Salty Podcast: Sailing

Salty Podcast #38 | ⛵What’s the Best Sailing Route from Florida to the Caribbean?🌴✨

• Captain Tinsley | Hayden & Radeen | SV Island Spirit • Season 1 • Episode 38

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Join me as Hayden & Radeen, the crew of SV Island Spirit, share their proven sail route from Florida to the Caribbean.  Expect exciting stories, tips, & inspiration for your next sailing adventure! 

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SALTY ABANDON: Cap'n Tinsley, Orange Beach, AL:
Oct 2020 to Present - 1998 Island Packet 320;
Nov 2015-Oct 2020; 1988 Island Packet 27
Feb-Oct 2015 - 1982 Catalina 25

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Capn Tinsley:

Welcome back to the Salty Podcast, where it's always a great day to talk about sailing. This is episode 38, and I'm streaming live from Key West. Before we dive in, I ask that you please smash that like button, subscribe to the channel and engage in the chat by asking a question or commenting on the discussion. Today we have a fantastic episode lined up. As we chat with Hayden and Radine, the crew of Sailing Vessel Island Spirit, a 1995 Island Packet 35 sailboat, they'll be sharing their favorite route from South Florida to the Caribbean, breaking down the highlights, challenges and tips for sailors looking to make that journey. Whether you're an experienced sailor or dreaming about your first voyage, this episode is packed with valuable insights. So grab your coffee or your cocktail, settle in and welcome Hayden and Ray Dean back to the Salty Podcast. Hello, hello, hello.

Hayden:

Hey, Tinsley, thank you Great to be here again.

Capn Tinsley:

Welcome back, welcome back, welcome back. Too bad, you're not down here in Key West.

Hayden:

I know, I know You're down there in the islands and we're up here in Pennsylvania, so this is almost international.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, and I didn't sail here, just for the record. I flew here, so hopefully soon I'll be doing that.

Hayden:

I saw those band-aids they had on your airplane, which looked a little scary, yeah Well.

Capn Tinsley:

I asked my pilot friend, he said no, oh, that's just 600 mile hour tape. So apparently that's like a regular thing that airlines use.

Hayden:

It looks like the same aluminum tape I use in my refrigerator insulation or something.

Capn Tinsley:

Now it's like and it was coming off. That was the disturbing thing, yeah, of course, of course it would be well. So if I start coughing, you can just um, if I start coughing, just keep talking, okay I got you, I got you so so tonight we're going to talk about your route from South Florida to the Caribbean, and you've brought us charts to make this very easy. So where would you like to start?

Hayden:

Well, I think we'd like to just say that we've made three runs from the USA down to the Caribbean. We have two runs from Annapolis, maryland, to Grenada, and then we have one run from Brunswick, georgia, down to Miami and then on down into the Caribbean. But we've spent a total of what?

Radeen:

Five seasons.

Hayden:

Yeah, five seasons in the Caribbean. We've stored the boat down there multiple times, in Grenada and up in Puerto Rico, and currently right now we're stored up in Antigua. So we have the boat based there to go back in December and start up there.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, I was going to read your pedigree, which you just read part of it your 25th year sailing, yeah, 25 years on this boat of it, your 25th year sailing. Yeah, 25 years on this boat 20 trips north-south on the ICW, on the eastern seaboard, nine winters in Bahamas and Exumas, five winters sailing the Caribbean, three trips from Annapolis, maryland, to the Caribbean. And over 50,000 nautical miles, and still counting, yeah, we don't know when we're going to get off this little. And over 50,000 nautical miles, and still counting, yeah.

Hayden:

Yeah, we don't know when we're going to get off this little 35, but we come home here. The first year we did two and a half years nonstop and it got a little crazy and then we finally decided to come home and do the standard six months on the boat and six months at home. So that's what we're doing now. That's a great plan. Yeah, so that's what we're doing now.

Capn Tinsley:

So, um, that's a great plan.

Hayden:

Yeah, that's the setup. So, but normally we base in Florida, right?

Radeen:

A lot of time.

Hayden:

Yeah, we based down in Stewart Florida or down in Biscayne Bay. So, um, why don't you put up one of the charts and just shows the whole route, that first chart which is kind of give somebody the idea of where's this layout? Okay, that is the beginning of the route which takes it from Biscayne Bay in the bottom of Florida, or. A lot of people leave from up north, a little bit farther, if they're going over to the Abacos. The thing I want you to realize is there's basically two sections of the Bahamas. You have the Abacos, which is what offshore boaters should do their first year. They go out the sea, wouldn't you say that's easy?

Radeen:

I agree.

Hayden:

Yeah, so going off to the Abacos is very, very simple. You can go over there just on day hopping and then, if you go your next season, you try to go offshore. You would go down to the Exumas and you leave Miami area, go across to Bimini and down into the Berry Islands and out to Nassau and then down to where the word Exumas are. There's an entire chain down there. That is just everybody's favorite place. What do you like about it?

Radeen:

The Wardrick Wells National Park is there and it's been a park since the 1950s and it's a no-take zone. You got to leave all the shells and the fish and everything you find there, and it's spectacularly beautiful. And that's in the Exumas, halfway down the Exuma chain, and at the bottom of the chain is Georgetown, which is a great place to provision and do laundry and get ready to keep moving.

Hayden:

If you can back up one chart to the overview picture. I think there's a chart before this.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh, yeah, yeah. Okay, can we just set. I just want to acknowledge this comment. If you watched last week the Sailor and Wanderer and they were talking about the swallow tattoos.

Hayden:

Yeah.

Capn Tinsley:

You get one every 5,000. Did you know about?

Hayden:

that I need a couple up my arm now. Yes, I do.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, he said you need a few, because it's every 5,000. Yeah, they said they saw someone with five on their arm.

Hayden:

I need five swallows on each arm yes.

Hayden:

So this chart shows, like, the whole perspective from Miami, florida, out to the corner, what would be Antigua, which is the farthest east island, and then, once you reach Antigua, which is where we're stored at, everything from there is south, and the challenge of this run from Florida to the Caribbean. You can see it's on a course of 120, which is, you know, southeast, but the trade winds are blowing in here from the east, constant trade winds of 090. So what you have is you have wind of 090 and a heading of 120. So that means the wind is 30 degrees off your port bow from Florida all the way out to there for 1200 miles, and that's why it's so difficult. You mainly motor sail into this all the way out here. It's what happens.

Radeen:

That's why it's called the thorny path.

Hayden:

Yeah, yeah, it's not a pleasant run. Now two of these that we did we have videos of bashing out here into this, into this. And last year was unbelievable because last year we had nine legs from Miami, florida to Antigua and every single leg we sailed 100%. We had no serious motoring and bashing into the wind. Because the weather pattern changed last winter where these low pressures were coming off the USA East Coast and when a big low pressure comes off the coast it's spinning counterclockwise, let's say off of the Carolinas and it comes out the sea towards Bermuda. The trade winds get pulled into that and the trade winds go north and when the north winds come, you go east.

Radeen:

Because you have a beautiful beam, reach so we sailed 99% of those nine legs. It was a wonderful season.

