February 23, 2011 Unfathomable.

We awoke this morning to discover our port side fresh water tank was empty, and our freshwater maker was not working to refill it.  I felt so guilty for taking my 20-minute showers... Kidding -- with all the swimming yesterday and rinsing off I had yet to take a shower. Also apparent was Dream Yacht did not fill our tanks prior to departure.  With a few phone calls and some tinkering around, Mike R. fixed it!  It produces closed to 1gal/min so we'll soon be topped off again.  After resolving that issue we pulled anchor and set sail.  The water already appears much clearer than yesterday, and the northerly swell has largely subsided. We sailed several hours, practiced some navigation skills and made our way to Ile Tintamarre.  

A big change from yesterday is the smoothness with which we operate as a crew. When the captain calls, "Ready about!" We are quick to man our stations the sailmaster has assigned us to work the sheets.  Ile Tintamarre was awesome! The visibility was near 50' (a huge improvement from yesterday), and a beautiful white coral sand beach in a sheltered bay provided excellent snorkeling conditions.  The island looks to be less than 2-miles long and perhaps 1/2-mile wide.  We set anchor around 2pm and just as soon as our anchor was set we all put on our fins, masks, snorkels and jumped in!  Our plan was to make it to Orient Bay for our final destination today (approximately 3-4 miles away, back on St. Martin), but in order to do so we must make passage into the bay while the sun is still high in the sky so we can spot the narrow channel and avoid the rocks and reef.  I heard more boats run aground there than anywhere else in the Caribbean -- already 3 this year and it's just February!  If the sun is low in the sky it makes for too much glare off the water to spot anything underneath.   So given the time parameters we did "power snorkeling" as Mike R. called it.  This is -- in rapid succession -- drop the dinghy, load into it, motor over to the premium/choicest snorkeling spot, toss out the dinghy anchor, don fins, snorkels, masks and hop into the water.  We fit in about 45-minutes of incredible snorkeling: lots of coral, fish and we even spotted 2 sea turtles right off our stern! Vicki and Mike H. had stayed behind on the boat and fixed us some lunch, but we would have to wait until we made anchor in Orient Bay to eat due to time constraints.  

Upon returning to the Madrid from power snorkeling, we pulled anchor and got underway for Orient Bay.  In order to accurately and effectively navigate this, we were constantly taking fixes on our position and monitoring the depth.  At one point our depth rapidly went  from 40' to 30', then 20'.  We called it out and immediately adjusted course.  No problem.  We got down to about 11' of water before getting back into deeper water for our approach to the bay.  The entire bay is rather shallow.  From there on in everything went smoothly.  We anchored about 3/4-mile off the shore of Orient Bay, and just a few hundred yards from perhaps the most choice piece of real estate in all the bay -- a very small island maybe 1/2-mile long and very narrow.  The southeast side has a beautiful spit of a finger of sand. It's called Green Cay (pronounced 'key).  We set anchor, grabbed a quick bite and some beers, then Mike R., Gabe, Jen, Mark, Vicki, Mike H. and I loaded into the dinghy and motored into the sandy spit. We pulled the boat right up on the beach and started snorkeling.  We only had about 1-hour of daylight left before the sun set.  We snorkeled until after the sun went down, and Mike R. pointed out 3 lobster!  Had we more time I'd really like to fashion a spear and get some fresh lobster.  We'll see how things look at future snorkeling spots! 

After snorkeling we hopped back in the dinghy and returned to the Madrid.  We enjoyed drinks and Mike R. made his famous BBQ'd salmon with fresh lemon and Caribbean Seasoning. Tony and Vicki made a great salad, rice and bread.  Best meal we've had aboard yet!  After dinner we went out on the trampoline and Mike R. gave us a little celestial lesson.  Sirius, 7 Sisters, Polaris, Taurus, Canis Major and many others were very easy to see.  The angle (degrees) off the horizon of Polaris is the same as your position in degrees Latitude.  Here, Polaris is approximately 18° in the sky, and back home it rests at approximately 47°. At this point it was about 11pm and we were all pretty beat from the long day so we went to bed.  Tomorrow we set sail for St. Bart's, a destination popular for spotting stars and celebrities, and also being very French.  We'll have to clear customs upon arrival, then decide where we want to stay.  Hopefully more great snorkeling!