Ashore in Lunenburg NS

You can start from the beginning of my latest adventure here.

If you would like to start at the very beginning of my previous passage across the Atlantic Ocean back in 2008 please head over to here.

For information on how to join in the adventure and sail on The Picton Castle yourself check out her web page:
http://www.picton-castle.com/

It has been 11 years since I first joined the Picton castle in Mallorca to start my adventures.
I have tried to capture something of why I did that and what it has meant for me here:
The Call of the Sea 

Thu Sept 1 2016

The BBQ was delicious, with charcoal cooked chicken, shrimp on skewers, ribs, salads and ice cold beer!

Went for a wander on the waterfront afterwards and then tried to watch the "races" but rapidly ran out of steam so came back to the BnB and crashed.

Woke up about 6:00am this morning really confused about where I was because:

A) The bed wasn't moving.
B) As far as I could reach I couldn't touch anything.
C) I could hear crickets chirping rather than water swishing against the hull.

Then I remembered I was in a beautiful BnB in Lunenburg having signed off the ship yesterday afternoon :-)

Had a lovely breakfast here at Greybeard's. The recomendations by my shipmates were bang on. Fruit animals, smoked salmon quiche, carrot cake, orange juice and lightly spiced coffee. Mmmmmm...

Bob and Rosanna do a fantastic job.

After breakfast I realized that tomorrow  (Fri) I would need to find someplace to stay so I jumped back on my little laptop, and the lovely and  fast wifi, and spent the next two hours trying to find a berth! The Labour Day long weekend is abad time to try to find accomodations in a high tourist area like Lunenburg.

It is now 10:00 am and I've got it settled. Whew :-)

I will be staying at the Kiwi Kaboodle hostel in Mahone Bay for Friday and Saturday night. Kiwi Kaboodle also runs a shuttle service that can get me back to the Airport in Halifax on Sunday which is a bonus!

My back and muscles are telling me that I probably should take it easy (aka 'be lazy') so I'm just going to go tour the Fishery Museum and drink cider in a pub somewhere.
:-)

Oh and mess around online of course.

I guess that means this is the final post of my latest trip on The Picton Castle.
I hope you have enjoyed following along on my passage.

Sailing on the Picton castle is a fantastic adventure, even when only for a few weeks.  There are very few times in one's life that working that hard physically can be as rewarding, that standing watch beside strangers can result in connections and friendships that last for years, and that learning a complex system of lines, processes and language, that so indelibly mark you as a seafarer, can mark a point in your life so clearly.

Eight years ago I headed out for my first adventure on this fine ship. Over the last two and a half weeks I've stepped back into a role I really thought was in the past for good.

Would I do it again?

I honestly don't know, and frankly it doesn't matter :-)

'Living in the now' is probably the biggest lesson I take from this short return to sea.

And in the spirit of that lesson I'm going to let tomorrow look after itself :-)

As always...

Thanks for reading.

And Watch below! :-)

KJ

Ashore in Clayton NY.

WiFi acquired!

I'm now safely ensconced in the library of Clayton NY, as It has the best WiFi in town apparently.

Had a magnificent night watch lat night it started off with a strong wind that made steering really difficult.  I had to turn her over to one of my shipmates, Kelly, because I was rapidly loosing control... sigh.

In my defense I claim lack of practice :-)

I eventually got another trick once the wind had moderated and we set the jibs and spanker which made steering much easier.  It was a beautiful night for a sail, intensely bright stars and Milky Way. The moon came up and added to the wonder.

Hit the sack at the end of my watch and was totally gone until 5:00 ish when we were turned out to help the on-watch bring the ship alongside at Clayton get tied up.

Then we got to go back to bed for two hours till our normal watch call at 7:30.

Spent the morning tieing on the great balks of wood that protect the ship's sides from the wall of the canal locks. I also went aloft for the first time to furl the foresail. Didn't do to bad for the first time in 8 years! When we got off at noon we were allowed to go ashore till an All Hands muster at 4:00pm when we will go over the route for tonight.

The plan is to leave the quay at Clayton around midnight so we can traverse the locks in daylight tomorrow.

We have a had a very curious crowd on the quay all day asking questiions and taking pictures :-)

Fiji is working the crowd collecting pets and scritches as usual.

