Blog post – Page 7 – Grateful Red

First Crew-Grenada to Trinidad January 2013

January 22, 2013/0 Comments/in Blog post/by Kristine

After a fun Holiday and Christmas Season at home on Lake Kegonsa, and a great after Christmas visit with Niki, John and the kids, Ken flew to Grenada and I flew back to Madison. I stayed at the house until January 28^th and Ken will meet up with the first crew to get the boat splashed (again) and ready for some sailing.

Kicking off a new sailing season – Grenada to Trinidad before turning west to Panama but ……. still some 2012 issues plus an instrument retrofit upgrade to do. The crew – Charlie, Kristi, Kyle and Garrett arrived ready to sail and Paul – done at the last possible second – instrument guru all arrived on time. But Granada marinas are closed from Dec 23 rd to January 6 th. The crew spent time at Da Big Fish, Paul started the install of the new super duper instruments and Captain Ken tried to “spring” the new sail drive from the container with missing papers in St. Lucia. No way Jose on the St Lucia container but for few bucks one could FedEx a new sail drive from the good old USA. New problem – the Grateful Red was in Spice Island marina, the Volvo dealer in Grenada marina and the interior repair person in the Port Louis marina.

New plan – the crew would move the boat from marina to marina with a sail drive that had no neutral, no reverse and the only speed was five knots.

Spice Island to Port Louis motor sail went without issue. Port Louis is the high end, terrific pool, fine bar and restaurant Grenada marina.

Kyle instituted “Pirate Night” when one wears a pirate outfit (Kyle had conveniently enough brought a pirate outfit with him) and drink pirate drinks. This led to a Pirate blender party at the Grateful Red. Amazingly in a few days the crew had numerous friends from bartenders to Holly and Fleur – the party crew. The party went well ….. Except for the use of diesel in the gasoline power blender (we now have a new blender), spilled daiquiri mix everywhere on the boat and Paul the instrument guy needed Garrett assistance to return to the boat at eight ….. a little out of shape??

The motor sail from Port Louis to Grenada Marine was a little rougher – upwind but uneventful. The dock was quite eventful as the Grenada marina shore crew didn’t clearly realize what no reverse, no neutral and only five knots forward meant in docking. Luckily the anchor took most of the beating as the Grateful Red ground to a halt before hitting the lift.

Grenada marina is the working marina in the middle of nowhere. Luckily the crew found a terrific lodge – Sousons . On the beach, bodying surfing, lots of sand, nice bar and restaurant – while the crew worked days and slept at Sousons Captain Ken and Paul stayed on the boat. With a zillion little instrument issues unresolved Paul’s time ran out – as usual – and he headed off to his next boat in the US. The Souson’s owner so liked the Grateful Red crew that she “gave” Ken a room for a couple of nights at the resort. Twenty four hours before Garrett’s flight home from Trinidad and one Pirate’s night later the Grateful Red was ready to sail with new sail drive. The boat was splashed at three in the afternoon and by five Charlie, Kristi, Kyle, Garrett and Ken were doing an overnight to Trinidad.

A beautiful overnight sail for the crew and landing at Chaguaramas marina in Trinidad. Garrett checked in at customs, grabbed breakfast at the marina and went off to the airport to fly home. Charlie had a video conference interview for a summer internship ( Charlie closed the intern deal and will be interning at Newport Beach, CA this summer) and at night Kristi, Kyle and Charlie celebrated Ken’s birthday at the Crew’s Inn restaurant before leaving at 0530 the next morning for the airport.

Boat in Trinidad job well done.

Getting a “splash” on Sailing Season 2013

November 23, 2012/0 Comments/in Blog post/by Kristine

Ken and Kyle stayed one more week and closed up the boat the best they could considering it would sit on land from end of May until mid-November. Can’t even imagine what we will find when we return.

Both Ken and I took separate trips back to Grenada to check on progress of off-season repair, upgrades and maintanence. I was pleased at how the boat looked after Ken and Kyle had done the final cleaning.

At Gordie’s urging Ken agreed to sail from Grenada to Union Island in November – the Kopke Greenhouse offseason – and the southern Grenadine Islands plus Gordie brought his buddy Gary. The fearsome threesome descended on the Spice Island marina with only one mission ……. Splash the Grateful Red for the 2013 season. As always a million issues needed to be remedied before splashing. Gordie and Gary worked liked like dogs ….. but met new friends with a catamaran. He was 88 and his co commander Kim was 40 something, quite a pair and entertaining.

