In early March of this year The Blue Heaven and crew were in the Dominican Republic for the fishing season. As you all know, Covid 19 came to a head at that time.
We were faced with some tough decisions, The Boarders of the Dominican Republic were due to close and Puerto Rico and the Turks and Caicos had already closed.the weather was forcast to be tall and terrible and unsafe to transit. We could have made the long trip at 10 knots to the Bahamas ( they were allowing vessels "safe transit' to fuel and keep going ) but facing a 60 hour transit with only 2 of us on the boat was an unsafe proposition. There were a few boats with crews of 3 or more crew members that waited for the winds to subside and made the transit to the US safely. We weighed the risks and options and decided with a few other crews to just fly back to the united states and let they new virus thing blow over. Little did we know that we would not be able to regain access to the boat for three months.
We exhausted all resources over the past few months trying to just get a flight back to the Dominican Republic. But after countless calls to the embassy and a number of other options that failed, we settled down and just waited for the boarders of the Dominican Republic to re open.
I don't need to tell you all this was a very stressful three months, not being able to access thee boat. But our trusty Dominican mate Duarte Paula did a fine job of looking after our boat, We arrived yesterday to find the Blue Heaven shining and sitting pretty.
The last week of June was trying. The Dominican Republic said that they were going to open to international travel as of July 1 but after so many disappointing attempts to gain access to the Dominican Republic, we spent the last few days on pins and needles worried that something was going to fall through. Yesterday we flew on a private plane with the crews of the Goin Gault and another boat directly to La Romana DR. We all breathed a big sigh of relief when the wheels hit the tarmac.
After arriving we went through on board systems and found that everything was functioning. Today were are going to Provision the boat and change out fuel filters and run the boat for a bit. Tomorrow we will depart and shoot for Ocean World in Puerto Plata, Dr. We then Plan to make the run to Flying Fish marina in Clarencetown Long Island in the Bahamas. We plan to fish out of the Bahamas for a bit.
Adam and I got Covid Tested on Monday before we departed with a negative result. I have submitted an Electronic health visa to the Bahamian government and we should be good to go,