Hayden:

Yeah, you end up waiting in harbors for the north wind to come, or any wind other than 090. The trade winds will pull north 10 degrees or they'll pull south to 100. And they just kind of go back and forth like that. They rarely go south or north like they do in the Bahamas. It's a big challenge in the Exumas to have south winds and west and northwest winds. You're on a lee shore all the time. It's very treacherous in the Bahamas when the fronts come through. But when you're going east, when the fronts come and you get this northwest or north wind, you head southeast and you can sail that and that's one of the keys to going down a 40-degree.

Capn Tinsley:

So you want a north wind, you want a north wind, you want a north wind.

Hayden:

When the winds go north or northwest, you go out to sea.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, we waited in the Bahamas Not to go across the Gulf Stream, because that would be a nightmare. No, no, no, when you get across over to say the Exumas. Yeah, you wait for Southwinds in Miami.

Hayden:

Right, right, radine wanted to talk about this Miami, how you use Biscayne Bay, miami, as your queuing up point.

Radeen:

Oh, yeah, okay, biscayne is a great place to stay on your boat and use your systems sail every afternoon, just to get in practice with everything. If you ended up waiting a week or two for weather, you've got many places to reprovision, restock everything that you used while you're waiting for weather and it's a great place to be ready to leave from for the Caribbean.

Hayden:

Yeah, if you go back to that chart number two, it shows how Miami is a great staging point For people coming down the USA East Coast. You end up in Florida and your goal is this yeah, you end up in Biscayne Bay. Your goal is this Exumas run. You want to get to the Exumas if you're going to the Caribbean. You want to get to the Exumas if you're going to the Caribbean. So you don't want to be up north in Stewart or Fort Pierce because you're not going to get south to the Exumas from there. You can. So what you do is you move down the coast of Florida to Biscayne Bay and you sit in Biscayne Bay where there's many places to anchor and there's marinas and mooring balls and isolation places. You can hang out in the lower keys and you wait.

Capn Tinsley:

That's State Park for during the day, right, yeah, bill Baggs.

Hayden:

State Park is right there. You have no Name Harbor. And what happens is you wait in Biscayne Bay and every seven to ten days a low pressure comes across the country and here comes a big low. And when the lows come out to the ocean and they're spinning counterclockwise, it pulls the trade winds into them and in down here in Florida. The trade winds will go South. And when the trade winds go South you take off from Biscayne Bay and run towards Bimini to get across the Gulf, to get across the Gulf stream, Cause you need the South wind laying down the Gulf Stream to get across.

Hayden:

Now it's a very short distance it's 45 miles. It's like 50 miles to Bimini. It takes six hours.

Capn Tinsley:

Right, I've done it. Yes, you have.

Hayden:

Yeah, we've crossed it 20-some times, I don't know how many times. Well, nine winters in the Bahamas, 18 crossings at least. So you get across to the Bahama banks and then you start making your run down towards the Exumas. Now the problem here is the north. When you went out on the Gulf Stream in south winds, what comes after south winds is southwest and then west, and then very strong northwest winds and then after northwest it comes up the north and then it blows like crazy out of the north and northeast.

Capn Tinsley:

So where do you hang out to wait for?

Hayden:

That's the whole problem. A lot of people, because they get afraid of that approaching front, will just simply make the run to Bimini. Now they're stuck in Bimini for the next seven to 10 days until the next front comes and they can move to the like Nassau area. What we done so many runs across there. We see no point in stopping in Bimini. We prefer to just stay back in Miami until there's a weather window that allows you to make the full run almost all the way out to the Berry Islands or, better yet, out to New Providence, which is Nassau. Get out there and put your staging up there for your next leg, and then your next leg is down towards that word, exumas, and that takes you down through Shroud Key.

Capn Tinsley:

Now, where do you stay? In Nassau.

Hayden:

Well, we usually try to avoid Nassau. We use West Bay on the end of New Providence as a big bay, and I didn't bring in the detailed charts here. With this I'm just doing the overview of the route. But I mean we could have another discussion of zooming into each of these harbors and looking at all the harbors. But we come through there where that arrow is, and on the west side of New Providence Island that Nassau is on, there's a big bay called West Bay. Everybody uses that.

Hayden:

Now the problem is you need to check in. So this is an advantage to going to Bimini. You stop in Bimini for a night and check in. So this is an advantage to going to Bimini. You stop in Bimini for a night and check in and carry on the next day, or you go overnight across those Bahama banks and where the first arrowhead is, that's where Chubb Key is and Berries, and you can stop there and spend the night there and then now you can check in there. That seems to be the best. We did that last year with Alex and Amy, our buddy boat 350 Serena, which was a joy to travel with another boat. We stopped there the first night. That's about 24 hour run from Miami.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay.

Hayden:

So you have to be comfortable running at night when you make this run. You cannot get to the Caribbean from Florida without doing overnight runs. There's going to be about three that you have to make that have to be overnight. It's just too far of a distance. All of this on this screen here could be day stops right, yeah, so far yes. I can get all the way to Long.

Radeen:

Island in the lower right-hand corner, but all on day stops right, yeah, so far. Yes, yeah, all the way to Long Island in the lower right-hand corner.

Hayden:

Yeah.

Radeen:

All on day stops.

Hayden:

Now, if you go to the next screen because this is now the easy part You've just made it to the Exumas. Now this is where everybody gets stuck at. Right there, where your mouse is at the beginning of that arrow, that's Chicken Harbor. That's Georgetown, everybody. That's Chicken Harbor. That's Georgetown. Everybody's nicknamed the Chicken Harbor because if you go past there, look at the ocean. You have open ocean to your right. You have the trade winds blowing from Africa, so you have six to 10 foot seas out there coming in towards these islands and they crash onto the beaches here and you have to bash into that, you have to sail into that. So most people come down to the beginning of that arrow at back, up at the word Exumas, and they stop at Georgetown and they do not go beyond that.

Capn Tinsley:

And that's perfectly okay.

Hayden:

We did that for nine years. We loved it. It's funny.

Capn Tinsley:

Big community. There Everybody's hanging out having a good time.

Hayden:

We both said to ourselves one year. We said, if we don't go past this Georgetown and we get to the nursing home, we are really.

Capn Tinsley:

Gotta make it past there.

Hayden:

We said we have to get past Georgetown, damn it. And so we started to study this. And it's not that hard.

Capn Tinsley:

You just again you just have to put up with some uncomfortable things.

Hayden:

Yeah, a couple of days.

Radeen:

And you also have to be patient. This past season we ended up stuck in Black Point in the Exumas for eight days and I think people think well, how can you possibly be stuck? You can't go five miles to the next island. Well, no, you can't, because between each Exumas there's cuts and when the wind is really high, high, the waves get really condensed and the cuts are not safe to navigate yeah another time.

Radeen:

We got stuck near the last arrowhead in the turks for three, three weeks. The weather was not suitable for leaving. So another thing you need to be is not on a tight schedule and you need to be patient and wait for the good weather yeah, if you take your time down through this, it's going to take you two months to get to the Caribbean.

