George came back armed with maps and guides and we got all enthusiastic about exploring St John's. Then we started thinking about all the jobs we had to do and looked at the weather with a view to establishing a tentative departure date. On Saturday and Sunday morning, Tuesday morning looked like the best time to depart. By Sunday evening it had become a split decision as to whether Wednesday evening or Tuesday would be best.
We went out for a very good meal on Saturday evening at one of the many restaurants on Water Street. Baked Halibut and Baked Cod!
On Sunday we checked out Bonny's storm rig to prepare her and us for the possibility of facing heavy weather. Thus far I have been fortunate to avoid any very severe weather during the few ocean voyages I have undertaken but the odds of continuing to do so on this trip were reducing. Cape Farval (Farewell), the southern tip of Greenland does like all prominent capes, see its fare share of stormy weather and the North Atlantic between there and Ireland/UK in the late summer is increasingly prone to attracting the remnants of tropical storms. The good news is that unlike the sailors of even very recent years we are able monitor the weather via Starlink and adopt appropriate tactics in advance such as preparing the boat in advance and or changing course or speed (a little) to avoid the worst of the weather.
The above photo shows Bonny's storm jib (the orange one) and trysail (a small sail hoisted in place of the mainsail).
On Monday we rented a car for the day to run various errands and to do a little sightseeing.
First we had to get an Uber to the Airport to pick up the car. The Airport surprised us both - modern and large, perhaps as large as Halifax Airport. I was for some reason expecting something much smaller like St Pierre. Then again St John's itself was larger too. It is of course the capital of the province of Newfoundland and Labrador and it is the biggest town/city I've visited since Halifax. I guess I'd got so used to the tiny settlements I visited on Newfoundland's south coast last year and to the small towns we came across in Cape Breton whilst on holiday this year, that a small city was something of an assault on the senses.
It's an attractive town apart from the area around the dock where we were moored.
But one street up we found ourselves on the pleasant main street with almost every building housing a pub or restaurant or cafe. It was also very busy with loads of people making the most of the warm sunshine - something we enjoyed for all four days of our visit.
After picking up the car we made our first cultural stop of the day.
It was huge but not overly busy and a friendly local confirmed it was the cheapest place to shop in the city. We picked up some safety head gear - bycle helmets! George had just been reading "Left for Dead" one of the books written about the legendary Fastnet race of 1979 in which the skipper of one of the yachts subsequently abandoned by the crew, is struck on the head by a flying tin of baked beans and dies of his injury! £25 seemed one of the more reasonable insurance premiums I've shelled out over the years! We also bought two 20 litre diesel cans given we might need to use the engine a fair bit in Greenland waters.
Next we went to find somewhere to refill our propane cylinder. We had a suggestion from Ted, the OCC Port Officer who very kindly dropped by the previous day to help us track down suppliers of boating bits and pieces. Our guide book warned us that it might be difficult to find places able and willing to fill UK cylinders and initially it didn't look promising as the chap studied it with some bemusement. However, after some frowning and tongue clicking he filled it.
At that point we were feeling pretty pleased with progress and went for a coffee to celebrate. All we had to do next was to by a few shackles and check out the water dock on the other side of the harbour before sightseeing and then shopping back at Walmart.
Three hours later our main achievement was to have established that despite a significant local yachting scene there were no yacht chandlers in St John's. We had called in at half a dozen 'marine' stores who all had a similar and restricted range of boating gear. We found some shackles that would do the job (to secure the Jordan Series Drogue - a sort of sea brake) to its bridal and the bridal to the stern of the boat) even though they weren't ideal.
After finally visiting the water dock we returned to the boat, dropped off our purchases, picked up shopping bags snd headed up to Signal Hill to do our sightseeing. From the top of Signal Hill it's very apparent why St John's was first established by the migratory British Fishing Merchants in the 17th Century as their base of operations on the island and why it subsequently became such a strategic asset for the Royal Navy during the Battle of Quebec and the Napoleonic wars; then the seat of colonial government and finally the provincial capital of Newfoundland and Labrador when Newfoundland was incorporated into Canada in 1949. It's both an extremely well protected and virtually impregnable natural harbour. The entrance/exit which runs roughly east/west and is therefore protected from the prevailing westerly winds, is via a narrow natural cut in the cliffs - "The Narrows" which after about 200 metres opens out into an expansive deep water harbour. Any attempt to take the harbour by force from the sea would have been at the mercy of the gun emplacements high up on the cliffs on either side of The Narrows. The French did briefly take the town during the Napoleonic wars, but from the landward side.
After our all too brief cultural excursion on Signal Hill, we headed for Walmart once more for the big shop. Our approach was fairly haphazard but we did go armed with a list albeit one where our estimates of quantities were rather vague and subject to arbitrary adjustment.
We got back to Bonny around 10 p.m. just in time to help Lea (with Johannes, Olena and baby Vera and their crew mate Flores, on board) tie up alongside. They had left St Pierre a few hours earlier than us on Thursday but had wisely abandoned their crossing to the Azores due to a tropical storm barreling it's way up the Atlantic. Of course it was a bit disappointing for them but it was so nice to be able to spend more time with them.
On Tuesday we prepared the other main item in Bonny's storm wardrobe - the Jordan Series Drogue. I bought it a few years ago for such an eventuality but to my shame had never taken it out of its bag! Now George provided the necessary impetus to prepare it properly for deployment. That's why we were hunting for shackles so long the previous day.
Departure day morning arrived along with a boat load of visitors. David and Inga from sailing vessel Nashawena whom I had met in La Hune Bay last year, had arrived in St John's late yesterday afternoon whilst we were out. Both Architects, their recent base was Lunenburg where they had been working for a local firm over the winter and were now on their way back having almost completed a circumnavigation of Newfoundland. It was wonderful to see them again and to hear their news. Johannes and Olena and Vera also arrived shortly afterwards to chat about their constantly changing plans - will they or won't they try again for the Azores. One hour it looked promising the next it didn't. By the time we left the following afternoon they were really non the wiser about what the weather gods had in store (nor indeed was anyone else). Anyway we had a very pleasant couple of hours over coffee (and cakes left over from Olena's Ukraine visitors the day before) swapping stories and second guessing the weather. Eventually we all had to get on with various chores and so the impromptu gathering broke up. George headed into town to do some last minute shopping and soak up the atmosphere and I got on with a couple of remaining jobs; the most important of which was to fit the replacement mixer unit for the shower that I had carelessly forgotten to drain last winter and which therefore cracked open when the water in it froze!
After saying our goodbyes to Johannes Olena and Vera...
...our last job was to take the boat over to the other side of the harbour and fill the water tank.
That done we exited the harbour at around 1500 local time. Our destination, Nanortalik, Greenland, was around 800 miles away and we estimated it would take around 8 days to get there.
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