Exit strategy

The three of us (Keri, Trudi and myself) were less than convinced of the ability of the boat and Eric to safely deliver us to Utila. Eric had stuck the pipe together with a bit of epoxy and claimed that it now worked - however - luckily for him - he still made for the safe waters of an anchorage at Puerto Cortes.

Eric, Margot and Mango (pronounced Mongo - a la francais) the dog set off in the tender for port to get some extra food.

We held a council of war.

T was not going another fathom on that boat. Keri wasn't keen either. I'd have taken my chances - but I guess that would have been daft. When Eric returned, we told him that I'd always wanted to visit Puerto Cortes (keeping a straight face should have been quite hard - given the sight of the busiest container port in Central America strewn before us, however necessity is a great aid in controlling facial expressions).

After a bit of grumbling and ensuring that we didn't want our money back - he agreed to let us off in the morning.

After a sleepless night (Eric disappeared into town after smoking a joint or two and did not reappear until 8am - I was convinced we were about to be attacked by pirates) we got off the boat and made landfall in the miniature boat that Eric carried with him as a tender.

T survived the three minute journey by talking to Mango.

After polite farewells at the Immigration office - we got in a taxi to San Pedro Sula and beat the hell out of dodge.

We learned many lessons on the Kir. One day we may have recovered enough to document them.

Pear shaped

We had been sailing for 9 hours when Eric decided that we needed to put a tack in to get us around a headland that was about 5 miles in front of us. He started the engine to help a bit and then had a bit of trouble getting the foresail in (it was a roller foresail and a halyard had got caught in the sail, making it impossible to furl completely.) I went up front to help (by holding the halyard out of the way) and we got the job done.

At this point Eric said to me that there was a problem - I thought he said that the rudder was broken - which would have been a teency-weency problem. However, he actually said that some rubber had gone. The connecting hose of the sea-water cooling system had perished and broken in two. We had no engine.

Now, on its own, on a sailing boat with favourable winds, the engine isn't the most important thing. However, if the wind changes, or you want to maneuver in port, or charge the batteries or anything else goes wrong - it is kind of critical. We instantly agreed to make for the nearest port - which was about four miles due downwind of us - Puerto Cortes.

The natives were getting more than restless.

Las Sirenas - day six

Again, we were moving at the crack of dawn, with yet another unpleasant motor through the choppy seas.

T and I had decided against another night of purgatory on the Rio Dulce (it was about this time that the Pirate issue was mentioned by the crew) and so decide to alight at Livingston to see if we could get by boat to Honduras - that had been Keri's plan all along and so we decided to join her.

We left the party to enjoy their river cruise.

We stayed in a nice hotel with a pool and an OK restaurant - with local Garifuna dancers thrown in.

We had all suffered a bit from the sailing experience, lack of activity, the nightmare of the first night and the awful bashing through the wind and waves conspired to make the trip a little less than perfect. We enjoyed a nice hot shower (there we no showers on Las Sirenas!) and a nice big bed. Oh, and we will draw a veil over the toilet facilities on the boat:

Las Sirenas - day five

After a wet (the hatches didn't seal properly) and hot night, we awoke and had breakfast. On the horizon appeared a boat bringing our two missing Dutch passengers, once they had arrived - we set off to a new place.

Unfortunately, the wind had changed direction completely, so the engine was required once more - for a rather unpleasant 3 hour bash to another reef. That reef was nice.

Another wet, warm night followed.

Las Sirenas - days three and four

We spent two days moored firmly to the bottom - doing little but swimming, reading and sun-bathing (on Sunday - it rained on Monday).

Mala entertained us all with tales from Greenland - which seemed to consist of hunting and killing things, then carrying them back home to eat.

On one snorkelling trip, Mala found a shark minding its own business and resting at the bottom of the sea. After calling me over to have a look at it (which I thanked him for) he then dived down and pulled its tail (which I didn't).

Many fish were caught and prepared for our dinner - which was nice.

On Monday night, we had to shelter from the rain - in the rather cramped conditions below.

We still had not seen our missing two voyagers.

Las Sirenas - day two

After a most uncomfortable night, we awoke to the swaying of the now underway boat. The scenery was quite stunning and made up for the blood (to mosquitos), sweat and tears of the night just past.

We made our way to Livingston where we stopped to clear customs. Most of us chose to go for a refreshing swim in the crystal clear waters of the Rio Dulce as it flowed past the town. In retrospect, once we were out, we did think that the turgid brown sludge we had been bathing in may not have been as clean as we'd hoped. Nobody seemed to suffer any ill effects though.

The rest of the day was spent with the motor on, beating into the wind to reach our mooring point before sunset. Once we arrived, we swam around a bit and then tried to play UNO in a howling (but warm) gale.

Saturday night was cool and mossie-free - beautiful.

Las Sirenas - day one

OK - time to catch up on some history.

On Friday 3rd March we joined the catamaran Las Sirenas We waited around in the hottest cafe in Livingston until we were picked up in a lancha and taken across the bay to the boat.

After being robbed of our shoes for the duration of the trip, we sat in harbour for a while as we waited for the last two of our number to arrive. Eventually we set off without them and so our happy party consisted of:

• Raul - El Capitan


• Carlos - Deckhand


• El Cocinar - The (almost) nameless cook


• Trudi - UK


• Paul - UK


• Keri - Canada


• Andreas - Germany


• Ilse - Germany


• Peter - Australia


• Robyn - Australia


• Mala - Greenland


• John - USA

(Much) later we were joined by:

• Remco - NL


• Mascha - NL

A good group of characters.

The first night was made in the swelteringly hot, windless, mosquito infested banks of the Rio Dulce. We didn't understand why we couldn't moor out in the windy, mosquito-less bit of the river. Much later, we were told why - Pirates.

After a nice meal, we sat down to play UNO. I was terrible.