Maiden Voyage: St. Maarten to Ile Fourchue in St. Barts

We headed through the 8:30am bridge and left St. Maarten July 7th! Woo hoo! We knew we had a rough trip ahead of us as the weather brought big seas and high winds on the nose. We motor sailed to Ile Fourchue (Matt steered while I held a bucket). It turns out our tiller pilot does not work, well at least not in bad weather when you need it most... Looks like we'll be building some strong arm muscles this season.

First time Varuna's been at sea in 7-8 years! She is happy! I, on the other hand, am minutes away from being very sea sick...

On a mooring at Ile Fourchue. What a cool spot (we thought) our parents thought it looked very deserted and scary haha! We were happy to have the whole place to ourselves for 3 days to recuperate and dry out. Nothing is on the island besides an abandoned shack and a few lizards (and maybe lots of tarantulas in all those holes in the ground?? yuck).

Got great 3G internet from our roaming phone plan on top of the hill. Checked in with family and uploaded to Instagram. You can see St. Barts in the background there. 

Very cool terrain. Dry and cactusy. Lots of things to poke your flip flopped feet FYI.

Varuna all by her lonesome and loving it! Trip 1 complete.