Feb 20
Francis Bay is a great place to have no distractions. You can swim or snorkel, or go to the beach, but there is nothing ashore like bars, restaurants, or stores. Or traffic, or sirens, or ferry boats, etc. It does usually have an OK Wi-fi signal available, so you have to be careful not to waste too much time on the computer. That leaves you to do those little maintenance things you've been putting off, or read.
Today the activity was read. All day, a whole book and started another.
GPS N 18-21.951 W 064-44.846 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10533.
Feb 21
Our friends Chuck & Barb on Tussen Takk II and Hunter & Devi on Arctic Tern left Francis Bay today and went around the corner to Leinster Bay I think. There is good snorkeling around there. We stayed put and kept reading. I finished the book I started yesterday.
While sitting here, we had a good sized squall move through. It rained quite hard for fifteen or twenty minutes, and the wind picked up to easily over twenty knots. During the squall, I noticed that the wind generator was not spinning. Sometimes if we know the wind is going to be real high, we turn the generator off because it can overheat. I asked Barb if she had done that, and she said no. But it clearly was in "off" mode, which is accomplished by a switch that simply shorts the wires to the generator together. So, with the wind still blowing hard, I started trying to diagnose what was wrong. I thought maybe water had gotten in the junction box at the base of the pole the generator sits on, but that has never happened in ten years prior, so that was a long shot. I took the control box apart and disconnected the wires to the generator from the on/off switch. When I did this the generator started spinning. That confirmed that something was shorting out the wires, but it wasn't between the on/off switch and the generator, which was good. I reconnected the wires so the generator was stopped again, and got my meter out. The outputs of the solar panel controller and the wind generator controller are joined on a terminal block which then has one wire going to the batteries. I found that at this terminal block the short existed, so that ruled out the on/off switch. I disconnected the solar controller from the terminal block and the wind generator started to spin. Using my meter, I found that the output of the solar controller had a dead short. How does a electronic thing with no moving parts, that has been in use less than a year, give up? I left the solar disconnected so we at least have wind. The controller has a five-year warrantee, but I will have to send the old one back to the manufacturer to get it replaced. I got online and found that Budget Maine carries them, so I called the St. Thomas store to see if by chance they had one in stock. To my surprise they did have just one. I can't get there until Monday, but I purchased it over the phone with my credit card and they put it at will call. When I get the other replaced under warrantee, we'll have a spare.
GPS N 18-21.951 W 064-44.846 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10533.
Feb 22
This morning, we went to pay our mooring fees for the night at Cinnamon Bay and the nights we've been here at Francis. We had a couple of good rain showers this morning, so I waited until it looked like the rain was gone for a bit before I dinghied over to the pay station raft. I found the box full and jammed with other envelopes already, so I took mine back to the boat. Perhaps I'll go to the National Park Service Visitor's Center in Cruz Bay and give it to them in person. I hear that really screws with their procedures. On the way back from the pay station, I briefly stopped by Lucille, a boat we met last year. I said hi and relayed to them where our mutual friends Mike & Lynn on Seabbatical are now. I didn't know it, but Barb was trying to telepathically get my butt in gear and get back to MoonSail, because there was another rain shower approaching over my shoulder that I had not noticed yet. Her efforts at telepathy failed, and I got pretty wet on my short return from Lucille to MoonSail.
About 10:00, we dropped our mooring in Francis and motored about four miles west to Caneel Bay. We have plans to meet old cruising friends Jim & Amanda, formerly of Adventure Bound, in Cruz Bay. When we got to Caneel, we picked up a mooring right next to Catsy, the 62-foot luxury cat that they now are captain and crew on. They are already in town, because there was an event called The 8 Tuff Miles, which is a foot race from Cruz Bay to Coral Bay. That is basically the length of St. John from west to east. There are roughly 1500 people taking part in the race, and it's a pretty big deal around here.
We dinghied into Cruz Bay and went to Across The Street for lunch. It was abut 11:00 when we got there and they had just opened. We timed our arrival perfectly as a group of 13 runners came in right after us. Our order got placed first. Jim & Amanda are going to meet us after lunch, as they are having lunch with some other race participants. This was the first time we ate at Across The Street, and we found that the menu is somewhat different than the one at their sister restaurant Woody's. Barb ordered steak kabobs that were supposed to be an appetizer, and they were huge. We took more than half home. I had fish tacos which were excellent.
Jim & Amanda were later than they thought they would be, but showed up about 13:00. We sat and caught up for the rest of the afternoon. About 16:00, we walked down to Mongoose Junction where the awards from the race were being announced. Amanda had just missed finishing on the podium for her age group, so since there were no trophies to take home, we went upstairs to The Tap Room for one more beer. After that we made our way back to the dinghies and the anchorage for a nightcap (at 18:00) on Catsy. It was great to catch up with Jim & Amanda, because usually if we see them in an anchorage, they have charter guests aboard and can't take time to do much more than say hello. We learned that they are building a house near Lake Placid, NY, which will have RV accommodations, so we may pay them a visit there this summer.
