Isla de Juventud – Batabano

Sunday April 22nd

This morning I lifted the anchor without even starting up the engine. Had a good two hours of preparations before I was able to go: folded up the dinghy and stored it on deck and replaced the genoa with the working jib. Even early in the morning there was already quite a breeze, and the normally only gets stronger during the day. Within an hour I had to put a reef in the main, but it has been going well like that. Averaged 6 knots for the first 2.5 hours, going about half wind to pass between some shoals. We just passed those, just after the GPS’s odometer reached a 1000 miles (that means 1000 nautical miles since the first week of January). Just changed course to go at the wind, pushing into about a knot of current. Will have to see where I am at when the wind dies out (that is normally around 7 at night). In the mean time the water color has changed from green to turquoise, beautiful.

Tuesday April 24th

Two days later and lots has happened in the mean time. Sunday afternoon the wind disappeared at 4 o’clock, way earlier then normal. Since it was in fairly shallow water I decided to drop the anchor and go for a swim. The water was greenish, but still very clear. Was able to see my anchor clearly (it was laying upside down, due to anchoring without using the engine to pull on it). Tried to dive to it, but it was to deep, my ears started to hurt really bad when I got close to 3 meters deep (it was about 4-5 meters deep there). Hung around lazy a little bit, just enjoying the quietness and the water. Then by 7 the wind started to come back. Decided that I was going to go back to sailing again. Picked up the anchor and left.

Within an hour the wind was blowing more than 15 knots, and on the horizon it looked like there were some showers. The wind kept increasing and I had to put in a reef. Of course it was an at the wind course, so the boat was taking quite a beating. Next things was to furl in the jib, and after midnight I even put in a second reef. This was the real first bad weather I had gotten myself into. Overnight the wind stayed between 25 and 30 knots, and the waves were making things quite uncomfortable (the whole area there was pretty shallow which gave short waves).

Did get some sleep, setting the alarm every hour to check the boat was still heading the right direction. I had not seen a boat since I left La Coloma the day before, so I was not concerned about running into other boats. By the time it was daylight I had gone more than enough east to get a straight tack to Batabano. Only had to navigate between some Cayos and make sure there was enough water between them. The wind settled a little, and the second reef came out and the jib went back on. Came into Batabano without any troubles, 2 in the afternoon, nice and early arrival for a change.

There is a long pier into the sea from the harbor entrance. And the people on there signaled that I should dock there. When I got closer in it got shallow quickly. And the first place where I docked the boat had actually run aground (not a big deal because it is normally soft mud in those kinds of places). We walked the boat backwards along the dock until there was a least some water under the keel.

Then the harbor master came and asked how long I was planning to stay. I said two days, and explained to him that the next day I planned on going to Havana to pick up a new passport. That is when the trouble started. He told me that it was a military port and did not cater to foreign yachts. And be now means was I allowed to leave the vessel unaccompanied. It even sounded like he was going to send me back out. I had looked forward to a little rest instead.

Of course all these `communications’ were in Spanish, as much as I can understand things (simple things only). The harbor master got on the phone (he had a cell phone, what a luxury) and I hear him talk about the whole situation. About 15 minutes later a car showed up, with someone speaking a little English. He repeated the things the harbor master had said before (I guess my Spanish understanding was not lacking there). I tried to argue this a little bit. They were trying to send me to Nueva Gerona (on Isla de Juventud), pretty much where I had come from over the last 30 hours. So I explained that I did not plan on heading back where I had struggled to come from beating into the wind. The only compromise they made is that I was going to be allowed to stay at the dock until the next day. But I was not allowed to leave the vessel unattended (so basically I had boat arrest).

There went my planned bike ride to Havana to pick up the passport. This really is the only port within bike riding distance from Havana. An alternative plan has to be made to pick up my passport. Maybe from Cienfuegos I can use the bus service (will cost some hard currency and require a nights stay in Havana, we’ll see).

It took me a little while to get over the frustration of all this, but it is a done deal, we are moving on. Had a look at the maps and see where to go from here, and decided that it was going to be Cayo Largo (by no means am I going to back track to Isla de Juventud, that was just too much work, and the cruising guide does not have very positive things to say about docking and authorities there either).

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