we should try our luck on Friday. Then in the wholesale supermarket down the road, we manage to find some nice frozen prawns and pork chops … guess who will have to light up the BBQ soon?!

Back to the boat, we pay for mooring and then prepare for departure. It was only US$10 per night on the mooring buoy, good value. We need to get moving, to make some water out at sea and to see the rest of the bays on the south coast.

Feels so long since we moved, we even take out the departure check list, to make sure we don’t forget anything.

Few minutes out of the bay, and the waves are in full swing, getting bigger by the minute as we sail away from Grenada full-on into the Atlantic swell. To get to the next bays we have to sail upwind. At first we sail with reefed genoa. The wind is touching 30 knots, 37 over the deck. And the waves are enormous – at least 4m. Cloudy Bay leaps over what seem like mountains of wave, then crashes down into the next trough burying her bow. Then as the bow comes up again, water is hurled backwards along the decks, and up to and over the spray-hood.

While Glen tries to focus on sailing the boat, Oana is determined to capture a good video of waves crashing onto the decks and over the spray top. But she gets more than she bargains for… she thinks she is safe with the camera on the aft deck, but a huge wave crashes right over the boat and over Oana too! She is soaked from head to toe. Let’s see how good that looks on the camera!

After 1h sailing out to sea, the waves are so big they are starting to break – just like surfers like! Glen is worried one wave might break over the dinghy, filling it with 1 ton of water, which will get us in serious trouble – basically the davits would break off!

So we bear away from the wind, with reefed main and cutter and the waves seem less dangerous now.

In bearing away, we will no longer be able to reach the proposed destination, so looking on chart for alternative. As we get closer to shore, waves look like they are no longer towering down on us, so we change course for the original destination, St.David’s Bay.

It’s a very tricky bay to get into, with rocks sticking out and shallow water. We are focusing on furling the mainsail away, and once the action is completed we turn around, and we see rocks just 50m in front of us. Luckily, at the same time we also spot the buoys that are marking the entrance channel. Without a plotter it would certainly be very difficult, if not impossible to navigate into here.

Once in the bay, it’s all suddenly quiet, and feels weird to see waves crushing just 100m behind us. The peace is welcome, and we anchor in the head of the bay next to Grenada Marine.

After our late lunch, Glen engages into one of his favorite activities, cleaning the salt off of everything in the cockpit. As for everything else, well that can wait for the next rain shower.

Few days ago we were commenting that we should put some Boricol on the decks, as too much fresh water from the rain will damage the teak. But after today’s sailing, there’s definitely no need for Boricol, decks are thoroughly soaked in salt water!