The plan involved a flight to Tenerife at the end of December 2013 and a crossing to Barbados where our wives would join us for a couple of weeks cruising down to Grenada and then northwards through the Grenadines ending in St. Lucia.
The crossing started on 1st January 2014 and took 19.5 days, arriving at Bridgetown, Barbados on 20th January. Details of the crossing and our "fun and games" en route are recorded on Alan's blog at ticketeeboo.blogspot.co.uk. The track we took is shown below.
The distance run from Tenerife to Barbados was 2772 nm and the best 24 hour run, 172 nm. Thereafter we "cruised" a further 353 nm over two weeks ending in Rodney Bay, St. Lucia.
In summary, the crossing was very successful and we had a good laugh in the process. The time passed very quickly and unlike other reported crossings, we were never bored.
The "cruise" however was less enjoyable (not reflected in Alan's blog). Beating into winds of 25 to 40 knots is not most people's idea of a nice cruise, not helped by a badly set jib which eventually collapsed when the stitching failed at the head of the sail. Security issues heightened by the death of a skipper murdered on his yacht in St. Lucia resulted in a cruise which did not involve visits ashore - simply sailing from one anchorage to the next. Such a shame.
