December 21 – January 10 2025; 17528 nm and 2122 days after departure from La Rochelle

Our plan in Cuba for the next couple of month was travelling in a comfortable reduced pace. Leaving Santiago and heading west along the islands southern coast. Stopping at some villages along the way, passing Cabo Cruz and then exploring the islands (if possible) in the national park “Jardines de la Reinas”. We were hoping to sneak in some anchorages at some of the park islands, due to different information regarding the permit. However the next official port we were planing to stay was Cienfuegos.
Our first stop after Santiago de Cuba was at Chirivico. A village 33 nm west of Santiago de Cuba with a pretty and very protected anchorage. The entrance was a bit tricky to navigate as there were reefs at both sides of the narrow and shallow entrance. Once inside it was a very calm and beautiful anchorage. Curious kids visited us on there home-made super simple build rafts (made from old wood, tyres and whatever material would hold that raft together; sorry no pic) and fishermen were waving and asking us for ropes. We liked it immediately and were very keen on going ashore. With our Australian tribe who had arrived already before us we went ashore. A friendly local welcomed us and was happy to offer his little dock where we could leave the dinghy. The thing with Cuba is that sailors are not simply allowed to go ashore. There are many rules which had to be followed but were differently forced to action. It all depended on the official who was in charge and his knowledge about the rules – my guess. However, the official way seemed to be to call or hail guardia frontera to let them know we arrived. Even when we could not reach them they always knew we arrived. As not many boats travel in Cuba and the locals were always happy to trade, it looked that words spread fast about our stopover. Someone would come, take our “despacho” and keep it until we would leave. Unless though there is no guardia frontera, well then we were not allowed to go shore at all but we didn’t know that yet.

The nice local told us we were good to visit his village as an official from guardia frontera would come earliest in the evening, probably not before the next morning. Very organised he had written down the times of each boat’s arrival which we found interesting but hey, why not? He offered honey, coffee and coconuts. And all of us were all keen on getting those goodies. You never know when you will be able to buy more, so better take the opportunity! The coconuts we got immediately but the other items we would get the next day. Meanwhile knowing that queso blanco was difficult to get I asked whether he could get me some. Unfortunately he denied. (That was a pity as we really liked it. Silly me, I had only bought a pound to try.) After chitchatting and agreeing about some business we went off to town. Chirivico was a small rural community set between the mountains of Sierra Maestra and the Caribbean Sea. Its vicinity looked beautiful and green thanks to the hills which created a pretty backdrop. Apart from that there was not much to see but again it was striking how clean and tidy the village looked. Strolling through town didn’t take long. So fairly fast we ended up in a small bar enjoying some adult beverages. Locals were welcoming us and a few again tried to trade food for ropes or hooks. Before it got dark we went back to the boats and we were all looking forward to receive our goodies and maybe go for a trail ashore the following day.

Not yet finished with my first coffee Phil and Lesley from Paseafique came by to inform us that guardia frontera had arrived and they want all captains ashore. Alright! El Capitano got quickly dressed and went with them and Marianna from Anthem ashore to the official. Thanks to Marianna the communication was always a little easier as she speaks pretty good Spanish. It felt like ages until they came back and the returning news were a bit disappointing. Even though the officer was very friendly and polite he made it clear that we were not allowed to go ashore and that we had to leave the next day. This anchorage was only to find shelter from heavy weather or a stopover to travel further. A pity! The nice guy who was keen on selling us coffee and honey somehow managed to persuade the officer that at least one of us was allowed to pick up our goodies once they had arrived. But important, whoever would pick them up had to stay in the dinghy! Not one more step ashore! Well at least the officer was so kind to let us stay another night. I’m sure he could have forced us to leave immediately. So instead of exploring the surroundings of Chirivico we fixed our top light with the help of Phil (you remember we are both chickens regarding going up the extreme heights of our mast) and enjoyed a relaxing afternoon. Just before sunset the nice guy from ashore came by in his boat and surprised us. He had managed to get me a queso blanco. How nice was that? And what we didn’t know then was that he could have gotten in trouble to come to our boat. A closer contact on the water for Cubans with foreign boats seemed absolutely forbidden.