Hayden:

Just be not in travel time but in layup time where you're waiting for the weather to be right. There is no way you would make this run of these red arrow. This is one run here. By the way, you can break this up into days by stopping at Ackland's Island. There you can stop at another little island where the gap in the arrows are, which is called Mayaguana, and then you can make it down to Turks and Caicos. Now again, these are overnight runs.

Hayden:

You have to be out here at night and driving into the sea state and be comfortable with that. It's not violent, it's not difficult, but a lot of people are not comfortable running at night because you're going full speed ahead, six knots into pitch black seas and skies. You might not have a horizon if you don't have a moon, and so without a horizon it's really difficult. So if you have a moon that's coming up when you leave, it's great, and then it's easy piece of cake because you can see the waves and the sea state as you're driving into it.

Hayden:

So this leg, we left Georgetown, rounded the top of Long Island and we came into Crooked Island and stopped for the night and then the next day was another overnighter to Turks and Caicos.

Hayden:

And because the Turks and Caicos we did not want to get stuck in, we just went around the bottom of the Turks and Caicos, right where that arrow is, and we just dropped the anchor on West it's called West Caicos and you can get behind a little sandbar and anchor and we slept for like six hours or whatever, and we up anchored and if you go to the next screen you'll see the next screen is the most challenging part. Now from the Turks and Caicos you're heading for the Dominican Republic and that run of that one arrow there is a two-day run. That takes a day and a half to two days for getting from the Turks and Caicos. You come south underneath the Turks banks and then you hit the corner of Samana, which is that little arrow pointing into a harbor. There's a marina in there that is called Porta Bahia Marina in Samana DR. It is a five-star restaurant, radine's favorite thing. Tell them about your favorite thing in Samana.

Radeen:

They have an infinity pool. And as a marina you're allowed to use the swimming pool. It is spectacular, it overlooks the Bay of Samana and I could just swim all day in there and it's a swim-up bar bar and it's really really fun and it's very affordable. The Marina is inexpensive and it's never crowded and cruisers get together in the lounge on certain nights and it's a great, great place to be stuck.

Hayden:

If you never went past Samana, you would be very happy. It's just incredible. But you do have Another place where you get past Samana you would be very happy. It's just incredible. But you do have another place where you get.

Capn Tinsley:

Steve Smith says thanks for sharing Hayden and Radine IP 27 here in Pensacola.

Hayden:

All right, thanks, steve. Thank you, that's great.

Capn Tinsley:

Keep the comments coming.

Hayden:

Right. So now the other thing that happens in this run, that first long red arrow being two days. Most people again will not be comfortable with that. So what they will do is they will go straight south and they'll go into the place called Luperon.

Hayden:

Very very very cruiser friendly. Van Sant, the author of the Thorny Path, the book that tells you how to get down here. He lives in Samana and is building a house there, and it's a cruiser's Mecca. People get in there and they never leave. It's like a place that you can be swallowed up in, like Panama, or like the Ria Dulce is a place A lot of people get into and stay. It's just so wonderful. Well, that's what happens at Lupra. You come down to Lupra and you're like I'm done.

Radeen:

Maria Dulce is a place a lot of people get into and stay.

Capn Tinsley:

They fall in love with it. It's just so wonderful.

Hayden:

Well, that's what happens at Lupron. You come down to Lupron, you're like I'm done, I don't need to go east anymore. The problem with going to Lupron that I don't like is, from that point where your arrow is, you've got to bash east to get back out here to Samana where the little?

Hayden:

harbor is and then, believe it or not, the third arrow on that screen going down to Puerto Rico, going down to PR, that next arrow. That is 24 hours. It doesn't look like it's that far, but what happens is you come out of Samana and there's whales everywhere and you see whales jumping and all the whales come down here to the. You see those shallow banks out there. It's called the Silver Bank, right above the first long arrow.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah.

Hayden:

Yeah, okay, that's the Silver Banks. All the whales come to there, they come down to there, they hang out there. There's even programs where you can get on a dive boat and live on a dive boat out there in the Silver Banks and swim with the whales. There's thousands of whales in the DR. You come down through here, you see whales and then you finally decide to leave the five-star restaurant or the five-star marina Judith Jacobson says enjoying this Samana DR is awesome.

Hayden:

Dr Judith was with us. She loves it in there she's around the world.

Capn Tinsley:

Dr Judith, I would like for you to come on the podcast, you guys, yeah.

Hayden:

You need to get Judith on the podcast and hoping. These people have sailed incredibly long distances around Cape Horn out to Easter Island through the Panama Canal and they just start in Denmark because you know it's there. That's where we want to start at, but it's also. Denmark and Norway.

Radeen:

It's awesome.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, I definitely want them all. Awesome, that is Easter Island.

Hayden:

You have to get Judith on here. She's amazing. So you come out of DR and now you've got 24 hours across to Puerto Rico.

Radeen:

And that is the dreaded Mona Passage.

Capn Tinsley:

That's rough Because that's where the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic meet Exactly.

Radeen:

And it's rough also because it's shallow there. If you look at the chart you can see the blue markings show the very shallow water. So when there's any waves at all, they build up, stack up and it can be a treacherous rough 24-hour.

Hayden:

What's happening is the Gulf Stream is flowing sort of from east to west here and it flows up through that slot and you can see it's 4,000 feet deep on the south and 3,000 feet deep on the north. But in the middle there there's an area called the Hourglass Shoal and it looks like an hourglass laying on its side and the bottom comes up to 100 feet from 3,000 feet. When you look at charts, if you study that, you'll see it. And because the water is flowing up over that, as the water comes up over that shallow area, the waves stack up and the wind is usually blowing against that current, because the wind might be east or north of east, it'll be on the top of Puerto Rico. So you dive down across that and you get to the, the southwest corner of Puerto Rico, and that's when you pop the champagne right all your hard work has been rewarded.

Radeen:

Oh my gosh.

Capn Tinsley:

And this is a side note, this Puerto Rican trench, yep, that's the deepest part of the Atlantic right.

Hayden:

It looks that it might be the Marianas Trench. I don't know. Is that it no?

Capn Tinsley:

the Marianas Trench is in the South Puerto Rican, puerto Rican.

Radeen:

I think that may be the deepest water in the.

Hayden:

Atlantic it might be.

Capn Tinsley:

And it's hard to imagine Eighty nine it might be. It's hard to imagine 89.62. How many miles is that, Scott? 89.62 feet, that's deep, that's deep, yeah, and.

Hayden:

I don't know if that's meters or feet on my charts there. That's my.

Capn Tinsley:

MB charts.

Hayden:

But you reach that bottom.

Capn Tinsley:

Pop the champagne.

Hayden:

It's called Cabo Rojo and the Red Cliffs, right yeah red cliffs right, yeah, and you definitely take your selfies there, you? You usually round that in the morning light because you've left samana and you've run this mona at night and you, okay, you've come up to the corner of puerto rico there and the and the sun's coming up, yeah it, it's fabulous right. Exactly.

Capn Tinsley:

And is it calmer after you make that turn onto the south side?

Hayden:

Yes, it is calmer. Hopefully, ideally, it is calmer. The problem is, the south coast of Puerto Rico is a dream in the regards that you have harbors every 10, 20 miles. You can pull in every two, three hours. There's some place to pull in and anchor.