My hands are a real wreck, the broken blisters are not healing well, because being on the 8-12 watch my hands are in soapy water for most of the first watch. Sigh.

Going to FB and stuff while I have the WiFi, might upload some pictures too.

More later maybe.

Thanks for reading
KJ

Left behind...

Friday Aug 19

All hands called after an early breakfast. 

Braced the yards around to the opposite tack and cleared up ready to sail.

Got booted off the ship along with two other new crew because the ship is heading out into the lake to continue filming. The ship will be incredibly crowded with almost 70 people on board. The Captain figured it was best if only the established crew stayed. I'm disappointed in one sense because it would have been the first sail, but in another I don't envy the crew trying to work surrounded by a giant film crew.

Stowed all the secondary dock lines and then got changed into my shore clothes just as a fog bank swept down on the dock.

My Shipmate Allison who is helping us get ready to leave tomorrow drove us up to the Royal Ontario Museum after the ship motored off into the fog.

And we are now ensconced in the air conditioned WiFi enabled restaurant Gabby's across the street.

More later...

The ROM is amazing.
Allison had suggested we could easily spend  a day there and she was not kidding.
Once we had our fill of the interesting displays we headed out of downtown on the subway and streetcar to a renovated area called The Distillery, very trendy :-)
Having a great iced cider at a Brew Pub and then we will wander back down Cherry Street to the dock, probably 20 minutes away or so.

The ship will probably come back around 8:00pm once it starts to get dark.
We'll aim to be there and help her tie up, or not, we'll see.

Later later.

Ship motored up to the quay at around 9:30pm, a ghostly ship looming up out of the darkness. In her black paint job she was nearly invisible except for the lighter grey of her sails hanging in their gear far above. Deft use of capstan and engine snugged her up to the quay, a very slick bit of ship handling in the dark.

I felt a bit guilty dressed in my shore going rig while a very tired crew carried on with getting the ship settled and the film crew  off with their junk/gear.

As luck would have it the Port watch is on duty tonight so I don't have to stand deck watch. Woot.

Did I mention I felt a bit guilty?

Thanks for reading.
KJ

So it begins...

Tuesday Aug 16 16:33
Made it to the Airport with lots of time to spare.

That is a big change from the last couple of times I've had to go to the airport, which was a great way to reduce my stress level, heh.

Now I'm hanging out at the gate waiting for the flight to take me to Toronto.

FB refuses to load on the Airport WiFi with a security warning and no possible exception,blah. I hope that isn't indicative of EEEbin's behaviour on hotspots.  On the plus side GMail and Blogger work just fine

More later.

It is later and I have landed in Toronto, collected my seabag and got a hotel room to spend the night.

They charge for WiFi if you can believe it!  Sigh.

After doing some digging it appears that the lobby has free WiFi but I can't seem to connect, sigh.  I'm thinking there must be something about EEEbin's browser that doesn't like these hotspot networks.  Maybe I should see if Anderson will spring for data on my cellphone then I could tether it. Just for blog updates of course :-)

Tomorrow I have to figure out how to get to the docks.

Then the fun really begins.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Wed Aug 17

Joined the ship officially this morning after a pretty speedy rush hour cab ride across Toronto.
I signed articles at about 10:30am , was aloft for a refresher by 11:00 and covered in tar a half hour later :-)

The ship is being "dressed" for her role in a series "Alias Grace" by Margaret Atwood so everything is covered in black paint and wood patterned wall paper.  She looks quite bedraggled poor thing.

The crew looks like a fun bunch so far. Chief Mate and Captain are nice (so far).
Very different kind of feel from the previous passage. Will be interesting to see how it all works.

My old shipmate Niko is the new cook as Donald is back in Grenada.   The ship's cat is a juvenile female called Fiji :-)

This afternoon we will be raising the gaff back into place and continuing with the maintenance that never ends.

Oh and the smell is absolutely fantastic! Brings back lots of memories :-)

More later.
Hoisted the gaff back up into place, which was a fine bit of sailorizing.

After we cleaned up the deck and coiled everything down we had a nice spell of socializing and tale telling on the hatch. 

I am officially in the Starboard Watch according to the First Mate Dirk.