GPS N 18-20.833 W 064-47.387 Nautical miles traveled today 4. Total miles 10537.
Feb 23
Today we are moving to St. Thomas to go into American Yacht Harbor marina for a couple days. Time to get food, water, do laundry, etc. The marina is full, so we can't expect to get our slip until after 13:00, which is checkout time for the current occupant. I called the marina on the radio about 11:00 to see if perhaps the slip was available early, but it wasn't. We knew our slip number, and that it was the second one in from the fuel dock, but we weren't sure which side of the dock it was on until we got there. We slowly passed the fuel dock and hollered to the attendant and he pointed to our slip. Since they are full, we are going on A dock instead of C dock where we have always been before at this marina. The slip they have assigned us is one they normally give to catamarans. So it is 26 feet wide and about 45 feet from the dock to the outer pilings that you have to put lines to. There is no finger pier on the slip, so we are backing in so we can step off the stern. We left the dinghy in the water and not up on the davits, since it would be in the way for getting on and off. Being the wide slip, backing in was no challenge at all. Two guys from the fuel dock took our stern lines as we approached. Once they had those lines, the wind kept our stern off the dock but now we had to lasso the pilings from the bow. They were each a good 20 feet from us. After a couple of attempts, I gave up on the lasso idea, to comments about being from Texas. I hopped down into the dinghy and took the lines around the pilings that way as Barb secured them back to the boat. The problem we now had was that with our normal dock lines, this left the stern too far away from the dock to get off and on. So, we had to dig out two old lines that used to be our jib sheets, which are much longer and replace the regular docklines with those. Once we did that, we had enough length to slide the boat back to the dock. It turned out to be one of our more complicated dockings. It reaffirmed my dislike for slips without finger piers.
My next task before we left the boat to get lunch was to plug in our power. One of the reasons to be in the marina is to get a good full charge on the batteries. Since we fried our battery charger last year, we have paid careful attention to making sure we don't have a reverse polarity situation before turning the charger on. There is a light on the main power panel to alert you of this situation. We have actually never had this happen since a marina in Galveston ten years ago, and don't know if that's what hurt the charger last year or not, but we're taking no chances. When I plugged our cord in, Barb yelled from below that we had reverse polarity. I tried three different plugs on the same power pedestal and found them all the same. We had not had anything to eat yet today, so I gave up for now.
We went up to Molly Malone's for lunch. While it wasn't the primary reason to come to the marina today, a nice side benefit was to watch the Daytona 500 on TV. As we ate, the race was getting ready to start. We finished eating and had one more beer as we watched the beginning of the race. Daytona is a long race, so I figured I would go get the power sorted out and come back without missing much. Back at the boat I got out my meter to determine whether the reverse polarity was a problem with my cord or the pedestal on the dock. What I found was that the pedestal was feeding 220 volts on what was supposed to be the neutral line. I asked the fuel dock guy if anybody had complained about it in the past and he wasn't aware of anybody. Since it is Sunday though, the maintenance guys are not onsite. I got a second cord out, which allowed me to reach the pedestal that was for the next slip. This one worked fine, confirming my findings.
With the power on, Barb decided to take a nap, and I went back to Molly's to watch the race. What I found was the race was in a rain delay which started a few laps after we left. So I hadn't missed anything. It appeared the rain delay was going to be long, so I went back to the boat and just paid attention to the developments via the internet.
About 18:00, we went to the Island Time Pub on the third floor of the marina building. It was packed, and we had to wait for somebody to leave to get seats at the bar. We had a few drinks and ordered a pizza to take back to the boat. The race was on at Island Time Pub also, but it was still in a rain delay. Daytona has lights, so they can run at night, and they still have not postponed it to tomorrow. We took the pizza back and ate, and I saw on the internet that the race was going to resume at 20:30 EST. That's 21:30 here. Barb went to bed, but I went back to Island Time to watch. The race didn't end until midnight, which is their normal closing time, but since one of the managers was interested also, they kept the TV on until the checkered flag. This makes the second time in three years I have stayed up very late to watch this race.
Even with being up late, we didn't sleep very well. Our stern is to the wind, which means even in the marina, there is always a little wave action slapping the hull in the aft cabin. This noise, combined with ferry traffic which ends late and starts early here, made for a restless night.
GPS N 18-19.487 W 064-51.116 Nautical miles traveled today 2. Total miles 10539.