A few days later some fisher, we were passing with Altimate, proudly showed us their catch. We thought, great let’s buy some fish so we wouldn’t have to rely on our varying fishing success. But when we made clear we would like to buy they didn’t made a move to come closer. So we turned Altimate and headed towards them. That was not a good idea on our part. They almost panicked and made clear that we couldn’t get together. Finally even we understood and turned Altimate. That was an eyeopening experience. The poor guys were so scared that they were watched that they didn’t dare to take the opportunity to earn a little extra money. A friend of us had a similar experience in another anchorage. He asked some fisher for fish but they denied. Just after sunset a snorkeler swam by and offered him fish in the security of the dark. He had a small plastic bottle tied around his body to stow away the money. Hardly imaginable for us to be restricted like this but real life for Cubans.

Christmas was coming closer in big steps. Our little tribe agreed on spending the holidays at Marea del Portillo. Another small village which provided a pretty and protected anchorage as well as friendly people who were very welcoming to sailors. One after another we all arrived and soon after, the Guardia Frontera official was on its way. Rowing her little boat a fisher lady, her name was Josephine, brought the official to the boats. She was a very talkative lady unlike the rather shy young official. She immediately offered her help for whatever we might need and welcomed us to her town. Both of them came aboard and within minutes the paperwork was done. Easy peasy and we were allowed to stay for as long as we wanted. Yeah!!! The officer took our despacho and just wanted a 24 hours advance notice before we planned to leave. They moved on to our friends’ boats Anthem and Paseafique. Excited about the next festive days we were already planning what to prepare for our Christmas party when Lesley from Paseafique was hailing all of us. I still don’t know what was the trigger in the end but fact was, suddenly we were not allowed to stay anymore. The young officer had called his supervisor and then the drama started. The boss enforced the correct rules. Marea was also only a shelter anchorage and it was not allowed to go ashore. He offered us to stay the night but we had to leave latest the next day. What a bummer! Josephine was trying to persuade us to stay ’cause she was sad missing some potential business. She secretly said, once the officer would have left we could come ashore. Well, we were not in the mood for getting in trouble. Even more important, it was already the 23 of December and we really wanted to have a place where we were allowed to stay a bit longer for Christmas. So we lifted our anchors and headed further to Pilon which was luckily only a couple of hours away. The next morning, the big boss was already waiting for us, taking our despachos. Pilon was an official anchorage where we could stay. But “el jefe” also made sure that we understood, that going ashore was ok but one person had to stay aboard. What was the point? Well, we don’t know. I think we had found the most correct officer in the whole island of Cuba. Kind of a bummer but hey, as we couldn’t do anything about it we focused on preparing a nice Christmas party. At least luckily, he didn’t stop us from visiting each other.

The 24th, we girls got together to figure out what we could prepare for X-mas dinner. That was a fun afternoon and regarding our limited food supplies I think we did very well!! I loved the Australian way of celebrating X-mas! And even though we had the smallest boat we had decided to celebrate on Altimate. Our cockpit can easily manage 6 people and has a fairly big table to provide enough space for a small feast. A little proud, already before noon we welcomed our new family(they told friends they had adopted us – that was so sweet) and party guests aboard Altimate. Australians are so much fun! I decorated Altimate christmassy, they came decorated. After cheering with our delicious and I thought as well good looking aperitif, Marianna and Adrian conjured a big stocking out of nowhere. I guess that was the reason that Santa had not forgotten us. Magically they pulled out little presents for all of us including little stories about the presents. We had so much fun and so much food. Sorry I keep repeating myself but we really had a blast! We learned about how the others used to celebrate X-mas and we told them about our Christmas traditions. It was a special Christmas for me as their fun spirit compensated the lack of being with our real family back home. Thank you Aussi-tribe for adopting us and having so much fun with you guys!!!

The next day was occupied for recovering, left over eating and for three of us going ashore. Pilon used to be sugar producing town but that was more than 20 years ago. Left was the sugar mill chimney and a rather poor looking town. A local tried to help us finding some fruits, vegetables and maybe some chicken. He did his best and walked with us from one place to the other. When we saw somebody with lettuce we asked if he could get us some too. Then he went off with his bicycle and about 30 min later he came back with a big bunch of lettuce. The poor guy had to cycle all the way to the mountains just to get the lettuce. Well it was definitely super fresh as he had pulled it right out of the earth. All in all we didn’t get much. The freshly pulled lettuce, some tomatoes, a strange kind of spinach and some coconuts. Not a big yield for spending almost three hours searching. At least we could make our guide happy as we payed him well and we picked up our despacho from “el jefe” for leaving the next day.