Woot! Wifi at Sailors Mission :-)

Loose ends…

Sunday, June 14th, 2009

So I wasn’t sure I would actually post anything here after I “swallowed the anchor” and got back home.
There are a few things I think that should be included though.

John has posted a fantastic map of our trip on his blog. He had a pocket GPS with him that recorded our
location at noon everyday. He exported all the data into an application that let him generate a map. He
also has exported the data to Google Maps that allow you to zoom into every place we went.

This is, as they say, a COOL THING ™!

You can check out John’s post here:

http://atlanticrounds.blogspot.com/2009/05/daily-waypoints-and-ports-of-call.html

Here is a much reduced version of the map:

It is really odd being back home after all the time away. I am very happy to be back home with my family
and, now that it is warming up a bit (it snowed here last week!), I’m actually enjoying doing yard work
instead of deck wash and rust busting

However it is strange to be here where things are both totally familiar and yet slightly different. I imagine
it as being a bit like experiencing a parallel universe. Not sure how long that feeling will last but it’s still strange nearly 3 weeks from our arrival in Lunenberg.

Work is a good example, my office was almost identical to the way it was when I left, there was even the
same items on my to do list on the white board! However the economic situation is such that the company
has had to do some belt tightening so some of the consultants I used to work with are gone. Walking
around in the office leaves me with a similar “Temporal Shadow” feeling like I had in Martinique.

On the plus side they want me to do a “show and tell” on Thursday to give them a feel for how my trip
went which should be fun. So I get to spend the next few days going over my 3000 some odd pictures
trying to put this trip into a 45 minute slide show.

Wish me luck!

I may post more stuff here as I’m not sure I’m exactly finished with my Atlantic Passage just yet. Check
back every now and then and, as always…

Thanks for reading. :-)
KJ

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Post Script 2015

If you would like to start at the beginning of my adventures start here.

The last day… Monday May 25,2009

Tuesday, May 26th, 2009

Today was very busy, which figures given that it was my last day and all.
Had a nice breakfast at a little bakery/cafe up from the ship and then went aboard for the grand,
traditional, “Crew Photo”.

The crew of the Picton Castle May 25, 2009

 Then we went aloft and loosed all sails so they could dry after yesterdays rain.

Once that was done we started unloading the ship’s “cargo” of tropical wood that will be used for two
new schooners that will be built at the Dory Shop here.

Once the smaller pieces were unloaded we spent about two hours rigging up heavy lines, tackles and
blocks so that we could swing the big pieces over the side.

After lunch we started to haul and heave and slowly maneuvered these massive chunks of wood. First we
had to pull each block forward from it’s position in the port breezeway until it was alongside the hatch.
Then we connected three different tackles and lines to it. There were two yard tackles one on the Fore
Yard and one on the Main and a heavy synthetic line run from the main topgallant mast down through a
block and then forward to the capstan on the foredeck.

There was complete silence enforced on deck so that commands could be clearly heard as we inched each
timber up to the level of the rail and then using the yard tackles and lots of pushing we swung each block
over the side and then down slowly into the water.

Once in the water the blocks were towed over to the Dory Shop using the rescue boat.

While we were doing this a scallop dragger on the other side of our dock was using a noisy diesel powered
crane to hoist bits and pieces of chain and stuff on and off their deck. The contrast was amazing
We then cleaned up the decks and furled the sails.

We mustered midships and the Captain thanked us for our hard work and discussed the “Sea Time”
documents that each of us received. These documents are legal documents that confirm the sea time and
duties we had on board the ship during it’s voyage. Each day and portion of a day at sea is counted and
recorded. In order to qualify for an official seamans designation you must have a minimum of 6 months of
sea time. For higher qualifications the requirements are longer so recording each day is important.

Then came the tough part for me… Saying Good Bye!

The last six months have been a fantastic adventure. At times exhilarating, frightening, awe inspiring,
boring, hot, cold, wet, head knocking, toe stubbing, arms aching, back breaking, calming, moving,
hilarious, sad and any other adjective you could think of frankly.

To have to say good bye to such great shipmates, friends, mentors and companions in adventure was really
tough.

This picture, taken by David on my camera as my daughter and I were climbing into the cab to head to the
airport, is of the ship reflected in the rear window of the cab… Sigh.

