Week 7 : Sint Marteen & Week 8 : BVIs

Night watch, St Marteen

Friday May 16th 2014

Week 7: Sint Marteen and Week 8 BVIs

Since we spent the last week in Sint Marteen shopping, provisioning and doing school , there is not as much news. All is well onboard Amelie.  

NEWEST PADI DIVER ! 

Newest certified PADI diver ! Congratulations Meg !

Meghan completed her open water dives and is now a certified PADI diver!  She can now dive down to 40 feet (with an adult).She and her dad look forward to exploring the many great dive sites in the BVIs over the next few weeks, including the famous wreck of  “The Rhone”. (FYI: She can dive over it , but not into it , as she is not a certified "wreck diver"). Meghan had some very interesting dives during her open water training; I will let her tell you all about it in her section of the blog…

Snorkelling fun:

Matthew lost his swim trunks (sigh!) while swimming and in my efforts to try and find them ( I didn’t). I found out that we were anchored almost right on top of a small wreck ! It was neat to see the many fish living right below us , including a very large barracuda (who "stood" very still perhaps in the hopes that I would not spot him). Meghan and I also snorkelled the reef near the boat, at “pelican point” and were very excited to see many large schools of fish, and a shark !!! (Grey reef shark) among the very nice rock and coral formation in the breaking surf. 

School of BlueTangs

Coastguards board Amelie !

We got boarded by the coastguard ! That was exciting ! As a routine check they stopped in to see us to make sure that we had adequate  amounts of life jackets (PFDs) as well as flares (which we had) we were also asked whether we had any weapons or drugs on board ( which we did not have !) All in all their visit only lasted about 15 minutes and after they had checked out all of our paperwork, they left. They were very professional and courteous and I for one, feel safer knowing those guys and gals are out there looking out for us !

The Coastguard visits us

Storm:

As part of the many items we have purchased for Amelie here in St Marteen, Mark bought a storm anchor. We already have two anchors of board, but he was looking to have a light weight anchor on hand to use in heavy weather , turns out timing could not have been better, as we had to use it that very night during an impressive storm (big rain, lighting and winds gusting to 35 knots). I wish I had taken video footage of that evening, as the swell and wind made it seem like we and all the boats anchored around us were underway  as we were all pitching forward on our anchors, wave crashing on the bow, it was exciting !  The storm lasted about 3 hours before the winds calmed down. We were glad to have the second anchor, set at an angle from our primary anchor,  off our bow. We were all able to sleep well that night thanks to this and to our anchor alarm (a GPS setting which lets us know if our anchor drags)  Good job captain Mark !

Mother’s Day: 

Mothers Day was a real treat ! I was spoiled ! First with breakfast in bed (thanks go to Cptn Mark) and then with a special song that Meghan and Matthew sang for me. (Meghan had taught Matthew a song, so beautiful, it brought instant tears  to my eyes! They also had each made a special card for me, I am a very lucky and very proud mom !  

Airplanes !  Upclose and personal : 

In order for captain Mark to get his airplane fix and as part of Meghan’s Science Unit on Flight , we went to visit MAHO beach at the end of the international airport  and got to experience the raw power of large jet engines as they take off and land right at the beach. When a jet takes off, it blows sand (and towels) with an impressive force and people run into the water  to get away from it all, or just to have fun. Meghan was “blown” away in this way by our very own Canadian Pride and Joy “West jet”. When the panes land, they are literally right above your heads, landing gear out, it gets your attention. Matthew and Mark were equally giddy with excitement watching the planes land.

Meg running from the jet blast, on Maho Beach, at the end of the international Airport

                                       

Surreal Experience !

Happiness is....

We left at 19:00 on Tuesday evening  to sail overnight to the British Virgin Islands. We arrived into Spanish Town (Virgin Gorda) at 8:30, just in time for school to start !

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Meghan on Amelie (Written in May 2014)

Hello everyone! In case you don’t know me already, I am Meghan the youngest of the "4Ms sailing" family and many people have suggested that I start a blog myself so wish granted! Welcome aboard the “Meghan On Amélie Kids Blog” (our adventure from my perspective)! I will try to do a blog about once a month for all the kids out there (this blog is mostly meant for kids, but adults are certainly welcome to read too).

As the youngest aboard Amélie IV (4) I am known (sadly) as swab! Yes, swab is the lowest class you can be on a ship but hey, I didn’t get too bad of a deal considering I have the most comfortable room in the boat with the most storage!