We all left the next morning. Two fairly long day sailing trips later we arrived at Cayo Blanco with an overnighter at Cabo Cruz. An island close to the nature park about a fourth of the way from Cabo Cruz to Cienfuegos. Here we hoped to finally do some snorkelling and celebrate quietly El Capitanos birthday. But hey sailing wouldn’t be half as fun without having all the times obstacles which suddenly appear, would it? This time our dear Volvo Penta engine started complaining. No, that’s not fair, it didn’t complain it suffered actually without complaining. That was the big issue. We should have but we didn’t see it coming. Even though we had several signs which we unfortunately ignored. Already month back Norbert realised a little lack of power of the engine. Usually with 1800 rpms our engine would easily run 5+ knots. Somehow that was sloooooowly getting less. So slowly that we just got used to it. But now arriving in that anchorage we hardly could make 4 knots and the rpm didn’t go higher than 1400. That was an (even for us) obvious sign of some big engine trouble. So instead of a relaxing birthday Norbert started to find the cause of the problem. He had already checked and changed all the filters etc but checking the internet and Volvo manual it sounded like it was likely that the elbow exhaust was clocked. By 9:30 am El Capitano had dismantled half of the engine (at least it felt like it as our salon was covered in stair parts, tools and other parts), had found the cause of the problem and already cleaned the elbow exhaust. The poor exhaust part was almost completely clocked. Amazing in fact that it still worked that long at all. We felt bad about not looking after it for so long but Norbert was in a good mood as it looked that we could repair it for now. Relieved that the damage was not as big as we thought I started to plan the further birthday. Maybe I could even finish the cake I had started in the morning? But then I heard a frustrated “shit” from the birthday kid. That didn’t sound good! The heat exchanger inner cooling circle which Norbert had tried to clean as well was completely corroded. While cleaning it he pushed a big whole in it. Clusterfuck! Excuse language. Without cooling system the engine can’t work. What a lovely birthday surprise, our mood was below zero. That was for sure one of the worst places we could be to get that repaired if at all.

Fortunately Anthem was with us in the anchorage. (Paseafique had decided to stay somewhere else.) And luckily it turned out that Adrian was an expert in engines. He had dismantled, mounted and repaired many engines. And not only could he provide his excellent knowledge he also had the tools to fix it. How crazy was that? How lucky was that? Sometimes I think as sailors we do have a few more guardian angels looking after us? Poor Adrian, suffering from very painful shingles was helping Norbert the whole day to get the corroded hole closed. It was necessary to clean it very thoroughly and then put carefully several layers of epoxy. It was already late afternoon when the engine was mounted back together and I could finally tidy and clean up Altimate. We were so deeply grateful for Adrians help and therefore very happy to invite them over to say thank you and have at least a little birthday celebration. Yay happy birthday!!!
The epoxy needed to dry the whole night so only in the morning we could check whether their effort was a success or not. Anthem wanted to leave the next day but waited until we checked the engine. Boy I can tell you we all were super overexcited and relieved when we didn’t see any water leaking. Adrian assured us that it will hold at least until we arrive in Cienfuegos probable even much longer. We did it!!!!!

The next 10 days fortunately went by rather unexciting. We made our way up further towards Cienfuegos with several stops at different island. Those reminded us of the San Blas but with much cooler water and no palm trees. At Cayo Cuervo an island about half way to Cienfuegos we gathered together again. This time we were even four boats. Kwilena another Australian flagged boat, which we had already met in Santiago with the German Sven, joined us as well. So a couple of days we enjoyed again the company of our Australian tribe. Meanwhile we had ordered a new heat exchanger from Germany as we did not want to dare to travel long distances with a broken heat exchanger. We were hoping to get it in 4 to 6 weeks. Well, knowing that we would need to stay for a few weeks in Cienfuegos to wait for the spare parts, we traveled a little slower than our friends. We finally tried some snorkelling but we didn’t see much and the water was way too cold. So with a few more stops and successful fishing (Big Eye Tuna) we arrived in Cienfuegos on Friday 10th of January 2025. Meeting again the whole tribe!