May 1
We started the day with the radio nets as usual. As soon as they were over, we decided to change moorings. It got a bit rolly early this morning, so we want to try moving in to a mooring closer to shore. There are fourteen moorings here and the only other boat left this morning. I was pleased to see that even deeper into the bay, I can still get a cell signal.
A few days ago, the dinghy started running poorly. While we were in Coral Bay a few days ago, I replaced the spark plugs, because it sounded like maybe it was not firing on both cylinders. Since then it has still done the same behavior. So today, I swapped the carburetor. Yes I have a whole spare new carburetor for it. I have taken the old one apart and cleaned the jets many times over the years, so this year I brought back a whole new one which cost about the same as a rebuild kit. When I got the new carb on, I fired it up and it seemed to run fine, so I think it's fixed.
In the afternoon, we went ashore to explore a bit. As we drove the dinghy across the bay, it acted the same as it did before, losing power and wanting to stall. I guess the carburetor wasn't the problem. We landed the dinghy at the VIERS dock. There has been a Park Ranger boat parked here overnight, but it went away early this morning. We found a Park Ranger truck at the building, but the building was locked up. We walked down the road and found the beach at Little Lameshure Bay, which is maybe a quarter mile further west than Great Lameshure. We walked the beach, where there were a few people who had gotten there by car. There are only four mooring balls in Little Lameshure, and they are all empty except for one tour boat with snorkelers. We still had not seen any sign of the VIERS camp that is now located at the old Project Tektite base camp. We walked back east long the road that leads to both bays. The road is separated from the head of most of Great Lameshure Bay by a large mangrove swamp. As we walked along the road, we suddenly saw a deer crossing up ahead of us. I don't think I have ever seen deer in the islands. Through the walk we saw at least eight or more of them, including a couple babies and a couple of young bucks with fuzzy antlers. We found the driveway to the VIERS camp about halfway between the bays. We walked up and found the Tektite Museum right in the middle of the campground. The museum is mostly pictures and write-ups about the project, with a few actual artifacts and a model of the habitat. After we spent some time in the museum, we went back outside and were greeted by a volunteer. She explained a little about the camp to us, and explained that there were no campers here at the moment.
When we went back to the boat the dinghy acted up again, so I guess I have more work to do on it. The rest of the afternoon was spent writing the last website update. We remained the only boat in the anchorage.
GPS N 18-18.945 W 064-42.375 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10424.
May 2
We awoke to a heavy overcast. Not your typical island weather. On the morning radio nets, we had contact with Seabbatical and found out they plan to cross from St. Maarten to Antigua Saturday. Lynn also mentioned that on Friday, the actual swing bridge mechanism will be brought into Simpson Bay Lagoon on a very large barge tomorrow. They have scheduled a two hour road closer to allow the existing bridge to be opened for this barge to come in. It should be quite a show at the Yacht Club. We also spoke to our friends Harry and Melinda from Sea Schell again. They have changed their plans to stop and see us, because they have an excellent weather window to make it east to Anguilla.
There are still no other boats in the anchorage, and it stayed that way all day. The rain did come and lasted most of the day. Usually rain in the islands is a brief shower kind of thing, not hours of rain, but that's what we have today. Glad we went for our walk yesterday, since the dirt road we were on looked like it would be quite a mess after a big rain. We had commented about how nobody was out on a day like this, when we saw one group of three people snorkeling. Also, during the peak of the rain, a couple hiked along the shoreline coming from out on the point back towards the road. And, a local guy was sitting in the rain on the shore cleaning something he had caught. Just when you think you are alone...
I took on another one of the books I bought for my nook. This one was Alan Alda's autobiography. I read two thirds of it in the afternoon, and finished it after dinner. Just before dark we heard sounds from over the hill between us and Little Lameshure Bay, that sounded like gunshots. There was four or five, then a couple minutes later, another four, then a couple minutes later a final one. Suddenly being the only boat in the bay didn't seem like such a good thing. For those who don't know, we don't carry firearms aboard MoonSail even though we fly a Texas flag. The park ranger boat has not come back to the dock this evening like he did yesterday either. All sorts of scenarios started going through my head, and none of them were good. The wind has also gone away with the rain. It is dead calm and very quiet save for the critters in the woods onshore and the occasional turtle surfacing for a deep breath. Obviously since I am writing this, nothing bad happened to us, although we have no idea what the sounds were.
GPS N 18-18.945 W 064-42.375 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10424.