Feb 24
With the race out of the way, it was time to get down to the business we came to the marina for. Before 09:00, we took the laundry up to the laundromat and Barb started working on that. My first task is to go to Budget Marine and pick up the new controller for the solar panels. I walked up to the street to catch a maxi-taxi to Budget. It's only a mile or so away, but it's over a big hill. There was a maxi-taxi sitting at the curb running, but with no driver, so I stood behind it watching for the next one to come. After a few minutes, the driver came back and I asked him if he was headed toward Budget. He said he wasn't on duty, but he was going that way and would give me a ride free. The ride in a maxi-taxi should only be a dollar, so I got a dollar out. When he stopped by Budget Marine, I hopped out and tried to give him the dollar. He looked insulted that I was trying to pay him. I withdrew my hand with the dollar and patted him on the shoulder and thanked him.
In Budget, I picked up the controller at the will-call desk and got a few other things. I walked back out to the road to wait for a maxi-taxi going back towards Red Hook. None came. I thought back to previous visits when we have taken the maxi-taxi all the way to Charlotte Amalie and back, and recalled that they take a more northern road from Tutu Mall back to Red Hook. I didn't know they all did this but after twenty minutes of waiting, none had come, so I started walking. It took me twenty minutes to get back to the marina, and still no maxi-taxis had passed. I checked on Barb and went to the boat. It only took a few minutes to install the new controller and make sure all that was working properly. I went back to the laundromat and Barb was just finishing folding everything, which I then carried back to the boat.
We went to a place for lunch where we have not eaten before. Fish Tails is between the marina complex and the ferry dock. It has a nice open patio out over the water with a good breeze. We got there just before noon, so they were changing over from breakfast to lunch, and we had to wait about ten minutes to place our order. The food was good. We'll have to keep this place in mind for future visits.
Next task is grocery shopping. We caught a maxi-taxi at the ferry dock, headed west. There is a nice grocery store right across from Budget Marine, about a mile from the marina. So, we hopped out there and paid our dollar each this time. Our plan is to shop and then have the store call us a real taxi to return to the marina. It's too far to walk carrying groceries. As we were shopping I had noticed a taxi in the parking lot. As we approached the checkout stand, I saw the driver getting in it. While Barb began to check out, I went out to catch the taxi. The driver rolled down his window as he saw me coming and I asked if he could take us to the marina. It wasn't until I got right to his window that I realized he had two people in back already. I apologized, but he said no problem, he would wait. I made sure they understood we were still checking out, and they said no problem. So I ran back inside and we quickly checked out and loaded the groceries in the van. On the way to the marina we had a nice chat with the couple who's taxi we had hijacked. They were here in a resort for a week, and they were fascinated by our story. The taxi took us as close as he could get to the head of A dock and we unloaded everything. We were able to lug everything to the boat in two trips, since there were no dock carts in sight.
We loaded everything aboard, and Barb was below still putting things away, when the fuel dock guy came and asked if we would mind moving to the slip next to where we were. My first reaction was no, since it was so much work to get tied up here. But, the guy with him, who was the owner of the cat they wanted to put in our slip, pointed out that with the two of them on our stern lines, we could move our downwind bow line to the other side of our bow, then release the windward bow line and just let the wind slide us across into the other slip. Our previous downwind bow line became the windward line and stopped us, and all I had to do was lasso the new downwind piling. There's that lasso thing again. This time though I got it on the second try since we were much closer to the piling in this slip which is designed for a monohull. I moved our power cord to the pedestal for the new slip, and the guy who was taking our old slip offered to pick up the power cost from our first night as thanks for moving. I graciously accepted his offer, as I'm sure most of our power usage had already occurred charging the batteries and heating up the hot water heater. He then moved his cat from the fuel dock into the slip and I helped take his docklines. We chatted a bit and he was a nice guy running a five boat charter fleet and sailing school out of here.
Old friends Devin & Don, formerly of Liquid Courage, and Don's brother Harold, a.k.a. Buddy are on island for a week. They are here for the purpose of burying Buddy's wife's ashes. They had a break in making those arrangements and met us at a new place in the marina complex called The Tap & Still. The Tap & Still in addition to being a bar serves burgers and hot dogs. Their burgers are very similar to what you would get at a Five Guys in the States. We met the guys about 14:00, and we weren't hungry, but they ate and we enjoyed several beers while catching up with them. We saw them last year in St. Maarten, but this year Don had a huge stack of pictures to show us from their trip to the South Pacific on Liquid Courage a couple of years ago. It was good to see them again.
Later, when we were hungry, we went to Molly Malone's for dinner. Barb had a chicken quesadilla, half of which will be another meal, and I had fresh caught Caribbean salmon. I rarely get salmon in the Islands, since it obviously is not fresh caught, but it was the dinner special, and it was very good.
