Karl & Kara Go Sailing

Friday 30 th  December 2022, Oranjestad, Aruba. So it seems it's been over six months since the last blog entry – not entirely sure how to get you up to speed! Since you last heard we have: -stored Gráinne in the yard in Curaçao -visited Amsterdam, the Singapore Airport swimming pool and Brisbane (and Karl Sydney) en route to Perth -worked (well, one of us worked) for five months in Perth -one of us became an Aussie! -visited Sydney, Brisbane, the Singapore Airport swimming pool, Amsterdam, Galway and Amsterdam yet again en route back to Curaçao -were reunited with Gráinne, did lots of spring cleaning, gave her a quick layer of antifoul, splashed, fitted the new radar, explored Curaçao a bit, watched some World Cup matches (vamos Argentina!!!), were the most Christmasified boat in the marina, spent Christmas at the beach and eventually left for the neighbouring island of Aruba (or Aarrrrrrruba as the pirates say). So I think I'll cover the first five points in this blog...

  Thursday 26 th May, Simpson Bay, Sint Maarten. Good old Simpson Bay We're back in good old Sint Maarten after quite the dash to manage to visit all the islands on the way after our longer than expected stay on Martinique. It's lovely to be back almost exactly a year since we left to head south to Grenada. It's the first time since leaving Carriacou in December that we've come into somewhere familiar instead of a brand new island, brand new country and brand new anchorage. Adventuring is all well and good but there was a lovely pleasure in knowing exactly where we wanted to anchor, exactly where to go to check in, exactly where we could dump our rubbish/buy our fuel/find a good supermarket and exactly where to find the best sunset rum punches. Karl held out a full 24 hours before succumbing to the lure of the Golden Arches for a Big Mac and we held out a couple of hours more before succumbing to the twin dangers of the crew of Christina Too and the Yacht Club rum punc...

  Thursday 12 th May, White House Bay, St. Kitts. We've suddenly gotten to the pointy end of the season and with flights booked out of Curaçao in late June we've picked up the pace a bit with our travelling and hence I've fallen completely behind with the blog. Boom, boom, boom we're hitting every island in full on fast tourist mode. Dominica – bam! Guadeloupe – bam! Montserrat – bam! Nevis – bam! Kitts – about to be bam! Next stop Statia – bam! So I'll just try to organise the blog as best as possible and not let it get too confused. So we're in St. Kitts & Nevis (nee-viss). Two former British colonies that banded together in the 80s to become an independent federation. “Is this your first time in The Federation?” the immigration officer asked me as we checked in making me feel like I was in Star Wars. We spent a couple of delightful days in Nevis and just this morning had a short sail up to Kitts. We've anchored in a spot with nothing going on othe...