May 3
It remained a quiet windless night. We decided it was time to go to the BVI again. When you check into the BVI, you can get up to thirty days immigration with no problem, so part of our scheduling was to not return to the BVI until we would be less than thirty days before we haul the boat and fly home. We are well within that now, so we decided to take advantage of the windless day to go east around St. John and up to Soper's Hole on the west end of Tortola. As we turned the corner at the northeast corner of St. John, we were hailed on the radio. I guessed from the sound of the voice, that it was someone who saw our Texas flag. Sure enough it was Ray & Brenda on Rainbow Rider. We had seen their boat flying a Texas flag anchored in Coral Bay, but they had not been aboard. They are from Wichita Falls, TX, and have been down here several years. They live in Coral Bay year round. We chatted with them for a few minutes, and they invited us to look them up next season when we are back.
When we got to Soper's Hole, we picked up a mooring not far from the Customs & Immigration dock. We launched the dinghy and I got my papers together to go check in. In the BVI, only the captain checks in while the crew remains onboard. I started the dinghy and untied from the boat. As soon as I did, the outboard died. It restarted but faltered again. It kept restarting, but even trying to finesse the throttle like I have before, it just didn't want to run. I found that if I held the throttle wide open, it would barely putt along. This was the worst it has acted up. Instead of continuing to the Customs dock, potentially in the path of the big ferries that come and go pretty often, I turned around and limped back to MoonSail. Barb took the line and secured me. I took the cover off the outboard and pulled the cord to start it. It fired right up and ran perfectly. I put it in gear to see if it would rev up (the throttle is limited when it's in neutral) and it revved, but the strap from the lifting harness was hanging in the water and wrapped around the prop and stalled it. I reached down and managed to unwrap the strap from the prop, while grumbling some choice words. Once the strap was free and carefully out of the way, I started it and revved it again. It seemed to rev up fine, with no signs of faltering. While that didn't make sense, I put the cover back on while it was running, and as soon as the cover was seated tight, it started to falter and then stalled. I took the cover off and restarted it. I found that with the cover on, it would die, and if I lifted the cover it picked back up and ran right. Somehow the cover is restricting it getting air. The opening in the cover is not restricted at all, so this makes no sense to me. But, in the interest of getting checked in and getting to lunch, I just left the cover off and went to Customs.
Customs & Immigration officers can be the Motor Vehicle employees of the boating world. For some reason, the majority of them just have to give you a hard time and find some tiny flaw in your paperwork. I think they are just on power trips and want you to remember they have power over you. I was as pleasant and polite as ever when I walked in, saying "Good Morning" to the five guys all sitting there doing nothing. When I said I was there to check in, one of them slowly got up to take my paperwork, which I had completed on the boat before coming in. He found a couple of things to make me correct, and he spoke in his best island patois so I had to concentrate on what he was saying. He thought he surprised me when he sprung the $200 temporary import fee on me since the boat will be staying six months, but I just smiled and said "Yes Sir". I knew about the fee, as it is clearly printed on the form. Eventually, he sent me to a very pleasant cashier who took my money and spoke nice clear English. With all my paperwork stamped PAID, I went back to the original guy to give him his copy and I was done. If they would just be pleasant (as some are) the whole experience would be so much nicer.
I went back and picked Barb up and we went to Pusser's for lunch. Even though Pusser's is not the originator of the Painkiller, I like theirs. We sat at the bar and were taken care of by a very friendly lady. The food was good and the Painkiller's were smooth and creamy, and strong. But, they are also quite expensive here, so we only had a couple and moved on after lunch. This Pusser's was the site of my first Painkiller back on our first charter in 2002.
After lunch, we were going to pick up a few things at the grocery. We walked down to where we thought the grocery was, only to find that The Ample Hamper is no longer there. Their website still lists a West End location, but we didn't find it if they have just moved. We did find another market though, to the other side of Pusser's. It was pretty well stocked, and we got what we needed. It was an odd layout though, because the store is two stories. But there is no way to get your shopping cart upstairs.
We returned to the boat with our purchases and spent the rest of the afternoon watching the world go by. We have never stayed in Soper's Hole overnight, and probably won't again, but I wanted to just see a little more of it rather than just in and out for Customs as we have done before. One of the things we noticed was a large lot on the south side of the harbor that has been cleared of everything but the largest trees. There is a herd of sheep grazing and bleating on the hillside. These sheep are contained by what looks like a good fence, which is uncommon. There are also a bunch of goats running around, and as usual, they are not contained at all. We watched as three of them made their way down a very steep embankment to get into the boat yard where they started munching on the decorative palms in planters along the shoreline.