Radeen:

And all the harbors are interesting and safe. The people are friendly. We felt welcome everywhere. We had no expectations of Puerto Rico when we went. We had no idea and we've fallen in love with it. It's wonderful.

Hayden:

I love Puerto Rico. The Puerto Ricans are so kind and helpful and nice and you've just left the DR, pretty much a third world country, and you've come into the US infrastructure which you immediately notice, and there of a sudden you recognize you're kind of in the U? S again. It's really, really welcoming to get cut to reach Puerto Rico.

Radeen:

One of our favorite places is right at the right-hand side of the Puerto Rican arrow. It's a little Harbor called Salinas and it's spacious, plenty of room for everyone to anchor, and you can rent cars there and go wherever you want on the island.

Hayden:

Yeah, we always go up into Salinas Harbor, anchor up in there, get the rental car guy, typical Puerto Rico. You get a rental car, oh it's $50, cash, cash only. The car will be at the marina. You go in with your dinghy, the guy's there, he hands you the keys, you hand him 50 bucks Not to sign anything. No, no, just bring it back full of gas and you're like I have no paperwork, no, no no insurance. Just take the car.

Radeen:

It's usually some mom's car or somebody else's car he picked up in the neighborhood I love those kind of rentals and he brought it to you less rules, rules and everything.

Hayden:

Yeah, you just take the card, go off, you go.

Capn Tinsley:

I want to highlight this comment here Ralph Bolden. He's from Orange Beach, but he and his wife are on their boat right now. Great video watching from Curacao avoiding hurricanes.

Hayden:

Yes, smart place to be Very safe. You're very safe down there. Congratulations we hope to get there. We hope to get there, maybe.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, this year are you going to go to San. Blas Islands. You're going to make it down there.

Hayden:

I'm not going to the Western Caribbean. You're going to have to get Mayor Session to talk to you about that. He's an expert down there and he's been into San Blas and Panama and Guatemala and we have a bunch of island packet owners that are over there and know the area. We've been thinking we're going to get to the Rio, but we're so enamored with this Eastern Caribbean because the different cultures and the different countries that you can move through and once you're out there it's pretty easy.

Hayden:

It's great sailing, best sailing probably in the world, and no question All of this. You're bashing into the sea. But now you're at the corner of Puerto Rico and look what's right ahead of you the Virgin Islands, the US Virgin Islands, st Thomas, st Croix, and then the little, teeny, tiny space of the British Virgin Islands. You know we've all taken vacations down to the BBI's and rented boats down there. Now that you've run all this distance and you get down here and you start poking around the Virgin Islands, you realize oh my God, they are so small, there's like nothing here and they're so close together.

Radeen:

You can sail for two hours and you're on a different island. It's such a relief after all these long distances, sure, sure.

Hayden:

The BVIs are 35 miles long and four miles wide. You know we came in from sea and went all the way around the BVIs and up to the Bitter End in an afternoon. It's really really cool. There you go. San Blas is a must visit. We hope to, we hope to, we hope to. If we go west, it would be we'd go west and Panama would be where we would reach and then do the San Blas. I could see basing in Panama and doing the San Blas for a couple years. Everybody loves it. They're very similar to the Exumas.

Hayden:

From what we hear People have been to both of them, from watercolor and beaches and palm trees. But what makes the San Blas so much better is the Indian tribe that runs it. They're so special is what I understand. They're so kind and helpful for you.

Capn Tinsley:

These are the guys. Sailing Wanderer were the people I had on last week and you were commenting. You guys Sailing Wanderer were the people I had on last week and you were commenting, and so I told them they needed to tune in because they're going to be heading up your way now.

Hayden:

Well, they're going to come from where they are. They're in the ABCs.

Capn Tinsley:

They're in Aruba, where they were last week. They're going to shoot straight up to Puerto Rico. Most likely because that would be a great—. Oh yeah, they're going to go up to the DR and hang a right I.

Hayden:

They were going to go up to the DR and hang a ride I think that's what they said. Or Puerto Rico. You could come into San Domingo. There's a harbor there to come into on the south shore of DR, but I don't know anything about the south coast of DR. We didn't run that, so I would shoot for Puerto Rico because it's fantastic. So then you got the US Virgin Islands and St Croix. Now, if you go to the next screen now, now you've actually made it to what's really, really sweet. You can just stay back here in the Virgin Islands now, where you can ship things in with UPS easily to the US Virgin Islands. You get your US mail. We activated a new Google Fly phone back there in St Thomas one year. You have medical help if you need it. There's so many services in the Virgin Islands.

Radeen:

Oh, you can get a lot of boat jobs done. It's really nice to be in the Virgin.

Hayden:

Islands. I love it. I could just base in the Virgin Islands. Probably I could actually just base on this screen right here. This screen here has probably, in my opinion, some of the best the Caribbean has to offer, because they're very developed islands, there's a lot of services here. They're very developed islands, there's a lot of services here, and when you move from US Virgin Islands out to St Martin that's 90 miles, that's called the oh my Godda Passage and we actually flew into the BVIs in 1996 to help an Island Packet 40 owner sail this passage and he asked us to come down here and make this run with him. We did.

Hayden:

Had a great Christmas vacation at the BVI's, came out of Salt Bay or whatever it was in the Virgins and headed east. It was a pancake lake. It was ridiculous. It was completely flat. Remember there was absolutely no wind. We got to St Martin so early motoring, and then when we got there the sun had not come over the mountain of St Martin and one of the tricks at St Martin is you need high sun to come into it to see the harbor. It's a real volcanic high island, beautiful. So we waited offshore to come in and we arrived at St Martin and then we spent some time there for New Year's and then we flew home from St Martin. But this passage this year tell them about this year what happened.

Capn Tinsley:

Hayden, can I ask? There's a question up here.

Radeen:

I would like to answer this question. Okay, the reason that you don't sail along the south coast of the DR to the south corner and then cut over straight to the southern part of Puerto Rico and pass south of Isla Mona is because Haiti is on the western end of the island of Hispaniola the western end of the island of Hispaniola and, if you're not aware, politically it's got problems. But you're also not insured by most insurance policies to be in Haitian waters, so that makes Haiti not a good choice. We know people who have sailed there, who are from Europe and their insurance doesn't restrict them, and they said it's beautiful and they felt safe. But that's why we don't do what Rick suggested.

Hayden:

Yeah, rick, that would not work. But if you're going west, you would go to the south coast of DR and then skip Haiti and then end up in Jamaica, I think is next. Right, I think so. And then the Caymans, and then you'd be in Mexico. But this is the route. This is the best route for the thorny path to come on the top of the DR. Right? There's another question, right, but why not sail from the northeast corner of the DR to the southeast corner, then cut across? Yeah, right, that's what we do. The northeast corner of the.

Radeen:

DR. Yeah, but we stop at the southeast corner of DR.

Hayden:

There's nothing to stop at in the southeast?

Radeen:

I don't think there's any anchorages right there at the corner.