Looking back...

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Photos of my last day are here.

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Ashore in Lunenberg May 24,09

Sunday, May 24th, 2009

Today was the first day ashore since I returned to Grenada that wasn’t going to be followed shortly by
going back to the ship. That is a bit strange to me.

Last night the Dory Shop hosted a BBQ and party that went on to the wee hours :-)  The highlight for me
was the live entertainment. There were initially 2 fiddlers, a standing Bass player, a banjo player and a
mandolin player. Eventually they were joined by the fiddler that played at the party a year ago! The
resulting 4 hour jam session was fantastic!

The B&B that my daughter is staying at is very nice and quiet and my bed was soft and actually “big
enough to roll over in” :-)  I got a very nice relaxing and calm sleep, once I got back there about 3:00am
This morning after a fine breakfast of waffles, fresh fruit and coffee, I walked over to the ship and started
packing all my gear. I ended up using my new sea bag because it was bigger than my second duffel bag.
It was cloudy and rainy today, more typical of Lunenberg at this time of year I think.

This evening was the official end of the trip with an “awards” ceremony that started at 7:00pm at the Ice
House bar which is attached to the Fisheries Museum here.

John has created a 2 hour slide show of pictures from the whole trip which was really cool. The Captain
gave a speech and Bruce read out his carefuly collected statistics. Everything from from how far we
traveled, 17,756 nautical miles if I remember correctly, to how many sheets of toilet paper we used , a
number I have mercifully forgotten.

The “awards” were carefully setup for each person which was really neat. I got the award for the “most
sailor looking” of the crew. Heh.

Each member of the crew also received a print of a painting of the Picton castle done by William
Gilkerson.

Tomorrow at 9:00am there will be a group crew photo on the deck of the ship followed by getting the lines
and tackles rigged to move the wood from Grenada over the side.

My Daughter and I leave for Halifax to fly back to Calgary at 4:30pm tomorrow. Then the fun starts.

I think…

Thanks for reading.
KJ

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St. George’s Bermuda May 13-15,09

Friday, May 15th, 2009

This is a fascinating, but expensive, place.

Bermuda is celebrating their 400 year anniversary this year. Amazing to think that this island has been
continuously under British control since 1609. There are lots of buildings that date from that time as well.
The architecture here is quite different than the other islands we have been to. The buildings are massive
with smaller windows and heavy concrete(?) roofs. The roofs are whitewashed and have a unique
washboard pattern and gutters to collect rain water. The buildings are brightly painted or whitewashed
although the colours are a different tone than the colours down south.

Yesterday (the 14th) Nicko and I were on galley duty. It went pretty well we only had to cook lunch,
grilled ham and cheese sandwiches. YUM!. We went on a shopping trip to get supplies for dinner which
was a great beef and Guiness stew that Lynsey cooked up.

I guess my blog has attracted some attention :-)  as I was interviewed by Lisa Monforton of the Calgary
Herald for an article in the Travel section of the paper.

Hi Lisa…

Today David, John and I are going to head across the island to the Maritime Museum which is at the old
Royal Dockyard. Should be interesting.
More later…

Just returned from our expedition to the Royal Dockyard and the Maritime Museum. We took a high
speed ferry from St George’s direct to the Dockyard and spent the day wandering around and looking at
the exhibits. The museum is built into the primary fort known a the Keep. There are a surprisingly large
number of forts and gun emplacements here, very reminiscent of Gibraltar actually.
After lunch we took a bus back to St Georges which took about 2 hours and went through the main city of
Hamilton. Bermuda is a very prosperous place! Hamilton is very busy and looks like it is booming.

Pictures to follow anon :-)

Some of them are here.

So tomorrow morning we will leave Bermuda for our passage to Lunenberg. We will arrive there on
Saturday May 23rd sometime. Strange to think that in one week I will be back in Canada having crossed
the Atlantic and the Equator under sail “before the mast”. Hmmm…

Thanks for reading.
KJ

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Bermuda May 13'09

Wed May 13,09

We motored into St Georges Bermuda this morning about 9:30am.

I’ve gone ashore as we the day off.

More later…

There are pictures from our stay in the British Virgin Islands and the passage to Bermuda here.