On board Amélie, we all do different things so I am here to talk about what I do onboard. 

Homeschooling:

As you probably know, my mom home schools me and Matthew which is what takes up most of my time. The big question everyone always wants to know is: “Do you like homeschool?” so I will answer that question once and for all. I enjoy what we are doing in every subject but it is not exactly what I expected. There are both ups and downs to homeschooling rather than regular school (in my perspective). 

One of the ups is (without bragging) I only have school until noon! That can also be a down though because I sometimes feel sometimes rushed through my work that I’d like to take more time on (but I am a huge perfectionist which affects that too!). Another up is definitely that I can really experience things I am learning about (or extra curricular things like scuba diving, museums, etc.) that I couldn't experience in a classroom. For example, when we went to see a volcano (Dominica Boiling Lakes-see blog: Week 3), I learned about how a volcano erupts while standing right beside one! The most obvious down though is that I don’t have my friends with me in class which was a hard thing to leave. It still is pretty cool though to meet up with other boating kids and ask what they do for school and if they like homeschooling. I hope that answers the question (by the way, here are some random pictures from the past month of school)!

Chores:

Another thing that the “swab” has to do aboard Amélie IV is chores. I do actually (most of the time) enjoy doing chores, mostly because I know I get a pretty good amount of money at the end of the week but also because I know it helps keep our beloved ship clean inside and out. My chores are in categories of: Daily Chores, Weekly Chores and Twice a Week Chores. There are some nice easy ones in there like making my bed but there are also some trickier ones (that yes I sometimes avoid) like washing the heads (bathrooms). 

Hobbies:

Hobbies I like to do on my free time (especially in the evenings) include doing art, reading or doing creative writing. I have just started to really like watercolour so I have done one painting so far. Right now, the art project I am working on is something that looks like stain glass but is really just a drawing with many pieces that has oil on it (I will post in a future blog when I am done). 

I also (as most kids do at my age) enjoy doing these elastic band bracelets called Rainbow Looms. I have even (as you see) made my own Rainbow Loom Shop (all bracelets are free!)! If you would like a Rainbow Loom bracelet, I will try to send one to you (wish me a lot of luck though!)! 

It is true that I don’t particularly love (but I still do like) reading but about a week ago, I looked at all my dozens books and decided that at least one has to be read! So I picked up a book called: Ella Enchanted by: Gail Carson Levine l  which is actually a really interesting book. It is about a princess who gets a curse when she is born and every order she is given she has to obey whether it is eating something she doesn’t want to eat or even cutting off her own head! As well as reading books, I also like to write them. They are just for fun but I do have a dream that one day, they might be published! And then of course, there is swimming which has no need for explanation (just pictures)!

Now that you all know what my role is aboard, I will tell you a bit more of our adventure.

Scuba Diving:

As you heard in the last blog (from my mom) I took my open water dives down in St. Maarten and am now officially an open water diver (PS: If you read this, thanks mom for letting me explain the dives and for advertising my blog!) I had a very funny and enthusiastic instructor named Henry who was my teacher through all 4 open water dives (in my pool dives back in Calgary I also had an excellent instructor so thanks to Ginny too if you read this!). On the first two open water dives, we saw some really cool wrecks like a sunken helicopter, boat, plane and merman figurehead (sadly I had no camera with me so I have no pictures). But after seeing a sunken sidewalk with white plumbing tube railings, I figured the dive site had sunken it all for us! We saw other cool creatures too though. While we were swimming and looking at the wrecks, my instructor stopped and picked up this type of weird sea urchin (do not worry, it was not a spiky one like Matthew stepped on-see blog: The Moments in Between-March 2013). He let each of us hold it (oh right, I was with 2 others who were doing their open water dives with me) which was really cool because all the little tentacles stuck to your hand. One of the hardest skills I had to perform was taking my mask off for 30 seconds (trust me, it is a lot harder than it sounds!). Imagine this, you take your mask off, your eyes are closed in water while you are thinking: what if my instructor lets go of me, what if I get water up my nose, what if he goes more than 30 seconds, how long do I have to stay in this darkness! It actually was more like that in my pool dives so I was more used to it this time.