Hayden:

What you end up doing is you get a little bit of northeast wind, you get 080 wind and you're coming down that angle of 120, 130. You got a double reef main up and a stay sail up and a motor on and you're close hold and you're just pushing, you just get it done. The problem along the northeast coast of the DR is that it's shallow and the fishermen of the DR go out there with long lines and they float them on little floats and you have these you know football field long fishing lines that are all over that can get in your prop.

Hayden:

So what you really want to do on the DR is you want to come out of where I have the word DR, that little short arrow. You want to come out of there and go due east. You want to go due east to deep water. When you get the deep water then you hang south towards the Mona Island and that gets you across the hourglass Shoal. And then you hang east to come into the corner of Puerto Rico. The little corner down there is called Puerto Real R-E-A-L. It's a fantastic marina. We anchor everywhere. We hardly ever take marinas. That DR Marina is one of the few marinas we stop in and stay in.

Radeen:

The Infinity Pool yeah, yes, the infinity pool.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah.

Hayden:

Yeah, it says fresh to salty.

Capn Tinsley:

She's. Yeah, that's fresh to salty. They've been on the podcast. So, hey, hey there. Thanks for engaging. Please, everybody engage. We love it, so we got.

Hayden:

We got the US Virgin Islands out to St Martin. Now the interesting thing that happened last year we left Puerto Rico on a north wind that was so strong that we actually I can't believe I did this we sailed straight past the Virgin Islands and the BVIs left them on our port beam. I'm watching them over there going. I cannot believe we're sailing past the Virgin Islands and not stopping in. We made a direct run for St Martin because we had 20 knots of north wind. We sailed straight out to St Martin, dropped the anchor in Simpson Bay Two weeks in St Martin, east trade winds are blowing like crazy. It flipped around back to north. We spun around, popped the Spinnaker and sailed the Spinnaker back to the Virgin Islands on a north wind again.

Capn Tinsley:

That was last year, wasn't it?

Hayden:

We had three sailing runs between the US Virgin Islands and St Martin, which is 90 to 100 miles, and we sailed them all. We sailed two of them on Spinnaker and one of them on a double reef main and a full gin, All night long, full moon. You know just this passage back and forth is the one of the worst passages in the Caribbean that they have a name for, called oh my Godda. Like oh my Godda, gotta do it, and we sailed it back and forth like it was a lake. It was.

Capn Tinsley:

I mean, it's still you chose your weather.

Hayden:

Yes, exactly, you just wait. And when, like I said, last year was so weird, the winds went north every leg. We had nine legs out to this Antigua and we sailed all of them. It was incredible.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, so let's go ahead and go and then we'll feature. I want to feature your favorite anchorage, but let's go ahead and finish the route.

Hayden:

Okay, the last leg then to make it to the. I mean, you've made it out here. Now you got St Martin. It's 100 miles down to Antigua and Antigua is part of Barbuda, those two islands, barbuda and Antigua. Barbuda is absolute paradise, just a dream up there.

Hayden:

But we came down to Antigua and you go into Jolly Harbor, anchor there and that's where our boat is hauled out at and stored. Now, from there, if you go to the next screen oh, here we got a question who is a good insurance company to go with? We want to do this trip but can't for two more years, right? Insurance is ridiculously expensive out here. So what we found is Markel. Usa has a policy called the Helmsman policy. We're using that because Markel has dropped what was called the Jack line policy, and the Jack line policy was written by Al Golden, a cruiser of many years. Figured out cruisers coming out here. This is the season they're out here and then they store their boat. And then, you know, or they go to Grenada, and the policies were written for cruisers that are out here, that are going to Grenada and storing. We paid a premium to be in Antigua, to store in Antigua, but Markel seems to be one of the best. And then the other company is called oh geez Diane that I'm working with right now.

Radeen:

Yeah, I'm sorry, oh, caribbean Risk.

Hayden:

Caribbean Risk Policies. So that's another company, but Markel is number one right now. That's another company, but Markel is number one right now. I just yeah, that's where I would start at.

Hayden:

Start at Markel USA, and then it's a USA company, because what happens is a lot of cruisers get policies, lloyd's of London, and if you have a claim or anything it's going to be settled back in London. If you have any discrepancies, you got to go, it's just. I would rather have a USA company and Geico and BoatUS and State Farm and all the logical ones. They don't cover past the Turks and Caicos.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, not even in like the winter.

Hayden:

No, it's very expensive to get down here with insurance.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, yeah, because I have Geico right now.

Radeen:

They'll give you a rider for the Bahamas, but you won't be able to go past the church.

Hayden:

I can tell you it's about 3%, like in the USA. It's 1.5% of agreed value is your premium. The Bahamas then ends up being about 2% of agreed value. Out here in the Caribbean it's about 3% to 4% of agreed value. If you have a $100,000 policy, it's gonna cost you $4,000 to be out here. $200,000 is gonna cost you $8,000 to be out here, and then there's all kinds of stipulations that you gotta get to Grenada or Trinidad. They're starting to remove Grenada as an option and forcing boats down to Trinidad. We're gonna store back in Puerto Rico this at the end of this season. We're going to sail the Caribbean and then go back over to Fajardo, puerto Rico Again. Usa infrastructure, san Juan Airport, fly in and out piece of cake and we'll pay a policy to be up there.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, thanks, fresh to Salty, yeah, good luck to you.

Hayden:

And the next screen just shows the whole picture then of the Caribbean, and that's the last screen. So here's the lay of the land there, once you get to. Antigua you got all these islands. Going south, it's 450 miles top to bottom, which is an easy two-day sail. We crossed it several times during COVID and it takes 60 hours to cross that nonstop. We left Grenada and sailed up to the Virgin Islands 60 hours, but each of these islands that you see pointed out here they're all day sail, four hours right.

Hayden:

Well at least from the bottom of one and arrive at the top of the next one. Right, you kind of work your way down. Each island has multiple harbors on the outside of them that you stop in, but the winds are always this east trade wind, so you're on the backside of these islands. Now, when you get between them, the wind accelerates.

Hayden:

It gets squeezed between the mountainous islands Like 30, 35 knots of wind between the islands. So you get laid over between them or you just stay 5, 10 miles back of them and sail down. That's the way of the whole land. Most people are down in Grenada now. They're stored down there or they're down below that in Trinidad.

Radeen:

Or they spend the summer in Grenada. A lot of full-time cruisers spend the summer on the south coast of Grenada. Their insurance allows them to be there and still be aboard, and there's a thriving community with the Radio Net and. Kids Net on Saturdays Grenada's great All kinds of activities. It's an active, active place to spend the summer.

Hayden:

Grenada is a cruiser's dream to integrate into. We spent two seasons there.

Radeen:

But we never spent the summer.

Hayden:

We stored there twice in Grenada also.

Capn Tinsley:

yeah, Well, the Sailing Wanderer says full-time cruisers. We use concepts. Insurance is a big topic.

Radeen:

I've never even heard of concepts. Yeah, okay.

Hayden:

Yeah, there's Rick again. Geico quote the Bahamas writer one major stipulation was you must have someone on the boat at all. Oh my gosh.

Capn Tinsley:

Someone on the boat at all times you can't leave it. They're getting real bossy.