Enjoy
KJ

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Rainy day on Jost Van Dyke May 4,09

Tuesday, May 5th, 2009

Yesterday I spent another very lazy day.

The highlight for me was spending 2 hours in a hammock outside Corsairs. Lovely.

The Internet we had been using during the morning died about mid afternoon so we walked over the hill back to White Bay and the Soggy Dollar Bar which had WiFi.

We headed back to Corsairs for dinner after sunset. As we were walking along the beach in the moonlight

I noticed a bright ring around the moon. It was very striking.

“Hmmmm, that means a change in the weather and not a good one either.” I thought and sure enough this morning we came on deck to grey lowering skies and heavy rain. It’s been raining all morning and is still coming down as I write this during the lunch hour. Lots of line slacking to do as the manila ropes shrink when they get wet. The longer the line the more it shrinks so lines like the Royal bunt lines, buntleaches and the braces need to be checked frequently. The lines can shrink enough to actually part or break bits of the gear so slacking lines is a regular rainy day chore.

More later…

Spent most of the day in the hold sorting old lines and lashing things down in preparation for our passage
to Bermuda.

The rain finally stopped around 3:30 and a watery sun came out just before sunset. There was quite a
lightening display off to the South where the thunderstorms along the weather front have shoved their tops
up over the horizon.

My anchor watch is at 4:00am so hopefully it won’t be raining again.

Tomorrow we will be moving to the island of Sandy Cay which is just offshore of Jost van Dyke and will
be our last Caribbean stop. the plan is to have a beach party ending to our time here before heading back
out into the Atlantic for Bermuda.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

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Lazy day on Jost Van Dyke May 2-3,09

Sunday, May 3rd, 2009

Spent a very lazy day yesterday.

Went ashore on the 10:00 skiff and then wandered along the beach and up over the ridge and down to
another bay.

This was White Bay where the world famous “Soggy Dollar Bar” is. They also had the only available
WiFi signal. The bar gets its name from the lack of dock in the bay. Early cruisers would just swim ashore
and pay with whatever they had in their pockets.

The place was crawling with pale day trippers, charter yachts and bikini clad beauties… very pleasant
scenery indeed.:-)

After hanging around the beach in the shade of some coconut palms I wandered back over the hill to have
dinner at a restaurant called Corsairs, which today has WiFi go figure.

Looks like today is going to be another lazy one.

Tomorrow we will head over to a deserted island, Sandy Cay, nearby for a last bash in the Caribbean then
it’s “all hands to the windlass” to head North into the Atlantic Tuesday morning.

The passage to Bermuda will take 8-10 days and is the second last passage of the trip.
Much of the conversations on board now revolve around that nasty word “after”. Not sure I’m ready for
“after” just yet myself.

More later maybe…

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British Virgin Islands April 30,09

Thursday, April 30th, 2009

We arrived in BVI and anchored off Spanishtown on the island of Virgin Gorda (fat virgin).

Our arrival was pretty exciting. As we were sailing up towards the island the Canadian Barkentine
Caledonia was approaching the anchorage from the other direction. For us to get in we had to tack and
we did so just as Caledonia was motoring past. From where I was on the quarter deck it looked like we
were really close to them. The people on Caledonia were all taking pictures as we swung through the
wind directly abeam of them.

The island here is marked by very large granite boulders some 50′ or more in diameter all piled up along the waters edge. Apparently they were originally enclosed in a lava flow of some sort and once the softer lava eroded left them lying around on top of each other. We up anchored after clearing in and motored over to the National Park that covered the corner of the island and spent the afternoon climbing and scrambling around these giant balls of rock.

Then we up anchored again and motored back to anchor off Spanishtown again. Got a good workout
today :-)

After dinner I went ashore and spent the evening doing Internet stuff and chilling.

More later…

I’m in a little restaurant drinking coffee and waiting for my laundry to finish. We will be heading for Jost
Van Dyke around 11:00am this morning and we will be there for 4 days then it’s on to Bermuda which
should take 10 days or so.

I’m actually looking forward to another long passage, and this one will be the second last of the whole
trip.

