Salocin

I had my hand specialist's appointment today, in which my ganglion cyst was aspirated. This basically means that the doctor takes a needle, sticks it through the top of my wrist into the cyst, and sucks out the liquid inside - a transparent jelly a bit like vaseline but thicker. He then pokes a few holes in the cyst in the hopes of preventing a rapid recurrence by letting the liquid leak out as it enters the cyst. It's an unpleasant procedure in the sense that it's never enjoyable to have someone pierce your skin with a needle and then poke around, especially without anaesthetic, but I'm greateful that the procedure can be carried out with minimal preparation, because I'd hate to have to find time to keep returning to the hospital, those places freak me out.

Apparently, cysts recur 50% of the time following aspiration. Either way, there's a big bandage around my right wrist despite there being no injury in order to apply pressure to what remains of the cyst, and the feeling of pressure inside my wrist has completely gone. The joint, muscles and tendons feel like they're not used to all the empty space vacated by the horrible thing, and there's a sort of anxious bruise-like soreness to the wrist, which I expect will fade pretty quickly. Since I row and I'm reheasing for a show in the next few days, I hope there are no complications!

Returned from a most relaxing break, the Caribbean as fantastic as it was last year. The sailing was more challenging than last year, because the seas were rougher and the distances much greater, but I love sailing so that wasn't a problem for me. We didn't do quite as many of the more light-hearted things such as throwing a football around on the beach, because we often arrived just before sundown, or people had other plans. From Martinique to Mayreau/Tobago Cays and back, this was a holiday to be remembered!

Our itinerary was as follows :

Day 0 - Martinique to St. Lucia (to pick up the other 8 crewmembers who had been provisioning in St. Lucia), and then down to Soufrieres on the West Coast of St. Lucia. The morning was a longish crossing in 12-14 ft swells, with 25-30 knots of wind and a reef in the sail.

Day 1 - St. Lucia to St. Vincent - long crossing in reasonable seas, arrived only just in time to catch the last of the light before night fell.

Day 2 - St. Vincent to Mustique - High wind going in the opposite direction to a vicious Atlantic current that whips around the northern tip of Bequia gave us hell as we made our way southeast. With the catamaran pitching and heaving, we had a frustrating time trying to make headway. We nevertheless arrived in Mustique in time for sundown, and a view of the island of the rich and famous. We ate in Basil's bar, which was lots of fun, and we drank their cocktails, which are not bad at all (try the Hurricane David if you like strong rum-based drinks).

Day 3 - Mustique to Tobago Cays - An easyish sail, with a few reefs to avoid. You have to arrive at Tobago Cays during the midday sun so that all the reefs are clearly visible, and you can easily navigate the narrow passages to the horseshoe reef itself. We bought T-Shirts and a Lobster dinner on an island from the boat boys there. The lobster was fantastic, the second boat (we were a flotilla of two) mixed an interesting rum cocktail and we shared in the local delicacies.

Day 4 - Tobago Cays to Mayreau - A 1-hour sail, we did no travelling this day, but it was like a day of rest. Mayreau had a nice bar in the sandy cove we anchored in, and we had a very relaxing evening and the best shish-kebabs in the Caribbean, made by us and cooked on the bar-b-cues on the back of the boats.

Day 5 - Mayreau to Bequia - Bequia (pronounced "Beck-Way") is a nice little island with lots to recommend it. It's not as far as it looks on a map and with a 10:30 start and 6.5/7 knots of speed, you get there in good time. We went to a curry restaurant and refueled and rewatered the boats.

Day 6 - Bequia to St. Vincent - A fun days sail, we anchored in a nice bay and had them cook a pig for us. The pig was more fat than meat, but the experience of watching people bar-b-cue a whole pig was interesting.

Day 7 - St. Vincent to St. Lucia - A really tough sail for the boat I was on, the wind was always coming from the wrong direction, and the catamarans (Nautitech 395s) were terrible at pointing into the wind (the best they do without the engine is about 60 degrees off the wind), so we ended up so far west of St. Lucia that we were off the map, finally gave up, started the engines and motored in.

Day 8 - St. Lucia to St. Lucia - We sailed up to Rodney Bay to return the boats there, packed our bags and caught flights back to the US. The worst part of the trip by far was navigating US customs where their pedantic and anal procedures caused two of our group to miss their connecting flights.

So overall a fantastic holiday - I've left out a few details that were a bit negative but not too bad, for flavour, a couple of them were...

- Leaking water tank on my boat that resulted in the foot of two of the berths being damp (you wake up with damp feet every morning, quite annoying).
- One of the engines on my boat decided to pack in on the second to last day. Didn't cause us any real problems except for a very complicated docking procedure when we got back to Rodney Bay as we tried to manoeuvre with a single engine!
- One of the dinghy engines didn't work.

One thing I would like to write, because you might google it and end up here, is that the charter company we went with were great : here is it in black and white: VPM Bestsail is a fantastic charter company. Luc was the dockmaster in Martinique and Nathalie was the administrator. The boats were in impeccable condition. When a tear developed in the Genoa of the Layou on the second day, they arranged for one to be shipped to us on a boat that was coming our way, without even hesitating for a second. They were friendly and helpful all along and their boats were in great condition. Thank you to them, and thank you to Bernard at Clapotis-Mer, the agency we found them through. Had their response not been so incredibly helpful, the ripped Genoa would have made it onto my "things that went wrong" list, instead it actually features as an interesting and fun moment on the trip, and the first time I've ever replaced a roller-furling genoa!

Now I'm very tanned and happy, and it's snowing in Philadelphia!

Only 4 days to go before I get up insanely early in the morning, hop on a flight, hop onto another flight a few hours later, then land in St. Lucia, where I'm getting onto a speedboat that will take me and 5 friends to Martinique, where we're picking up 2 40-foot catamarans, which we will be sailing down to St. Lucia the next morning, to pick up the rest of our friends. The 16 of us will then sail from St. Lucia to Cariacou and back again, via St. Vincent, Petit St. Vincent, Tobago Cays (the image to the left), Mustique, Bequia, and other small islands that closely represent paradise to my mind.

8 days of sailing in one of the most beautiful places in the world, with a bunch of close friends. With the end of my MBA approaching, and the real world threatening to burst the pleasant bubble I have been living in for the past 2 years, I can only keep thinking that it's never too late to make the most of the time you have left.