Friday, March 21 — The Nordhavn 68 in this photo was named Stella Luna, and we got this great shot of her under the brightly glowing, half-full luna at dawn.
Like yesterday, the wind was low and the bay was calm, so after we finished school and chores, we headed out to go snorkeling with some other families. Our rendezvous spot was at the southwestern tip of Stocking island.
As we had briefly mentioned back in December, we (relatively) recently upgraded our dinghy. We’d had a Gig Harbor hard shell sailing/rowing dinghy with a Torqueedo 503 electric motor with 1.5 horsepower. We also had 50-watt solar panels to charge the motor when we had it out, which were made by Torqueedo. We were very happy with those solar panels.
On Friday, March 14, starting at 0100 and lasting until 0500, there had been a full moon eclipse. Had we stayed up and the clouds cooperated, we probably could have seen it from here. But chose not to. When we awoke, the eclipse was fully over and the moon was shining like a spotlight.
Wednesday, March 12, 2025 — We were up again early to get the boat ready to go to sea. A storm was coming in the next few days. As much as we liked this place, we’d had to make a decision between staying here longer than planned or leaving sooner than planned. We opted for sooner. We picked an anchorage ten hours away so we could do a day run.
We quickly got the dinghy up and all the loose things stowed. As soon as dawn broke (shortly before 0700), Eric turned on the engine. The stabilizers didn’t turn on. Eric troubleshooted and determined that the servo controller (main computer) was getting power.
Our new friends also decided to move on for the storm. Here they were leaving the anchorage as the sun rose.
Wednesday, March 5 — The weather forecast had changed for the worse, so we needed to either leave Jamaica sooner than planned or stay longer than planned. We opted for sooner, which meant we needed to get serious about boat projects and sightseeing.
After our morning routine of schoolwork and boat chores, Eric ran a bunch of tests to verify how the boat’s systems operate. After the voltage regulator problem he wanted to parallel in each of the battery banks to the house bank to make sure they each worked, which they did. He verified that the main engine shuts down without voltage from the house bank of batteries. He verified that if he shut the engine bank off, then shut off house bank, then the engine wouldn’t shut off. This confirmed his suspicion that the Seafire system was getting power from the engine bank in order to shut off the engine.
Ed had come by that morning and was being pushy about escorting us on a sightseeing trip. Knowing that we were running out of time, at 1500, we took him up on the offer. He said he was taking us to the Frenchman’s Cove and the Blue Lagoon. Ed walked us over to the gas station between the two main roads in town and we caught a taxi.
The taxi took the road that paralleled East Harbor. We headed southeast for about five miles. Shortly beyond East Harbor, the waterfront became all privately owned property. The buildings along the shore were mostly homes, with a few hotels, and was an interesting mix of old, new, small, large, low-end and high end.
This place is apparently a private home called Trident CastleThere were plenty of small homes, too. Continue reading →