Another landmark restaurant was the Jolly Roger, which was on the north side of the bay just down from the Customs dock. But, I can tell just from looking that it is no longer there. There is what looks like a whole new building there, that is a bar/restaurant, but there is no signage that I can see. At 17:00, we dinghied over to this place for happy hour. It is now called Lime & Fish Inn. I asked the bartender about the change. He said Jolly Roger closed some time ago, and that the bar area was pretty much new except for the roof. The inn part of the business is across the driveway and is the same building it was, but it's a different color and the distinctive sign on the roof is gone. We had a few drinks and shared an appetizer for dinner as our lunch had been pretty late.
GPS N 18-23.147 W 064-42.226 Nautical miles traveled today 10. Total miles 10434.
May 4
Our plan today is to go to Cooper Island. It's about twelve miles, so I was going to hoist the dinghy on the davits instead of towing it. It is always tempting to be lazy and tow it, but it slows us down almost a full knot, and I always worry if it's getting jerked around in the waves, that something else will break. The lifting harness was not on the outboard, since I had to remove the cover to run it, so I had to reattached it. I wrapped it around the motor and went to clip it in place, and found that one of the plastic clips had been broken yesterday when it wrapped around the prop. I guess we'll be towing the dinghy after all.
We plan to go to Cooper with a brief stop at Nanny Cay Marina to fill our water tanks at the fuel dock. Nanny Cay is on the south shore of Tortola, between Soper's Hole and the main city of Roadtown. This is where we will be hauling MoonSail for the hurricane season this year. The winds were light and the seas weren't too bad, so as we motored east along the south coast, the dinghy did fine. While we were underway, I made a change in plans. We decided to get a slip for the night at the marina, that way we could get our water, charge the batteries good, get a look at the marina since we'll be back in a couple of weeks, and go to the Budget Marine there and get a new hoisting harness. We entered the marina and I hailed them on the radio to see if there was a slip available. There was a lot of boat traffic in the marina, and lots of boats were flying flags indicating their participation in the ARC Europe and ARC Atlantic rallies. There were thirty boats all getting underway at about the time we came in. The dockmaster on the radio told us to come back in an hour. I saw and empty T-head and asked if I could just tie up there until the action cleared, and then we could find us a real slip. He said OK. Barb got the fenders and lines ready and we approached the dock. We haven't docked without the aid of a dockhand in years, but it went perfectly.
While we were waiting for the dockmaster to be able to assign us a slip, I walked to Budget Marine. The store here is a nice large store, and they had one dinghy hoisting harness. It is not the same as the one I had, but it will do. I also went to the marina office and filled out the paperwork for spending the night. Back at the boat, we finally got the dockmaster's attention. Now that there were suddenly thirty empty slips, I was hoping he might just tell us to stay where we were, even though T-heads are usually saved for large boats or catamarans. But, he didn't think that way, so we had to move to a regular slip. Of course the one he assigned us required moving the fenders to the other side of the boat. We got to the slip, and this time we had a dockhand and the neighbor both waiting to take our lines. We got secure and plugged in and headed to lunch.
The main restaurant at Nanny Cay is Peg Leg's. It was already 13:00, so there was no crowd. We got our drinks and were ready to place our order. I was planning on having a tuna wrap, which was described as a wrap containing tuna, a seaweed salad, and wasabi. When I ordered it and said I wanted the tuna cooked rare, she informed me that "The tuna wrap is made with mahi-mahi. Do you want that rare?". I was a bit dumbfounded as she didn't seem to think it was unusual to make a TUNA wrap with a fish other than tuna. I switched to a salmon sandwich instead. Sitting at Peg Leg's, we were facing south, with a view of Norman's Island, St. John, and the waters beyond to the south. It was overcast, and the forecast was for a chance of squalls. It looked like there might be a significant squall in the distance, south of the islands. As we watched, I noticed a waterspout in this storm. It was miles south of us and no threat, and it was cool to watch. I took a couple pictures, but it doesn't stand out in the pictures like it did to the naked eye.
Looking out over the beach that is part of the marina complex, we were also treated to watching the BVI Dinghy Championships. In the sailboat racing world, a dinghy is not an inflatable that you use to get between your boat and the shore. It is a small sailing boat for learning to sail and racing. There were at least thirty Optimists and a dozen Lasers competing is a series of races over two days. The Optimists are all crewed by kids, while the Lasers were a combination of adults and teenagers. It was quite an event, bringing boats and sailors from not just the BVI, but the USVI and Antigua.