Hayden:

Geico is. I'm not a big fan of Geico. We've had some friends that had claims with Geico that didn't get paid. I'm not a big fan of Geico. We've had some friends that had claims with Geico that didn't get paid.

Radeen:

So I'm not sure about Geico, but Geico gets you to the Bahamas, it won't get you past there.

Hayden:

Okay, Now you asked about our favorite place. You got to zoom in to Simpson Bay, St Martin, Okay let me pull up Simpson Bay, see if you can pull. Let me pull up Simpson Bay. See if you can pull that up, Should she?

Radeen:

go back to the previous thing, yeah.

Hayden:

I'm going to pull it up on Google Maps. She's going to bring it up on Google Maps.

Capn Tinsley:

Yes here on the Salty Podcast we like to feature people's favorite anchorages, while she brings it up.

Radeen:

I'll talk about what we like about it, please. Saint martin is half dutch and half french. The people who live there are citizens of the netherlands or citizens of france, and they're free to travel back and forth between their home countries and work there without any problem. So, uh, it's divided roughly north and south. The south side is the Dutch side and the north side is the French side, and when you stay in our favorite harbor in the middle of St Martin, you can dinghy 20 minutes one way or 20 minutes the other way and be in France or be in the Netherlands.

Hayden:

There you go, there you go. Yeah, just stop right there. First of all, zoom back out just a little bit.

Radeen:

There you go, okay.

Hayden:

Now, starting at the bottom, zoom in a little bit more. Stop right there, okay, starting at the bottom, it says Simpson Bay.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay On the outside.

Hayden:

Okay this is a very easy common place to arrive from sea when you're coming over from the US Virgin Islands. We've sailed in here on Christmas Eve. We've sailed in here New Year's Eve. We've come in at midnight. There's boats everywhere. It's easy to see. You come in by radar and you just drop an anchor, that's all. There's the boats Right there. Oh, they're everywhere. They cover that whole place place. That's where the most of the cruisers will hang out at. But all this up here to the top and around this beach. You see a beach around the top of that. You go right up and you anchor and you can take the dinghy to that beach right here, no, zoom back, zoom back, more zoom back no back

Radeen:

the other way, now go zoom out, zoom out, stop there.

Hayden:

See the beach to the north, right here, that entire beach. That's the runway. Right, there's the jet runway oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, so okay yeah, the jet's taking off on the runway, so you anchor anywhere in this crescent beach area. Okay, that is very easy piece of cake. You come in at any time of the night which you will end up doing or the morning, and just drop an anchor and sleep. It's, it's, wow.

Capn Tinsley:

So all of this is deep enough, all of this.

Hayden:

Oh, 10 feet, 10, 15, 20 feet, it's all sand.

Radeen:

It's all sand, so clear it's easy to see.

Hayden:

Fabulous. Now back up a little bit more. And now what you'll see here, back up some more. Okay, right there to the right. You see that little cut where, that little bit right there, there's a cut there. All the mega yachts go into there. That's the entrance into the lagoon. Now, snoopy Islanders for all the Steve Jobs of the world or the big billionaires of the world, they park their mega yachts on Snoopy Island.

Hayden:

That's a private island and 100 footers 200 footers will be there If you just go outside of that to the north and look at this pond. There's a pond here. It's called Simpson Bay Lagoon.

Capn Tinsley:

Is this area?

Hayden:

You got the bridge. Yeah, you're going to. We anchored there for weeks and it's flat, calm and absolutely a dream. And if you keep going North, you just zoom out a little bit more, zoom out, some more, zoom out, some more, a little bit more, a little bit more. Okay, now stop there. Look how big the lagoon is. Your mouse is in the small section of the lagoon, but all of that is lagoon All of that is anchorable.

Hayden:

All of that's protected on the North side, that's the French side, and you can go under that bridge in the middle. It opens twice a day and you can get to the French side and anchor over here as well. Now you see, in the top there's another exit right there to where your salty word is, where it says Sandy Ground Sandy.

Hayden:

Ground. Right there, that's an exit. You can take your boat out through that bridge. That bridge opens up and you go out to the other side, marigo, and it's the French Harbor. So zoom back into that and look at this sandy harbor. You can anchor all over this and it's all filled with morning balls. Now, to the far right is Marigo Market and you see, to the right, yeah, marigo Market. Right in there that's the marina and that's where the dinghy dock is and that's where town is. So now this is the French town of Marigold. And way back on the other side of the lagoon is the Dutch side where all the businesses are. So if you zoom back a little bit, keep zooming back, zoom back, zoom back, okay, yeah, stop right there. Okay, perfect, all right. Now, if you just look at this lay of this land, you see the line through the middle. That's the division of the French to the Dutch country, that solid line, yeah, okay. So there's an east to west line running there. That's French and Dutch. French is to the north and Dutch is to the south.

Hayden:

If you base your boat back in any of these three locations I just pointed out, you can base it in Simpson Bay, down in the bottom. You can base it in Marigot. At the top you can be brave and go into the lagoon and drop an anchor in the pond. The charges to anchor here are $20 a week. That's it $20. And that's. If you tell them how long you've been there, then they charge you. I mean?

Radeen:

well, most people pay. It's based on our system. Yeah Well, it's also based on when you checked in.

Hayden:

You have to check in or check out. Now, if you just stay back out here in Simpson Bay, people tend to not pay. I, Simpsons Bay people tend to not pay, I would think. But if you go under these bridges, they log you going into the bridges and then you have to go and pay to get the bridge to lift, to go out. So it's fine. But bottom line is you go into this lagoon, you drop the anchor. It is flat, calm, no current. It can blow 20, 30 knots through here and it's a lake.

Hayden:

That's why you love it so much Down to the very bottom of the lagoon, there where it says Simpson Bay Resort. Inside the lagoon, here, down below the break there, zoom into there, this bottom corner, keep zooming. Okay, stop there. Look at this. This is all your marine services. You've got dinghy docks here. You have bars and restaurants, cafes here. Budget Marine, who else is?

Radeen:

in there.

Hayden:

Island Water World Water World Services. They're all on the right-hand side of the shore there. Ab Dinghy, marine, yamaha Outboard Repair Services Anything?

Radeen:

you need the rigging company.

Hayden:

Oh my gosh FKG rigging. Get a whole new rig here. This is ground zero for yacht services. Everybody Up here and goes in here and this is where you get your work done. They'll come out and work on your boat In the lagoon. They'll re-rig it. I had guys I broke my boom vang off of my pop rivets Sailing up from Grenada and I won the bar of their pop rivet gun. I didn't have a quarter inch pop rivet gun and the guy says no, we don't loan tools, but we'll come out in a dinghy and do it. And they came over to the French side of Marigot at lunchtime put six pop rivets in my boom. Guy said just stop in the office and pay us when you have time. And it was $75. I couldn't believe it.

Hayden:

I mean, I have a service guy come out and fix my boom bag. This is this is $75. This is repair headquarters. This is why it's our favorite place.