After a couple days finally splashed …… the fearsome threesome was sailing to the Grenadines. First night was a revisit to Union Island, inside the reef looking east ….. ocean all the way to Africa. Plus new crew Gary doesn’t drink …… the perfect dingy driver! Day two was an anchor off in the Tobago Cays – only one other boat. Gary and Gordie went snorkeling; was difficult given the strong current away from the boat. Plus an old issue reappeared the Grateful Red diesel would not go into reverse. Supposedly Volvo and Spice Island had repaired this issue in the off season maintenance. Using only forward and sails the Grateful Red was sailed to Mayreau and anchored off for the evening. Gary drove the dingy into shore for a dinner and night on the town. Food was good, the people fun but the music was incredibly loud and Gary got us back to the Grateful Red without altercation. Next morning we pulled anchor and headed back to Port Louis in Grenada. Now the Grateful Red diesel didn’t go in reverse and would not change speeds – it was 4.5 knot or turn the engine off. No reverse, no neutral and no speed changes allowed. Great sail to St. George but the motor into Port Louis is another story.

With only one speed, no neutral and no reverse docking is more problematic. In addition we arrived …… as usual …. at sunset and the harbor master didn’t understand the issue. The assigned dock location was between two large boats. What is …. Is, so we lined up the Grateful Red, foresail only and turned the engine off. We successfully glided in- luckily a couple of younger Aussies stepped in and helped stop the 18,000 pounds of Grateful red from hitting the two large parked boats. Another successful dock and another reason to have rum drinks at the Port Louis bar!

Have to thank Gordie and Gary for getting the Grateful Red splashed with a shakedown sail …. in the end a new sail drive had to be sent via Federal Express from the US to Grenada and installed before the Grateful Red could begin the 2013 season.

St Lucia to Grenada with the “A” Team! Last Sail of the season

May 28, 2012/0 Comments/in Blog post/by Kristine

May 15^th and 16^th, Charlie, Kyle, Kristy, Steve Carlson and son Garrett arrive in St. Lucia to help Ken sail the boat the remaining way to Grenada where the boat will stay for Hurricane season. The following is Charlie and Kristy’s recap of their journey.

“We landed in St. Lucia for our first night at Rodney Bay.  We had

breakfast at the local bar and set sail that morning.  We then sailed

to Marigot Bay on the Southwest corner of St. Lucia and had our first

crew dinner with ken, Garrett, Steve, and kyle.  We then sailed our

longest day to Chateaubelair arriving at night to be greeted by a

lonely local kayaker.  The next morning we went into shore for

supplies and met some of the locals.  Promptly upon returning to the

ship we set sail to our next destination of Buccament Bay for lunch.

After lunch we sailed to Bequia.  We spent 2 nights in Bequia and made

our first friends of the trip.  Our first night on the island we met

an English group who had chartered a boat from Grenada and were

returning on the same route we were.  Our second day was spent on boat

chores and shore shopping.  After sampling some of the local fruits

and doing some sightseeing we called it a day to see our new friends

at dinner.  Dinner was spent listening to the elegant piano playing of

Steve on a picturesque view of the harbor.  We met our waiters soon

after dinner along the beach and went to the local bar to enjoy some

drinks with our new friends.  The next morning we set sail for Tobago

Cays making a stop in Canouan for lunch.  Upon arriving in Tobago we

noticed a French wedding on the beach with a grill and good music all

night.  We spent the night on the water and set sail early the next

morning for Anchorage bay in Union.  We spent 2 nights in Union and

celebrated my 21st birthday there.  The first day we spent drinking

out on happy island and met our British friends again.  They sailed to

the other side of the island and we all made a special trip across the

island, up and down mountains, to an area only accessible by foot and

boat.  There we ate barbeque on the beach, limboed, and danced the

night away.  The next day we spent on the beach making friends with

the local dogs, watching parasailors, and snorkeling along the reef.

After calling it an early night we set sail for our second longest day

to Grenada.  After experiencing our first minor squalls the crew was

relieved when we landed in our final port.  Port Louis was the most

developed place we stayed our whole vacation.  After some much needed

showers and drinks we found our British friends again.  After saying

our goodbyes we called it a night.  We spent most of the next day

cleaning the boat and taking a tour of the island.  We had some

trouble with customs, but after some stern talking to and some extra

fines we were cleared.  We held a tailgator party that night with some

local sailors and enjoyed our last night of the trip together.

Sincerely,

Charlie and Kristy