Passage Curacao to Aruba
Monday 10th/ Tuesday 11th Dec 18
We checked out yesterday so we are ready to move without the trek to Willemstad. We need to be in Aruba early morning and as it is only 90 miles, we leave late afternoon. The wind is strong over 20 knots with gusts of 30… Fortunately it is all behind us and the waves are not so big. What it does though is completely mock up our time/distance calculation. We thought that we would be doing between 5 and 6 knots boat’s speed, as it turns out we are trundling along at 7 and over for most of the way… we have to shortened sails to keep the speed down, even with the equivalent of a table cloth out, we are still doing around 6 knots. Beautiful night to be out, there are plenty of shooting stars… it is a wonder that with so many falling off the sky there are still millions of them out there.
Sunrise finds us outside Oranjstad, in Aruba, us and 2 cruise liners cued up to get into the entrance of the reef. We are asked to wait until they are all tied up, it only takes half hour. Horrible dock though, more suited to big vessels [those black tyres] and the wind is not helping much. Still customs and immigration are very swift and we are at anchor by the airport just after 9am… easy day today, did not sleep much last night.
Wednesday 12th dec 18
First job today getting the black tyres mark off the hull… takes most of the morning and with the wind and the waves, standing in the dinghy is not that much fun. We thought e would go to the beach in the afternoon, there are plenty of trees so it looks like a good place for hammock… unfortunately with the wind peaking at over 30 knots in the anchorage, the idea is soon dismissed. We don’t often set of in this kind of wind with Mr X, not a good idea to do it with our little dinghy and our electric outboard. The Suzie too rally is here and so is Jackster with whom we spend another lovely evening.