These 6 months are nearly over and I have crossed a great ocean and passed through Neptune’s Court and
felt the power which is the Sea itself. So much beauty, hard work and fun. The next 20 days will be bitter
sweet as we head North back to the cold but also back to the warmth of our loved ones.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

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A quick hop to Basse Terra Sat Apr 25,09

Wednesday, April 29th, 2009

We were supposed to leave for BVI today but when the Captain went ashore to clear out there was
nobody around to do it. While we were waiting we worked on several small projects including the
Grenada Boat, now known as “Mr Bones”, and getting stuff in the hold lashed down ready for sea.
Just after lunch the Captain came back and announced that we would be shifting over to the largest island
in the Saints, Basse Terra, for the weekend then clear out on Monday.

Our watch was off today so David and I went ashore and had a quick look around. This is a very quiet
island! The town is very small with only a couple of bar/restaurants and a couple of souvenir shops and a
small grocery store. No ATM, or Wifi to be found :-)

Unfortunately in my rush to catch the skiff I forgot my camera so I don’t have any pictures of this quaint
little place.

We arrived jut as a funeral was being conducted so everything was shutdown completely. Just to add to
the atmosphere it poured rain, in those huge drops only a tropical rain squall can bring. I tried to shelter
under a tree but got soaked anyways, I also forgot my rain coat, blah.

Bill found a small hotel for the night which also had a restaurant so we were able to have a nice dinner,
which as an added bonus was pretty cheap.

The anchorage here is a bit dicey so we may have to move the ship in the morning.

Thanks for reading
KJ

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Ashore on Ile des Saints Wed April 22,08

Friday, April 24th, 2009

Went ashore on the first skiff run of the day.

After getting some Euros from the ATM David and I went to the hotel where Rick was staying. We then
rented some scooters for the day and tore off down the narrow roads to explore the island of Terre De
Haut.

Went up to Fort Napoleon which commands the heights above the town and harbour. The fort is pretty
well preserved and a good example of French forts from the mid 1800s. The museum there had a good
display on the Battle of the Saints between the British fleet under Rodney and the French fleet under
Bouganville. They had couple of nice ship models of vessels in the battle.

After the fort we decided to do a beach tour so we picked up a baguette, cheese and a bottle of cheap
wine and headed out to see the sands.

The beaches here are really small, with the exception of one they are all only a couple of hundred feet
long. But they are usually in nice coves so are fairly picturesque.

The weather was hot and sunny but there was a fairly strong Northerly wind blowing which made sitting
the shade quite pleasant.

Our watch is on tomorrow but we get Friday off so I think I will do a bunch of Internet and chilling for the
day :-)

Thanks for reading…
KJ

Here are some photos from my day ashore.

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Racing on “Charm III” Sat Apr 18,09

Saturday, April 18th, 2009

Had a great day racing on board the Charm III captained by Richard West. We actually beat the one
schooner the skipper was most anxious to beat which was the Astor.

I have never been in a sailing race before so this was an interesting day.
The schooner Charm III is a staysail schooner, this means that instead of a gaff rigged foresil she has a
staysail on a boom. Above this she carries a Fisherman’s Staysail. The advantage of this rig is that it is
essentially self tending in tacks and is supposed to be marginally faster upwind. This schooner was
designed and built in 1923 so she is a bit older than the Picton Castle actually. She has the distinction of
having the oldest masts still afloat on their original hull :-)

She sails really well and ha a very friendly and fairly laid back crew. Which was good cause I’m not sure I
was all that useful a hand. Shackle and Sarah and I were the Picton Castle crew that were aboard for
today’s race.

We headed for the starting line about 9:30 this morning. We got the sails and lines sorted and ten tacked
back and forth waiting for our class to start.

One of the schooners in our class is called “When and If” I believe. Her owner planned to sail her around
the world when and if he had chance. He died before he could do it. His name was George Patton.
We crossed the starting line bang on time which was met with much rejoicing. This is not an easy thing to
do apparently.

The race was on a course that had two downwind legs and a couple of up wind slogs, very cool, lots of
room for tactical sailing.

On one of the downwind legs we set a massive sail called a “Gollywobbler” that fills the space between
the fore and main and is used as a downwind sail like a spinnaker. Setting this monster is quite a process.
We first had to douse the Fisherman, un shackle and stow it, then set the Golly and take in the staysail.
When we rounded the buoy we had to do the opposite.

