Only 18 miles or so left in the journey, Simpson bay, here I come!
The night was full of shifting winds and showers and I woke up several times to check my separation from the other boats. The megayacht hogging the anchorage had left sometime before midnight, but I wasn’t going to change position from a spot that had good holding. But it would have been a lot calmer closer inshore.
Morning
Rain squalls and little wind met my eyes in the morning, but even limping along under engine that wasn’t too difficult. I set sail left the genoa furled. I tied a preventer to the boom and proceeded to sail downwind past Philipsburg and towards Simpson Bay.
The winds were strange, coming from the west and I kept on looking at the dark rainclouds to the east and thinking that I needed to reef. But those showers were already downwind of me this day.
Philipsburg was comparatively empty with but one cruise ship at the dock and I passed by without incident.
Arriving at Simpson Bay I saw that the anchorage was pretty busy with several very large megayachts anchored out. Both sides of the entrance channel were filled with sailboats for mere mortals. I opted to tuck in as close as possible to Kim Sha beach (which ended up being not that close). I talked with my friends Mark and Marjorie on the VHF and arranged a taxi service to customs & immigration. I showered, shaved and otherwise made myself presentable and they came by to chauffeur me over.
Lunch, Happy Hour and Evening
There were only 2 people ahead of me in line, but that didn’t mean that things would go quickly. Both of them were local agents and each had a stack of superyacht crewmember passports in hand – one of them was as high as my forearm.
Nonetheless I cleared in without problems and then proceeded to watch a bridge opening and head into the Sint Maarten Yacht Club (SMYC) to say hello and see if they still served beer at this august drinking establishment. They did.
Several hours later Mark and Marjorie came by and we continued testing the alcohol reserves of the bar with great success and they dinghied me home after dark
. I mentioned that I needed to work in the morning but would need a ride ashore in the early afternoon so that I could purchase a new dinghy and outboard.