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I got up early to present myself and clear into the country. At the dinghy dock I locked my dinghy with the chain as always and was greeted from behind: “Dude, there is really no need to lock your dinghy here. It’s all pretty safe… and I mean no offence but honestly man…who is gonna want to steal YOUR dinghy?” He had a point.
The Mona Passage is the infamous bit of water between Puerto Rico and the Domican Republic. It is supposedly the roughest place to sail in the Caribbean. This is because the seafloor is very uneven and constantly changes from great depths to very shallow places. And there are strong currents. This makes for rough high and steep waves. It should not be attempted in more than 15 knots of wind. I was going to have no wind for the first ten hours and then around 20 knots but by then I would hopefully be two thirds of the way through.
After the end of three days there would be thunderstorms on the northern Dominican coast so I wanted to go even if it meant motoring for ten hours. I couldn’t even remember the last time I had to motor that long.