During the race the giant “J” Class boats roared by. They sail like giant fish more than boats. They are
very impressive and they create quite a wind shadow as they go.

Watching all these classic yachts, gaff riggers, schooners of all sizes all churning along in the beautiful
tropical blue seas was wonderful.

The last leg is upwind and here the tactics get tricky. Our skipper elected to do a bunch of short tacks
really close to shore and this made all the difference. Although we got very close to shore at one point.

Once the race was done we motored into the dock and stowed away the sails. A couple of Gin and Tonics
to celebrate our victory and a nice lamb dinner prepared by one of the crew ended a fabulous day.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

There are some photos of the race here.

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Ashore in Antigua Thur April 17,09

Friday, April 17th, 2009

Had a very interesting day today.

I went ashore expecting to spend a quiet day surfing annd chilling while everybody else went racing. The
first half of the day went exactly like that but just about 11:30 John came by. He had rented a car the day
before and driven Spencer to the airport so he could go home. After a bit of Internet surfing we headed
out in his car, with blessed AC, and found a local bar for lunch which was wonderful and CHEAP!

Then we headed down to the shore near Rendezvous Bay and watched the all the boats racing. It was a
fabulous panorama of great sailing vessels like the “J” class sloops, schooners and ketches all the way
down to our brightly coloured brave little dinghy ” Sea Never Dry”.

After the race we went back to the harbour in Falmouth to meet our crewmates who were sailing on some
of these vessels.

I have been shanghaied into sailing on a staysail schooner named “Charmed III” which is an Alden
designed Malibar 5(?) ship. Deb, Bruce and Charlotte sailed on her today and it appears that I will be
sailing on her in the racing tomorrow.

Hmmm…

Should be fun, I’ll let you know how it goes. I’m off to get in on the free food and booze action down on
the docks amongst all these expensive yachts.

Wish me luck for tonight and tomorrow :-)

Thanks for reading.
KJ

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Ashore in Antigua Wed Apr 15,09

Friday, April 17th, 2009

We had to move the ship closer to shore this morning so after breakfast it was hands to the windlass!
Once we were anchored again I went ashore on the first skiff and spent the day wandering around
Falmouth and Nelson’s Dockyard at English bay.

Today was the start of the Antigua Classic yacht Regatta and there are an amazing number of beautiful
classic yachts here. I have never seen so many schooners and ketches in one place before. There is even
one massive three masted staysail schooner from France that is almost as long as the Picton Castle! There
are also some very pretty smaller boats mostly ketches and cutters. The glare from the varnish was almost
blinding in the bright Sun :-)

Needless to say the place is swarming with people from all over the world. Most of whom are either very
“well heeled” or the paid crew for said well heeled people. Several of our crew managed to get on as
volunteer crew on several boats. There are a nice clutch of wooden sloops built on Carriacou some gaff
rigged as well as bermudian sloop rigged. They are noticeable mostly because they are painted using
ordinary paint. No fiberglass, varnish or brass anywhere. Doesn’t seem to hinder their sailing at all.
English Harbour and Nelson’s Dockyard (which is now an Antiguan National Park) was once the
equivalent of Halifax for the Royal Navy. The dockyard has been restored fairly well and has a lot of
plaques and information boards even though the buildings are now hotels, bars and concessions so you get
a good idea of how the place worked when Nelson was in charge (hence the name).
Tomorrow our watch is on and then we get the next two days off.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Here are some photos from my trip ashore in Antigua.

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Getting Inked in Martinique Apr 11,09

Saturday, April 11th, 2009

So after much consideration I have decided to get a tattoo.

I know Biz, my daughter, thought I should get one to mark the trip but I couldn’t decide on a pattern I’d
like to live with for the rest of my life :-)

The primary reason we are here in Martinique is to visit a tattoo artist that does Polynesian style tattoos
and is well known to the Picton Castle crew.

Many of the crew have got new tattoos, some small some very complex all beautiful and unique. Her style
is very light, which I like, not heavy and blocky like most tattoos I’ve seen.

John got a nice one on his calf you can see it here.

This is the place then to get it done, after crossing both the Atlantic ocean and the Equator I’ve an idea
that I think will work well, a combination of traditional and artistic. I’ll see what the artist thinks.