As we walked back to the boat after lunch, we made a detour to check out the shower facilities. There are four shower areas on the property, but the girl in the office had told me the one near our dock was the best. The brochure she gave me listing all the marina facilities said they were "probably the best marina bathroom facilities in the world". We had to see this. We followed the signs and found the shower area. They were right. There are ten individual bathrooms, just like you would have at home, each with a sink, toilet, shower, and table. They were clean, well lit, nicely decorated, and air conditioned. Most marina shower facilities are more like locker rooms, with individual shower stalls, but community dressing areas and sinks. These truly were upscale.
Back at the boat, I put the new lifting harness on and hoisted the outboard. The new harness is simpler than the old one, but doesn't look as substantial. It will do for a couple weeks, but next season I'll bring back one like the one I broke. Since we have good wi-fi, I also did some research to try and explain the way the outboard is running. I didn't like what I found. It sounds like there may be an exhaust leak such that the exhaust is coming out inside the engine cover, which basically smothers the engine. I looked at the exhaust once I had the outboard on the rail, and didn't see anything obvious, but it's hard to see down in where it goes.
Between Peg Leg's and the beach, is a beach bar. We went there for happy hour and had several drinks. The bar was quite busy with parents of the racers, while the kids were all in the pool terrorizing the older woman who was the security guard. The pool is supposed to be for hotel and marina guests only, so the kids technically shouldn't have been using it, and of course they were all running and diving and carrying on as kids do. They were basically ignoring the security guard who was pacing around trying to maintain some order. She lost. You can order food from Peg Leg's while at the beach bar, and we decided to order pizza to take back to the boat for dinner. After dinner we went and took showers in the wonderful facilities.
GPS N 18-23.567 W 064-38.090 Nautical miles traveled today 6. Total miles 10440.
May 5
On the Coconut Telegraph this morning, we spoke to Seabbatical and learned that they made it to Jolly Harbor, Antigua safely. They had left St. Maarten late in the afternoon, and had a pretty good passage overnight to Antigua. That route is usually into the wind, so they had waited until a night with very little wind so they could motor there in pretty calm seas.
We have decided to spend another night in the marina, so we can enjoy ourselves all day. We went to the Genaker Café for breakfast today. It is an open-air place. The waitress was a very large woman who didn't really seem suited to being on her feet all day for her job. It took several minutes, but she finally acknowledged us and dropped menus on the table. When she came back to take our order, we gave it to her, although she didn't write anything down, and she gave me a look that I interpreted as meaning serving us was not what she wanted to be doing. She stepped away behind me, and next thing I knew, she laid a napkin on top of my head and rubbed it. The look apparently had been in response to seeing sweat on my bald head. We all got a good laugh out of it then. Breakfast was very good. Barb had Eggs Benedict, and I had breakfast burrito. Of course there were mimosas involved also.
After breakfast, Barb did a couple loads of laundry. We could wait until we are back to decommission in a couple weeks, but it would just be that much more to do then. While she was doing the laundry, I filled our water tanks. We had also started the process of equalizing the batteries one more time to get them to hold more juice. While I was on deck filling the tanks, a dockhand came by. He said a boat was coming into the slip next to us. As a precaution, I put our two fenders on that side down, just in case they bumped us. When the boat came around the corner, there was a lady on the bow ready to toss a line, and she hollered that their engine died so they had no power. Good thing I was on deck. They were unable to really turn into the slip at all, and the wind, which was thankfully pretty light, was blowing them towards the bow of a catamaran in the next slip over. The lady tossed the line to the dockhand standing on the end of the finger pier, and I prepared to try and stop their anchor from hitting MoonSail. They were not going very fast, and the dockhand pretty much stopped them before they hit us. I was able to lean over and grab their bow pulpit and basically pulled them into the slip while making sure their anchor didn't hit us. What could have been pretty ugly actually worked out well.
When Barb returned from the laundry, we decided to go spend some time at the pool. This wasn't the best day to have done this, but it's our only day here. It wasn't the best day for it because of the kids. There had been more racing this morning, but it ended by noon when we got to the pool. So lots of the kids were in the pool. We did find chairs and found that the kids stayed out of the deep end for the most part, so we enjoyed ourselves. We spent a few hours up there, which included watching the awards presentations from the races. We noticed a scruffy looking guy standing off to the side also watching the awards. It took me a minute to realize it was Foxy, from Foxy's Bar on Jost Van Dyke. I don't know if he had a kid or grandkid competing, or if he was just there because he has an interest in sailboat racing and promoting activities in the BVI.
We went back to the boat about 15:00. It was very hot on the boat. There was no breeze at all in the marina, which makes all the difference in 80° being nice or not. About 17:30 we went up to Peg Leg's for dinner. The marina brochure said that Sunday in Prime Rib Night at Peg Leg's. Alas, they apparently don't have prime rib night anymore. We still had a nice dinner.
