Page 25 - Yachter Spring/Summer 2021

A call from our good friends Chris and Katie offering us their villa and dock could not have come at a better time.We were getting worried about civil unrest, food shortages, and other restrictions being imposed.We moved Henry to the dock and felt a wave of relief knowing that we were safe.There must have been around 50-60 boats at anchor off Jolly Harbour. Every morning we would listen in to the 0900 VHF radio net, ably run by Karen and Mike van Rensburg of LighthouseYachting.This proved to be a wonderful lifeline for all of us, with shared information and offers of help from all quarters plus updates on local government restrictions. One day Merrill from yacht Ambition (Canadian) suggested that we might have an evening Cocktail Net. He got the job and ran this successfully for 59 days.The Cocktail Net featured a quiz hosted by a different boat each evening which proved to be great fun with a truly international flavour.We made lots of friends although hardly met any of them!
William
When the main part of lockdown hit, I was in the UK, working from home. It very quickly became apparent that we were not going to be able to stick to our original plan of heading to the USA with Henry.With hurricane season officially starting on 1 June, it was time to make a plan B quickly.After considering many options we decided that sailing Henry home to the UK was the most sensible thing to do.
Chris and Katie
Discussions commenced with Sean Deveraux, the manager of Rodney Bay Marina (a real star throughout this drama), to see if we could organise a crew to sail Associate 3 back to Antigua for the hurricane season.This all proved impossible, but even
if we had found crew Associate 3 and her crew would not be allowed to enter Antigua. After discussions with Peter and Wendy, then William,‘TeamWhatley’formed,and a‘Task Force’ was set up.
William
The plan was hatched that I could sail Associate 3 from St Lucia up to Antigua singlehanded, before joining my parents for the Atlantic crossing aboard Henry. I spent many hours searching Sky Scanner looking for flights to the Caribbean and researching local COVID regulations for many countries. I had booked several flights only to have them cancelled and was almost ready to give up and accept the fact that there was no way of flying to the Caribbean in early June. On 3 June whilst eating my lunch and having one last look through Sky Scanner, I noticed an Air France flight to Martinique leaving Heathrow at 1830 that same evening. Without too much hesitation, I booked it, packed and left the house heading to the airport all within two hours. I remained sceptical of the flight, thinking it would be cancelled.To my surprise I checked in at Heathrow with no problems. In flying to Martinique,I had to stay overnight in Paris, this all went without a hitch until halfway
CRUISING REPORTS 25