Hayden:

You can get anything you, you need here. And then we flew out of here and flew back to miami and flew back on a you know we had to go to the us and it was like 400 bucks round trip on short notice, on like a one week notice. This is, this is in the caribbean, this is as good as it gets right here, because there's, and so did you leave your boat on a mooring ball.

Hayden:

I left the mooring ball out here that I hired a guy to watch it. He has 20 mooring balls in the Harbor out there where I was showing you and we bought a mooring ball from him and I think it was. I don't know.

Radeen:

I don't remember $30 a night, it was reasonable, ridiculous. And he also provided transportation from the boat.

Hayden:

He took us into the dinghy dock and brought us back. Yeah. This is cruisers heaven if you need services. So why didn't you leave your boat there? Oh, the haul out yard is not that great here. This was an island that was totally devastated in one of the hurricanes recently.

Capn Tinsley:

It was either Maria or Irma. It was either Maria that came through, and devastated the Virgin Islands. Right after I had been there, we had flown there, and it was right after that.

Hayden:

Yeah, I think this is the place to come to get services and enjoy a French island and buy your Dutch things that you need for service. And then you sail on to the Virgin Islands of BVI's, up to Anguilla, down to St Martin, down to Antigua, and carry on South to Guadalupe and the other islands you know.

Capn Tinsley:

Okay, so what's the plan for this year? It's going to be December.

Hayden:

Yeah, Radine has the plan Go ahead.

Radeen:

Well, we're going to launch the boat in Antigua and take our time we're not going to kill ourselves to get it ready, it's just going to be leisurely and then we're planning to go south. We really like the French islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe and we haven't had much time to explore all of what we want to see there, and we've never been ashore at Dominica, which is the rainforest island. We've stopped there, but we always had good weather so we kept going, and we've never even set foot on land, so we'd like to do a rainforest tour and some nature tours and probably we'll go down to beckley.

Radeen:

Yeah, and that might be our turnaround. We've spent so much time in grenada we were there for two and a half months during covid we feel like we've done it thoroughly and want to spend time on the other islands that we're less familiar with okay, so you said dominica, and then uh, guadalupe, guadalupe is and then Guadeloupe is a fabulous French island and Martinique is French.

Hayden:

We love the French islands and they're just fabulous cafes, bakeries, great wine, great Bordeaux wine $8 Bordeaux Superior. Can't get a better bottle of wine in France than that for 10 euros. It's just pretty nice. So we like the French islands and that's Guadeloupe, martinique, and then Dominica is the nature island. That's all the waterfalls, the trails to hike.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, they have some nice mountains there, some good hiking. We looked into it one time. They had good diving and good hiking, all on the same day.

Hayden:

We got to go to the Pitons, the big mountain peaks of St Lucia. We got to go in there.

Capn Tinsley:

Is that going to be as far south as you go?

Hayden:

Beckway would probably be the farther south. Beckway is south of St Vincent.

Capn Tinsley:

It's St Lucia south of St Vincent.

Hayden:

It's looser than St Vincent and then just below St Vincent there's a little tiny island that's part of St Vincent and it's called Beckway, and that's a cruise.

Capn Tinsley:

You got a little arrow on that yeah.

Hayden:

Everybody in the cruising world will probably call out Beckway as their favorite place because it really caters to the cruisers also. It's a great harbor, sandy bottom to anchor, sandy beaches everywhere. It's services again. So back we uh below saint vincent. A little arrow here right below saint vincent and then you're at grenade. I mean, I don't know, we might go down to the abcs. We don't know we might go down to the ABCs. We don't know. Yet we stuck the boat out there in Antigua so we can do some nice beam reach sailing because we've bashed our way out here. Three times.

Hayden:

You don't get to do a lot of sailing, even though last year we had fantastic sailing. That's unusual.

Capn Tinsley:

How long do you think you're going to leave the boat down there?

Hayden:

I think we're going to put it in Puerto Rico this season and do one more season and then bring it back this season. We kind of miss not having a boat back here at home.

Radeen:

So it's kind of frustrating I mean you get to have your boat year round when we're home here in Pennsylvania we have to put it away for the winter, so it's a toss up.

Capn Tinsley:

Well, I think you should get another one.

Hayden:

Well, I always want to have two boats.

Radeen:

Yes, I thought you were my friend.

Capn Tinsley:

I think we had this conversation before, like get an IP27 or something.

Hayden:

Yeah, get a boat up north and a boat down south. That would be perfect. That would work.

Capn Tinsley:

Sailing Wanderer. We have to run Great job. Hayden and Radine, we'll see you down the road.

Hayden:

We'll catch up to you.

Radeen:

We look forward to meeting you. We look forward to seeing you.

Capn Tinsley:

Thanks, would you rather do boat work there or in the USA?

Radeen:

Oh boat work. I have to say USA.

Hayden:

Yeah.

Radeen:

It might be more expensive, but you can reliably and quickly get all the parts you need, either St Martin or the USA.

Hayden:

Yeah, I would do boat work in St Martin or USA.

Capn Tinsley:

You're able to do so much yourself.

Hayden:

I do all our own work. Yeah, we've done everything. We've torn the boat apart four times and put it back together.

Capn Tinsley:

So yeah, okay, can you talk about the offshore I-65 route?

Hayden:

Yeah, I can. A lot of people make that run but we can't do it because it's just the two of us. The I-65 run is you leave Norfolk Virginia, you go five days straight out to Bermuda and you pull into Bermuda If your weather's not good. If your weather's good, bermuda is is longitude 65. You turn South and now you beam reach 10 days from Bermuda straight to St Thomas.

Hayden:

So it's a 15 day run and that's why there's there's um why there's regattas called the Caribbean 1500 that make that run. They leave Virginia. Salty Dog Rally does the Caribbean 1500. We're stuck at 500 miles. The two of us are good for 500 miles.

Capn Tinsley:

That's a lot. Y'all are just animals After 500 miles.

Hayden:

We're delirious and we need to get back down and sleep. I mean we both don't sleep well on passage, even though we try the proper watch schedules. Which is three hours on, three hours off around the clock for two people. Which is three hours on, three hours off around the clock for two people. Uh, six hours during the day 6 am noon to 6 pm, 6 pm to 9, 9 to midnight, midnight to 3, 3 to 6 am. Start, six hours again. We do that watch the two of us, but we don't get enough sleep Right. I mean, we've sailed Grenada up to 450 miles to St Croix. It was exactly 60 hours, man. We dropped that anchor, we were done.

Radeen:

So, getting back to why don't we?

Hayden:

do it. So 65, we can't yeah.

Radeen:

A lot of insurance companies require you to have a third crew member. So we don't want to be tied down with the crew member in a schedule and also our boat isn't really big enough to have a third person. So that's another reason why we don't do it.

Hayden:

Yeah, we've sailed with a bunch of crew that really good friends Jeff, gaber and Blaine Parks. They've crewed with us and when you have three on board it makes it so much easier. I sleep, I get great sleep when Jeff or Blaine are on and I could go around the world with three people. There's no question about it. Two I haven't figured out how to do longer than 500 miles. And everybody says once you get past the third day with two people Judith can speak to this Probably once you get past the third day, then you do sleep because you're so tired and you get on a sleep schedule and then it's automatic.

