We left at 10 and arrived in Roseau, Dominica's capital and by far its largest city, at 2. It took Roger 27 minutes, before departing, to attach, raise and secure our dinghy to its davit bar, and 17 to get it back down into the water at the end of the trip. These are times that he hopes to improve with practice.
The trip down the west coast of the island from near its north to near its south end, was about 20 miles and the winds were at our port side, but very gusty. The winds varied from five to eighteen knots. We used the full main and started and ended with the small jib but used the big genoa in the middle. The thing about wind from the side is that when it gets stronger and makes us go faster, it appears to come from further forward, and when it slows and we slow, it appears to come from aft of the beam. This means frequent trimming of the sails, which is a strenuous activity, so instead of adjusting our sails, we adjusted our course to keep the sails full, varying from slightly east of south to slightly west of it. Our boat speed varied from 3 to 7 knots. A big French flagged catamaran passed us and we gave chase, almost catching her until it was time to turn left to the anchorage.
This "bay" hardly merits that name. The water is plenty deep (we are moored in 50 feet of water a few hundred feet from the beach)
but while about two miles long between its "protecting" capes, the bay's crescent is less than 1/4 mile deep. It is totally exposed to winds from the west and roly when waves come from the north or south. We were approached by Pancho and his side kick, Lenny, (the Roseau equivalent of Martin) who told us that there was only one mooring left. It was the southernmost one. They took our propane tank to be refilled and promised wifi and that they would have the tank back that afternoon. We were frustrated because we could not get wifi on the boat or at a hotel 1/4 mile away. They were a day late in returning the propane tank so we had a great salad that night and rolls and a pineapple for desert and watched another Pirates of the Caribbean DVD.
Next morning Roger cleaned the bilge again, thoroughly, but the smell was back by evening. His current theory is that there is a small hole in the aft holding (sewage) tank. If this is so, the first step will be to empty it and then not use it until a replacement can be fabricated and installed.
Sea Cat took over from Pancho and directed us to moor on one of his moorings, further north and nearer town, where we do have wifi on the boat, hence this plethora of postings.
We dinked into a dock near town. Since this is the open sea and hence wavy near shore, we had to use our little stern anchor. You tie the dink with a line from its front to the dock and then back off as far as you can and throw a small anchor off the back of the dink which is tied to its stern. Then you pull yourself closer to the dock with the front line and get off. with experimentation, you can get it so that the dink is held by its two attachment points, jerking back and forth and up and down but far enough off the dock so that the waves do not bounce it against the dock, which is not good for the dinghy.
We had coffee at a Starbucks imitator and lunch at CocoRico, mentioned in the cruising guide. It has a very "U.S. looking" menu and was populated by mostly white people. We have seen very few white people on this island who are not tourists like us. It was market day so again we marketed. Hundreds of little stalls, most staffed by a woman who was sells much the same vegetables and fruits from her own garden. We also shopped at the IGA for staples and looked for and found a bookstore that was shown in the cruising guide map, but it was closed. It was Saturday, but more significantly, there was no cruise ship at the dock, so many of the stores were closed. So was the information center and museum, but the free public library was open. We returned to the boat, swam, watched two lads fishing by hand reel,
showered and had a delicious home cooked hot meal.
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