Bob & Janice Waller
Like so many others we love to travel and we love to sail so cruising makes a lot of sense. Janice has retired from Cornell as a business manager and Bob has retired from South Seneca school district as the high school principal. It's time to sell the house, get rid of whatever doesn't fit on our 40 foot Caliber LRC named Tsamaya (this means Travel Well in Setswana) and set off to see the world. Our reasons for publishing this blog is twofold, first to keep in touch with our friends and family and secondly to share our experiences. If you would like to receive notification when we have added to our blog please subscribe. You will receive an e-mail message and a link to the blog when we have added new information. There is also a section of this blog which will enable you to send comments. Please take a moment and let us know what you think and what we could do to make this blog more interesting to you. I wish you all the very best and hope to see you as we travel. In the words of Mark Twain "nothing so liberalizes a man and expands the kindly instincts that nature put in him as travel and contact with many kinds of people"s v Tsamaya
Travel Blog Posts
May 24th 2012
So, where have we been since our last blog entry? We left Jolly Harbour, Antigua on Sunday, May 13th (Mother’s Day) at 7:30AM and put our anchor down at Cocoa Point, Barbuda at 1:45PM – what a lovely sail it was! Yes, I know you may not believe it, but not all sails are lovely depending on the direction of the wind, the direction and size of the waves or the number of squalls you might encounter. Luckily this trip was a great one – we did see one squall coming so prepared for it, but luckily we only got some extra wind and a few rain drops as we skirted the edge of the squall. Barbuda is a very flat island with its highest point 125 feet above sea level, therefore difficult to see until ... read more
May 12th 2012
Flexibility is the name of the game. That word had been drilled into us back in Peace Corps days and it has served us well since then. It came in handy just yesterday too! As mentioned in our last blog entry we planned on leaving this weekend, Sunday, April 13th. We have provisioned to the hilt (there is not enough room on this boat for even a small can of tuna), re-organized the boat for the crossing and were pretty much ready to go except for those last minute chores such as putting the dinghy up on the deck, putting the wind monitor on the stern, and setting sail. On Friday we had gone to shore for some errands and when we got back to the boat in the afternoon we talked to our weather router, ... read more
Antigua - Working on checking off the list & Friends
Published: May 10th 2012Central America Caribbean » Antigua & Barbuda » Antigua » Falmouth Harbour
May 10th 2012
We are now in Antigua. So, what have we been doing since we got here on April 24th? The first order of business was to make it to shore to check into the country. In all of our travels this is the first time that we had to also deal with having a cat on board. We always report that we have a cat and it has not been an issue. Here we found that it was a different situation. Besides doing the usual paperwork for ourselves, we also had to have an appointment with a veterinarian. In actual fact they wanted to see the cat, but in our case as it was the end of the work day, the vet stated that he would trust us and just looked at the paperwork that we had ... read more
April 29th 2012
April 13 - April 24, 2012 - Guadeloupe Guadeloupe is another one of the French islands located in the Caribbean. This one definitely has a different feel from the others we have visited, at least as seen from Pointe a Pitre. It still is French, however, the look and the feel of the area has a mixture of French and Creole culture and architecture. One of the most noticeable is language. When on Martinique it was difficult to find any one that spoke any English. Here in Pointe-a-Pitre we expected the same, however, we found that many that we spoke to really wanted to practice their English and even apologized for not speaking better English. We told them that we were very impressed with their use of a foreign language and wished we could speak French ... read more
St Anne & Marin, Martinique & Sailing to Guadeloupe
Published: April 17th 2012Central America Caribbean » Guadeloupe » Pointe a Pitre
April 17th 2012