Radeen:

Then it's easier.

Hayden:

We don't want to. We don't want to do that, we're not interested in that.

Capn Tinsley:

All right. So if you were, if you were going to do the I-65 route, would you say three people?

Hayden:

You need three minimum four would be best.

Radeen:

Four would be better.

Hayden:

You need a big two cabin boat, two bed two head boat, Then you gotta, then you get.

Capn Tinsley:

It's gotta be somebody you want to be with For 15 days.

Hayden:

We've sailed out the Bermuda four times as crew on Island Pack at forties, and on 420s and 45s with the Maryland school Tom Tersey I was one of his fill-in crew that would help him, and so we've gone out and back to Bermuda multiple times. I know what that's like. It's not a highlight for us. We would rather be anchored in Biscayne Bay, miami personally, and enjoying Miami. We like cities. We like to take our boats to cities and towns and places where we can anchor them, swim on a beach in the day and then go to town for a walk and nice dinner or whatever. That's what we like.

Radeen:

Some people truly love the offshore sailing, but I don't think we do.

Capn Tinsley:

It's a means to an end. Yeah yeah, exactly, and did you say 15 days?

Hayden:

It's 15 days, it's five days. It's 600 miles to Bermuda, which is five to six days depending on the speed of your boat. And then it's 1,000 miles from Bermuda to St Thomas. So it's 1,500 miles, 500 out, 1,000 down. It's 10 days from Bermuda down to St Thomas. That's like a job. Don't sign me up for that one, yeah you're retired, it's so much like a job.

Capn Tinsley:

I'm with you, I'd rather take shorter trips and enjoy wherever I am.

Hayden:

The best sail in the entire world that we've had is from Puerto Rico back to Florida One hour of engine time all the way back, stopping on the islands as we went. You're just downwind, broad, reaching the whole way. That's the sail Coming back from the Caribbean. That's the sail.

Capn Tinsley:

Well, you've really dropped some wisdom on us. If anybody else has any questions. Is there anything else that you can think of that people should know? Let's tell them how they can reach you, because you're also a boat broker.

Hayden:

Well, everything is under the name SV Island Spirit. So if you do SV Island Spirit on anything on the social media, you'll find us, and then we have the website SV Island Spirit dot com and everything is linked up from there, so you can find us from there.

Hayden:

Yes, yeah and yes we are brokers with CJ Yacht Sales in Florida, who is the company that was born out of Whittaker Yacht Sales, debbie and I. Whittaker retired and one of our brokers picked up the staff and started a new brokerage firm and we have CJ Yacht Sales and I help people that want to find an island packet and get into it and we know the boats very well. We can help direct you what would fit your sailing goals. We love doing that.

Radeen:

Yeah, we feel like matchmakers helping people find the right boat.

Hayden:

Yeah, yeah.

Capn Tinsley:

Well, and you also know other boats. We do yeah but definitely Island Packet is your. I call you the Island Packet expert.

Hayden:

It's our passion. Both of you are. We've been with the brand since 1986. 1986, we chartered our first one. In 1991, we bought our first one, so we've been an owner since 1991.

Capn Tinsley:

Yes, and you it was. How long were you on the IP27?

Hayden:

10 years on a 27. 10 years and now 25 years on the 35.

Capn Tinsley:

That's some experience. You need to get some swallows.

Hayden:

I got a spot right here for you.

Capn Tinsley:

It'll have to go up this way and down that way it's so much less here.

Hayden:

Obviously I've got some room up there too.

Capn Tinsley:

All right you guys.

Hayden:

Well, this has just been a joy.

Capn Tinsley:

Thank you so much for coming on again. You're welcome. I know You'll have to come back again because you know I'll be bugging you about that. Oh, fresh to Salty says to write a book.

Hayden:

Oh, thank you, Fresh to Salty.

Capn Tinsley:

Oh, thank you guys. If it's okay, I'd like to reach out and see if I could hire you guys for a consult Love to help you About where to keep my boat in the Caribbean outside of the hurricane season, weighing various factors.

Hayden:

You got a fan there. Love to help you Rick.

Radeen:

There's absolutely no need for you to hire us.

Capn Tinsley:

We'll gladly share what we know, but you'll be glad to sell them a boat, right?

Radeen:

Yeah, I'll sell you a boat yeah.

Capn Tinsley:

So we do have a tentative date for Kirsten Neuschafer. I think is how you say her name and say the name of that race Golden Globe race. She won that race. It's around the world unassisted. I don't even think you knew about this.

Hayden:

Yeah, I wasn't up on it so you pointed it to me. But yeah, no equipment, no electronics, no stopping, no assistance. Yeah.

Capn Tinsley:

Nothing that was invented after 1968. No, can you? 1968. No, can you imagine? No, it's crazy. And she was the first. I mean, there's a great documentary about the first one they had in 1968. One guy kind of faked it because his boat didn't make it. He never made it out of the Atlantic and he, he lost his mind and he ended up.

Hayden:

I would lose my mind in three days.

Capn Tinsley:

Well, it was a long story, but yeah, it's really sad. So it was so controversial. Only one boat made it and it's Robert Knox Johnson. That's the only boat that made it across the finish line. So it was so controversial Because, you know, before that race they said it couldn't be done.

Hayden:

An unassisted solo.

Capn Tinsley:

I don't know why you would try it, and so they didn't do it again until 2018, and that's when Kirsten it got on her radar and she'd never been in even a race. So she does it in 2022 and she wins, and she even rescued somebody because somebody's boat sank one of the participants.

Hayden:

So they're in the Southern Ocean.

Capn Tinsley:

The guy is on a rife raft in the Southern Ocean nasty place and she went and got them, took her 24 hours to get to them, rescues them, puts them on a tanker and she still wins the race.

Radeen:

That's remarkable.

Capn Tinsley:

I mean come on, that's incredible.

Radeen:

Oh, that'll be a great podcast.

Capn Tinsley:

Yeah, so I think we've got. We're going to be doing that October 9th.

Radeen:

Yeah, so we always.

Capn Tinsley:

I was just exchanging some and she's like really famous, so I'm really honored. Well, so is our Judith, Make sure you get Judith on here.

Hayden:

I was just exchanging some and she's like really famous, so I'm really honored that she's coming on. You are Well, so is our Judith. Make sure you get Judith on here. Oh, yes, yes, well, I'm going to need some people next week.

Capn Tinsley:

So just a couple more comments. Just bought one, rich. She bought a 2018. How do you say it? Fast boat, fast boat, fast boat. And then fresh to salt, nice rich we have a 2002.

Radeen:

Ooh, another fast boat, another fast boat.

Hayden:

Hey, you guys can't sail with us, we're slow boat. 35.

Capn Tinsley:

And then Kirsten Judith said she's amazing. We follow the Golden Globe race. Judith, how about you coming on next?

Hayden:

week.

Capn Tinsley:

I'm putting you on the spot right here, judith, is it All right, guys?

Hayden:

We'll go ahead and end it there.

Capn Tinsley:

Thank you so much. And as we say, let me get it queued up. What do we always say? We say Salty Abandoned out. Thank you.

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