On my two final open water dives, it started with a very bumpy ride over (not to mention, WET!) When we got underwater though, there was fortunately no current! We saw some really amazing creatures on these dives (ones that I thought I’d only ever see at the most twice in my life!)! We started by seeing a sea turtle which was amazing for me since they are my favourite animals! Here is a very important note though, if you ever see a sea turtle, don’t go too near to it (stay a couple of metres away) because if you don’t it will scare them and they will forget to swim to the surface (which would kill them). Probably, one of the coolest things (if not the coolest thing) I have ever seen was the rays. They were hiding in the sand at first so all you could see was their tail. Then my instructor shook some sand near it which made it realize it was found so it shook off and swam away. To give you the full picture, it was about the size of me (probably bigger)! We also saw a miniature cleaning shrimp (like the one in Finding Nemo), a non-blown up puffer fish (also like in Finding Nemo), a big (around 3 feet) trumpet fish and a moray eel (who was not too happy about us visiting his home! No harm done though!)! 

I hope you enjoyed my first blog ! Goodbye from everyone aboard Amélie IV!     

Week 8: BVIs,Virgin Gorda Island &Beef Island.

HAPPINESS IN THE BVIs.We are SO happy to be back and remembering why we love this place so much !  These islands are veritable jewels, such good sailing, so many great diving and swimming spots, exciting things to see and do. Everyone’s in great spirits here !

Jumping in at the Bitter End, B.V. Islands

THE BATHS : 

We started our stay in the BVIs re-visiting the beautiful rock formations called The Baths (off Spanish town, Virgin Gorda). Although this is our third time here, this place never ceases to inspire awe, and this time we brought our snorkeling gear and really took advantage of the great underwater sites to see   !  

The Baths, B.V.Is

Swimming back from the caves, The Baths

The beach at the Baths

The Baths

The Baths

FULL MOON PARTY: We then motored over to Treillis Bay, on Beef Island to take part in the "Full Moon Party" which we had missed a few years ago.Treillis Bay is a Mecca for artists and appreciators of art alike. It is a laid back but very “hip” place with a great atmosphere....Aragorn Studio and the pottery studio next to it has some stunning works of art. We saw one of the potters firing up some pieces in a kiln right on the beach, hammocks and great climbing trees, lanterns, music, delicious buffet, a cold drink, aaaaahhhh!

Treillis Bay, Beef Is.

Sea turtle made out of driftwood and sea fans

Full Moon party

Full Moon Party

Fire Dancers on the Beach

Artist Aragorn welding at Full Moon Party, (accopanied by Saxophone)

Dude !

Feeding the gulls in B.V.Is

Saba Rock, British Virgin Islands

Engine Room Woes

On Thursday, just as we were having a great sail, close hauled and making great time on our way to Gorda Sound,            we suddenly had to do an emergency “heave to”, which essentially means to stop the boat while the sails are out, when, just as we were approaching the entrance of Gorda Sound (a narrow, reefed channel), our engine would not start !  Yikes!  But all was well and under control as we “hove to” on the first try (good job Cptn Mark!), and “we” (ie Mark) were able to trouble shoot what the problem was. It was not the ignition as “we” first thought, but a breaker that had tripped (reasons to be determined ASAP). We had a Plan B, in case we could not get it started, we would have sailed back to were we had come from and anchor just outside the marina, but since it was an easy fix, we were able to start up the engine and make it into Gorda Sound and grab a mooring for the night, right beside the Bitter End Yacht Club.

We are planning on being here for a couple of weeks. In a way, the BVI's sort of feel like a final destination for us, as we have been working our way North over the last month and a half but this is as far North as we are going,(for now). We will start our descent into the southern islands (Grenadines, Grenada etc..) for Hurricane season which officially starts on June 1st. The plan will be to leave on, or around, May 28-29th, to get to safer waters.

 As you might of seen from the photos, Matthew's hair is so long that he looks like a real beach bum with his pink nose and very blond highlights (too many sunburns!).I have to put zinc oxide (thick white cream) on his nose two or three times a day as well as sunscreen, because of the amount of time he spends in the water !…He looks a little bit like Sean Penn in "Fast Times at Ridgemon High",dude ! I will leave you with a funny thing heard over the radio while I was cutting tomatoes one night before dinner:"Fat Virgin,Fat Virgin,Fat Virgin...This is Seduction, Seduction,Seduction..." Hehehe, that made me smile.

                                                              

Flying Fish made from Copper, Treillis Bay