Log #43D Night time entry to Jamaica

Written at: Big Half Moon Key, Portland Bight, Jamaica

Jan. 28, 2007

Hi Folks,

We are at anchor off this isolated, shoal infested, sandy fringed, tree clad key 20 miles from Kingston harbour for a couple of days while waiting for our auto pilot to be returned. I wanted to get out of the yacht club and explore some of the keys and shoals around this part of Jamaica, and do some snorkeling, rather than just sit in the yacht club mooring, as comfortable as it was.

This log gets us into Jamaica, and finishes the long arduous 1200 mile passages we made to get this far, though unfortunately not to Cuba as planned. Going back to Antigua will be another strenuous series of hopefully shorter passages with more planned stops, but against the prevailing winds.

All the best,

Aubrey

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Log #43d Night time entry to Jamaica

Royal Jamaica Yacht Club

Kingston, Jamaica

Jan. 25, 2007

As we continued our sail from Cabo Rojo in the Dominican Republic, and continued to have problems with the self steering, we felt it imperative to get it fixed, so after the first day out decided to head for Jamaica. With the US embargo on Cuba the chance of getting a US piece of electronic gear repaired there was non-existent, and we physically could not manage a sail there, then another sail back to Jamaica or Puerto Rico to get it repaired after visiting Cuba. So Jamaica it was. Judy looked up the entrance for Kingston on our C-map to find it is a very complex entry, but well marked as it is a major shipping port. With the distance we had to cover it looked like we would be there at night, and neither of us felt like heaving to or tacking back and forth until daybreak for a daytime entry.

We were 100 miles out from the DR and when we made the decision had about 200 miles to go to Jamaica. The second day the winds settled down to light force 3 and 4 giving a quieter sail, but still two hours on and two hours off the wheel. Also Judy had a chance to tape the repairs she made on the main sail, and thus we were able to use both main (we left it triple reefed) and genoa, wing on wing. The third day out the wind picked up again to a brisk force 6 (about 25 knots) for a good fast sail wing on wing. As we were exhausted from two hour watches, Judy identified an anchorage in Jamaica, at Port Morant, closer than Kingston, charted as having lighted buoys and a set of range lights which should provide an easier night entry. OK, it looked good and was 39 miles closer than Kingston.

As we approached the first waypoint for our night entry, we did not see an entrance buoy nor did we see the range lights. We had to make a ninety degree course change, as there were shoals both sides of the entrance, unlit! We had furled the main and genoa and were motoring in very slowly, trying to pick out the several buoys marked on the C-map. Only one green flashing buoy was observed. We kept it to our port side as we closed what we thought was the entrance. Still no other buoy lights or range lights! I was getting very nervous about this narrow entry into the larger bay. At one point I thought "What if it is no longer used and they have put an unlit bridge across the entrance?" Judy then asked if I wanted to anchor outside the entrance. If possible, yes! She immediately checked the C-map and identified an area outside the entry channel to our starboard that should allow us to anchor in 20 to 30 feet of water (we still had no working depth sounder). We slowly left the "channel" to explore the area Judy recommended. I was very nervous and did not want to go much further, and we dropped the anchor, unfortunately going down wind. It dragged! That meant we had to haul it up and circle around in the dark to try another spot. I hate motoring around a strange anchorage at night, especially without a depth sounder in shoal infested waters. This time I just circled until facing into the wind and told Judy to lower the anchor again. It was difficult to tell if the boat was moving or not as we didn't have any land reference to identify our movement. Judy then reported we were dragging again! Wait... I put Veleda into neutral and told Judy to let out more chain, hoping this procedure would set the anchor better. When I then put Veleda into reverse, the anchor held. We had our anchor! (17 52.29N, 076 19.33W) Whew!

When I turned the engine off at 2200 after a 59 hour passage, I heard white noise from surf on a shoal somewhere not too far away. I was glad we had our anchor. Incidentally, the area in which we were anchored had no anchorage designation on our C-map. We just selected it as a possible site, hoping the anchor would set properly. There was a slight roll, and some wind, not too bad for such an open area. We still could not see any of the channel markers or buoys, except the one green flashing buoy marking a shoal on the far side of what was the channel. Our C-map indicated we had been coming up the channel ok, but when we could see no channel buoys, I was too frightened to attempt going through the narrow entrance in a blind pilotage mode, and was glad we anchored in a type of lagoon outside the bay.

We had a reasonable night's sleep after 59 hours of hour on hour off hand steering for 280 miles from the Dominican Republic. Next morning I saw shoals only 100 metres outside of us and forward of us; foaming water crashing over them making the white noise I heard last night. I hate to think what would have happened had we tried to cut the corner, or been even 50 yards off the channel, one side or the other. We saw the wreck marked to the east of the entrance, but even in daylight could not see the actual entrance. We found out later that the bay was no longer used for shipping and that only small open fishing boats used the area. All the lights had been discontinued except the green light marking the western shoal.

We didn't bother going ashore, but left at 0700, motoring west for Kingston. We were hailed by a police boat and showed them our exit papers from the DR. No problem, and they indicated we could do our entry procedures from the Royal Jamaica Yacht Club rather than stopping at the Customs dock first, then going over to the RJYC. The entrance to Kingston Harbour is indeed a complex one, which we were happy not to have to negotiate in the dark, and which I will describe in my next log.


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