Het avontuur van de Good Return

On the 16th of June 2010, myself (Gerrie F.) and the Good Return embarked on an amazing, daring and even hazardous voyage, spanning a distance of 3500 sea miles. The first 450 miles were journeyed alone to Rhode Island, where a close friend of mine, Phil Pouliot, joined to help complete the journey.

From photographing whales in the Bay of Boston, breakfast under ‘The Great Lady’ (Statue of Liberty), cruising through New York, fighting the famous thunderstorms of North Carolina, Cape Cod (Jaws), to keeping up with wild horses sprinting across Virginia Beaches and cruising through the affluent intercoastal areas of Florida and the cross voyage to the Bahamas, it was nothing short of genuine, high-flown adventure!

There was more adventure to come after ‘tanking up’ with bad fuel, sold, onbeknown to us, in Nassau, Bahamas...We ended up drifting 28 km off of Monte Christi in the Dominican Republic. After a mayday and about five hours later, we found ourselves in the capable hands of the US Coastguard the Martinicus, from Puerto Rico, who towed us to safety in Porto Plate (DR).

Two days later, with new diesel and clean tanks, we were on our way again. Mother nature, however, was still in ‘playing games’ mode and we fought high seas and bad weather for the remaining part of the voyage. We stayed over in Samana and Punto Cana so we could ‘catch our breath’ before daring the huge crossing of 708 km to Bonaire on the 17th of July.

Although the weather forecasts were good, it was only hours out to sea when we were caught by a storm, which kept us in it’s grip for a total of 14 brutal hours. It was with great relief therefore, that finally, at 23:00 hours on the 19th July, we spotted the Brandaris (highest mountain of Bonaire) and heard the very welcome voices of the Dutch Coast Guard who had been following us on radar. Home at last, on *Dushi Bonaire, I kissed the dock when we landed.

My special thanks to go to Phil, without whom I could not have made this (literally) unbelievable journey! Thanks too, to the Good Return, true to her goals and true to her name!

(* Dushi is a term of endearment in Papiamento, the local language of Bonaire, Caribic Netherlands)