{"id":5381,"date":"2024-03-23T20:15:09","date_gmt":"2024-03-23T20:15:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kaibrueckner.de\/blog_amy\/?p=5381"},"modified":"2026-06-11T19:56:34","modified_gmt":"2026-06-11T19:56:34","slug":"the-mona-passage-and-the-trip-to-luperon-dr","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kaibrueckner.de\/blog_amy\/?p=5381","title":{"rendered":"The Mona Passage and the trip to Luper\u00f3n, DR"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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\u2019t even remember the last time I had to motor that long.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Luper\u00f3n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

I got up at 4 in the morning and weighed anchor at 0530 before sunrise. The sunrise was very beautiful and apart from the fact that the engine is very loud and there was no wind and it was incredibly hot it was a very relaxed beginning of the trip. I went to sleep a lot because I already had a feeling that the night would be very different. It was. The wind picked up and so did the waves. We had 25 knots of wind and then 5 and then 25 again and so I was constantly reefing and unreefing. It wasn\u2019t getting any better the next morning. And after passing Cabo Cabr\u00f3n I had hoped the waves to become smaller but no such luck. We now had the wind from behind and were sailing goose winged. This meant I had to fix the boom of the mainsail on one side and attach a pole to the genoa on the other side. When the wind changed direction I would have to shift everything to the opposite sides. This now only took between 10 and 15 minutes but it was extremely strenuous and dancing around the foredeck in 2.5m waves with a 3m pole in your hand is no picnic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Cabo Cabr\u00f3n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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sailing at night<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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The Dominican North Coast<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

There was a big splash next to the boat and then I saw a small fin. At first I thought it was a dolphin. There were two of them. And all of a sudden both of them jumped out of the water simultaneously. Beautiful large beasts about the size of Amy with a white belly. They were minke whales and apparently playing with us. They would dive just below the surface, aim for the boat like a torpedo and then surface on the other side. I was mesmerised but also a bit scared. One of them jumped not far from the boat with a gigantic splash. This I found the most scary thing. What if they hit Amy by accident?<\/p>\n\n\n\n