Holed below the waterline
When we left Puerto Rico in early August we were worried about running into a tropical storm or, worse still, a hurricane. The thought of getting a crack in our hull and nearly losing our boat to a sinking didn’t cross our minds.
The Atlantic hurricane season starts in June and to decrease your chances of being in the path of one of these powerful storms it’s best to be tucked into an island below the hurricane belt. There are only a handful of islands to pick from and we chose Grenada to be our hurricane hole for the season.
We should have already been safely anchored there enjoying the local carnival with friends, but instead we were sitting in the south-west corner of Puerto Rico anxiously awaiting the arrival of a new mainsail to replace our current ripped one. Since hurricane season was upon us, our original plan of island hopping down the chain was no longer an option. We decided to take the fastest route there to get to a safe harbour before a hurricane had a chance to make an appearance.
Our sail arrived and four days later on 7 August 2019, an ideal weather window opened up and we set our course for Grenada. With a projected rhumb line of 474 miles, this would be our longest sail our 35ft Pearson sailboat fitted with an electric motor.