GPS N 18-19.487 W 064-51.116 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10539.
Feb 25
Our night was restless again, with the noise of the water on the hull, and the warmth. Even though the wind gets into the marina, it is always cooler out on the water After coffee I tried to listen to the Coconut Telegraph on the SSB, but couldn't hear anything with the interference generated in the marina. Directly across the dock from us is a very large sailboat. I suspect the couple onboard are hired crew. The day we got here, it took us a bit to realize there was something odd about the boat. Then we realized the boom was not on it. Well this morning, the boom got delivered to the dock. Their boom was probably 2/3 the size of our mast. Quite large. So, we had some entertainment as they rig two halyards to either end of the boom, a couple other lines to the dock for control, and then used their big electric winches to raise the boom up and into place. They made it look pretty easy, but without those winches it would have been a different story.
We have a few things to do before departure. I filled the water tanks, while Barb took advantage of being stern to the dock to polish the stainless steel of the arch that can't be reached from the deck of the boat. She had polished all the other stainless on the boat over the past couple of weeks, so this completes the task. I also got a couple more gallons of gas for the dinghy, and we were set to go.
We had our meters read and went and paid the marina bill. Before leaving though, we decided to have lunch at The Tap & Still and see how those burgers were. They were very good and as we suspected, much like Five Guys. While there we ran into Vinnie from Corsair's. He obviously knows the guy who owns this place and they were chatting. He visited with us a bit before his ride got there.
We finished lunch and cast off with the help of the dockhand. I slowly motored out of the marina basin as Barb put away docklines and fenders. We are going to head to Christmas Cove, a place we have not been to in our boat before. Christmas Cove is in the lee of Great St. James island which is a small island between St. Thomas and St. John. It is about two miles from the marina. There are mooring balls there, which are free, making the place pretty popular, although there are no services on the island. From what I understand, the moorings were installed a few years back with grant money from somewhere. The grant did not allow for maintenance of the moorings though, leaving them questionable in some people's minds. Since it is not part of the national park, I think you can anchor there also, but I don't know what the holding is like. When we got there, we found all the mooring balls taken. At least two of them were obviously day trippers in small power boats, but I didn't want hang around waiting to see how long they stayed, so we turned around and headed east to our old standby, Francis Bay.
GPS N 18-21.851 W 064-44.757 Nautical miles traveled today 7. Total miles 10546.
Feb 26
Today was another reading day. About the only thing worth noting was I got a crick in my neck for no good reason. We had spoken this morning to old friends Chuck & Micki from coram Deo, and they plan to arrive in Francis Bay today. They had been in Culebra and arrived in St. Thomas a couple of days ago. We never saw them last season, so it will be good to catch up. I was sitting sideways across the back of the cockpit reading, which gives me a good place to be out of the sun most days. I kept looking over my right shoulder to see if coram Deo was in sight. One time as I turned my head around, a sharp pain went down the right side of my neck all the way to my shoulder blade. I hate to have pains for no good reason. I felt like I had a stiff neck the rest of the evening. coram Deo finally did show up late in the afternoon.
GPS N 18-21.851 W 064-44.757 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10546.
Feb 27
I awoke with my neck feeling some better, but still sore. That was my excuse for having another do-nothing-but-read day. Finished another book.
GPS N 18-21.851 W 064-44.757 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10546.
Feb 28
The morning was spent reading, but we have a plan to join coram Deo for lunch at Skinny Legs this afternoon. Skinny Legs is about two miles from here as the crow flies, around the island about eleven miles by boat, or over the hill about five miles by taxi. Micki had already arranged for a cab to pick them up at Francis Beach, and we were invited to join them. We met on the beach about 14:30 and walked up to the parking area where the taxi was to meet us. He was there a couple minutes late, but on time by island standards. I didn't realize you could drive from here to Coral Bay over the hill. I thought you had to go all the way back to Cruz Bay on the north side, and then back east to Coral Bay on the south side. But, I was wrong. The driver dropped us at Skinny Legs and asked what time we wanted to be picked up. He refused to take payment now. That's an island taxi's way of making sure he gets your return trip too. We told him to pick us up about 17:00.
We found a table for six and ordered drinks and burgers. Skinny Legs has more than burgers, but if you are only eating here once, a burger is the thing to get. The burgers are half a pound, cooked how you like it, and served with chips as they "proudly have no deep fryer". We caught up with what has been going on in each other's lives since we last saw each other, and got to know Micki's sister and brother-in-law as well. The taxi was right on time for our return trip and took us right to the beach. After a little walk on the beach , it was back to the boat for a quiet night.
GPS N 18-21.851 W 064-44.757 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10546.