My appointment is at 2:00pm today and I’m sitting in the cafe drinking cafe ‘o lait listening to the
buzz/wine of the tattoo gun…

More later…

It’s later and I have a nice tattoo on my left forearm.

At least all the pain and healing itching will be on the same side :-)

Now the dilemma is to post pictures or surprise everyone when I get home?

What do you think?

Thanks for reading.
KJ

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St Pierre Martinique Apr 10,09

Saturday, April 11th, 2009

My galley day yesterday went by without a hitch.

Luckily Donald was cooking, boo yeah!, so we just had to stay ahead of the dishes. Keeping my freshly
bandaged hand dry was a challenge but a bright yellow rubber glove managed that :-)

This morning I came ashore on the first skiff run for a look around. Being Good Friday it was very quiet
but the museum was open. There were lots of before and after photos of the city in 1908. The most
powerful display to me was the huge bell from the cathedral. This inch thick bronze bell looks like a
squashed beer can! The force of the blast and the extreme heat simply mashed it flat as it fell from the
tower.

There are also examples of things found in the ruins as people began to build anew. Blocks of fused nails
and screws from a hardware store, melted coins and smashed ships portholes plus many ordinary things
made into macabre artifacts by the sheer power of the volcanoe.

Nicko and I wandered through the town and saw the ruins of the theater, a large church and the prison
where one of the only two survivors was in solitary confinement in a small cell deep inside the prison.
The ruins show the power of this event. There are great blocks of masonry piled up like they were
children’s blocks dumped out of a bucket.

The current town, built amongst the ruins, has made no attempt to hide it’s charred and blasted
predecessor. Many of the houses incorporate the walls directly, they are usually blackened bare stone and
mortar whereas the new walls are painted cinder block. The streets are the same as well, many with the
original cobbled surfaces.

All in all St Pierre is a fascinating, if slightly macabre place to see. Rising above it, to the North, is the
grey peaked Mt Pelee still rumbling a bit and being very carefully watched.

The crew has adopted a restaurant bar tattoo parlour called L’ Escapade which has WiFi even :-)

Unfortunately they closed at 3:00 this afternoon as did everything else in town. Apparently this weekend
will be very quiet so not sure what we’ll end up doing tomorrow as we also have it off.

Thanks for reading.
KJ

Here are some pictures from my look around in St Pierre Martinique.
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Sailing to Martinique Wed April 8,09

Friday, April 10th, 2009

This morning after breakfast and domestics we began the process of heaving up our anchor and the three
shots of chain hanging almost straight down from the hawse pipe. Pulling this up with the windlass was a lot harder than normal because we had to lift the whole kit ‘n kaboodle. Normally the chain is laying on
the bottom and we drag it along only lifting the part that goes up to the ship.

Once the anchor was up we motored away from the shore and set all sails as we got out of the lee of
Dominica. We were under sail by 11:20am.

We are now sailing along at about 5 knots headed south towards the French island of Martinique. I mostly
know this island for the destruction of the city of St Pierre by the volcanoe there. Many of the crew are
looking forward to this stop because they want to get a tattoo. I may do so as well but haven’t decided for
sure yet :-)

We will be in Martinique for at least 3 days probably 4.
More later…

Just finished cleaning up from dinner.

I had first helm on our afternoon watch. We were motorsailing towards Martinique and ran into a
rainstorm with gusty winds. I had my foulie jacket on but hadn’t done it up yet. I ended up standing my
trick at the helm with my jacket open. Luckily the rain was fairly warm :-)

We took in all sails around 5:30 and motored into the anchorage at St Pierre and dropped the starboard
hook. The Captain says the holding is not great here but the anchorage is fairly sheltered so we should be
OK.

St Pierre never really recovered after the eruption of 1908. From a population of 40,000 there are now
only 7,000. The current city is built inside the ruins of the old city. There is a good museum here which I
intend to check out.

I have looked at the picture taken the day after the eruption so many times that my mind overlays that
scene of utter desolation over the current lush green countryside. We are anchored near to the point where
the photo appears to have been taken so it’s almost like a temporal shadow. It is a very odd sensation.

Our watch is on tomorrow and I have galley so it will be a long day.

Thanks for reading.
KJ
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