Well, as we learned when we were in Peace Corps – you always need to be flexible. In our last blog we mentioned that we were going to wait in Martinique for a FedEx package (our credit cards), but we heard that there was a great weather window for traveling north to Guadeloupe so made a change of plans and up came the anchor. We are finding that not having the credit cards is definitely helping our budget. We don’t have to have them immediately as we have plenty of provisions on the boat; therefore we would set sail north and have them sent there. Before leaving Martinique we did get a chance to explore St. Anne and nearby Marin. One evening just before sunset we took a short hike up the hill behind the church ... read more
April 10th 2012
Going Home or Coming Home?? Sorry about the time lapse between our last blog entry and now, but we have been busy at both of “our homes”. As we had mentioned we traveled back to the US so Janice could have some surgery on her wrist, the “regular” Dr. and dentist appointments, and see family. When we are going to travel back to the US we always refer to “going home”, but then after we have been in the US for some time, we always start looking forward to “going home” back to Tsamaya. It definitely gets confusing. When we are back in the US it is great getting a chance to see sisters, Mom, Aunts, Uncles, nieces and nephews and catching up with what is happening with everyone. We also enjoyed being able to jump ... read more
Bequia to St. Lucia (finally) Feb 12 - 24, 2012
Published: February 25th 2012Central America Caribbean » Saint Vincent & Grenadines » Saint Vincent
February 25th 2012
We enjoyed our final days in Bequia listening to live music at some of the local restaurants and did our last provisioning for the trip north. We figured we should stock up on what was known vs. the unknown in the stores on other islands (you know bird in the hand). We planned on going directly to St. Lucia, however, we had heard about Cumberland Bay on the island of St. Vincent and decided we had time to stop to see it for ourselves. We were glad we did! We thought we’d only stay overnight and continue on, but it was so nice we stayed an extra night. Cumberland Bay is a very pleasant anchorage tucked among the mountains of St. Vincent. It is a beautiful setting and a nice calm anchorage. One of the tricky ... read more
Finally Leaving Bequia - St. Vincent & the Grenadines
Published: February 9th 2012Central America Caribbean » Saint Vincent & Grenadines » Grenadines
February 9th 2012
So, why have we still been in Bequia? If you remember at the end of the last blog entry we stated that we would probably be leaving the following Wednesday or Thursday. Well, a few things happened. One of course was the weather which was not the best for traveling north. This time of year the trade winds come from the north and as we are headed in that direction, it is not the best for sailing. We have also been having quite a few days of squalls and heavy seas. This would have only delayed us a couple of days as there was an opening of a couple of days, but…. As we are going back to the US in March for Janice to have surgery on her right wrist (deQuervarin tendonitis) we started making ... read more
Our time in Bequia - January 11 - January 31, 2012
Published: January 31st 2012Central America Caribbean » Saint Vincent & Grenadines » Grenadines
January 31st 2012
As we mentioned we are currently in Bequia, one of the many islands that are part of the Grenadines and therefore part of the country of St. Vincent & the Grenadines. We found it was a very pleasant island to spend some time on our travels south last year. Luckily there are a few ways we as cruisers can find out the schedule of events on the various islands in the Caribbean. We had heard great things about the Bequia Music Fest from others that had been in previous years. This year it was running from January 26th – 29th so hoped we could coordinate our travels to take in this event. We arrived in Bequia on January 11ththerefore were a little early for it so had to decide if we would going to hang around ... read more
We Made It to the Tobago Cays!
Published: January 18th 2012Central America Caribbean » Saint Vincent & Grenadines » Grenadines
January 14th 2012
Last June when we passed through the Grenadines heading south a lot of people told us about the Tobago Cays and how beautiful they are. Unfortunately in June the wind was really strong and we needed to get out of the hurricane box before July 1 so we passed them by and figured we’d come back this year. It's worth noting that some of our friends had made it out to the Tobago Cays in June and told us there were five boats anchored inside the reef. Well, it’s amazing how things change. Now it looked like a parking lot for catamarans. Someone reminded us that this was the European Christmas/ New Year holiday and that within a week most of the European charters would clear out. So between the weather and the Europeans we decided ... read more
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