Back at the boat we could see lightening in the distance. The storms never got to us, but it is very unusual to see lightening storms in the islands.
GPS N 18-23.567 W 064-38.090 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10440.
May 6
With the interference of being in the marina, I couldn't hear anything at all on the SSB today. Not the weather, nor the Coconut Telegraph. I disconnected our power and hose and went up to the office to checked out. It wasn't until I was checking out that I realized that they charge a daily rate for power instead of metering it. I hadn't realized that when we checked in, and I'm surprised for a marina of this caliber that they don't have meters. I didn't mind, but charging a flat rate was always an issue when we were running the marina in Grenada.
With the help of a dockhand and our neighbor again, we backed out of the slip and headed on our way. We are resuming the plan of a couple days ago and heading to Cooper Island. There isn't much on Cooper Island except the Cooper Island Beach Club. We were here in 2002 and 2004 on our bareboat charters, and 2007 on MoonSail when we first went south. We did not stop here in 2010 when we did the crewed charter. What made the place cool, was that it was a laid back, funky beach bar. They had a restaurant and a few bungalows they rented. You couldn't get a frozen drink at the bar until after 18:00 because they didn't run the generator until then and that was their only source of power. Well, add another spot to the list of places that have changed over the years. As we walked up the dinghy dock towards the restaurant, we could tell something was different. We were greeted by a very pleasant man who seated us at a nice table overlooking the beach. The place has been totally renovated and is very much more upscale now. It is very nice, but doesn't have that funky feel to it anymore. It is a popular spot for tourist boats to stop for lunch these days, and we quite accidentally got there just before the crowd. Just as we got our food, a boat pulled in that filled the rest of the place. The service was not your typical island service - meaning it was excellent. The staff hustled and both the wait staff and the kitchen handled the rush of all those people excellently. The food was also very good. I asked about the renovation and learned that it was done in 2009. So, I guess it's not new news, but it was new to us.
We spent the afternoon relaxing on the boat and watching the evening show of charter boat arrivals. We always make fun of the charter boats picking up moorings, but we saw a new technique today. A boat with a mom, dad, and two kids approached a mooring. When they were close, one of the kids jumped off the bow! Dad backed the boat up as the kid swam to the mooring. Dad then approached slowly and the kid in the water handed the pennant up to the other kid on deck. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt that maybe they lost or broke their boat hook, but that was a new one.
As we had been motoring across the Sir Francis Drake channel this morning, we noticed that it looked like it started to pour over a good portion of Tortola, including Nanny Cay and Roadtown. You couldn't see the island at all in that area. It also looked like it was raining heavily over St. John, further west. As the afternoon progressed, it didn't look like these showers moved at all. I'm thinking we got out of the marina at just the right time. Mid-afternoon, we also noticed a large plume of black smoke coming from near the eastern end of Tortola. It wasn't as far east at the airport on Beef Island, but looked like it was coming from the area of Fat Hog's Bay, where there is quite a bit of development and a couple marinas. We never did figure out what was burning, although the smoke went on for some time.
At happy hour, we went back to the bar. Their happy hour special is two-for-one painkillers, rum punches, or Carib beers. We tried the painkillers and the rum punches. While we were sitting in the bar area, there was nobody in the restaurant area, except two good sized hermit crabs making their way across the floor. We've seen chickens and iguanas in several restaurants, but this was a first for hermit crabs. After a couple of drinks, we went back to the boat and had left over pizza for dinner. In the distance again, we could see lightening, but once again we had dodged any rain.
GPS N 18-23.141 W 064-30.832 Nautical miles traveled today 7. Total miles 10447.
May 7
In the morning, after listening to the morning radio stuff, I went above for the first time about 08:30, to find almost all forty boats that had been here overnight, gone. Such is the case at a destination popular with the charter boat crowd. We had considered staying here two nights, but since the place has lost the charm we remembered, we decided to move on too. Our destination today is going to be Trellis Bay on the east end of Beef Island, which is right at the east end of Tortola. The airport is actually on Beef Island. We motored in pretty calm seas the six miles from Cooper to Beef Island. As you are heading north from Cooper Island in the Sir Francis Drake Channel, you turn west between Beef Island and Scrub Island. You then have Trellis Bay on your port side and Marina Cay on your starboard. We were heading for Trellis, but at the last minute, I changed my mind and turned right instead, heading for Marina Cay. As we approached the mooring field, I wondered if the place was closed. There were no boats at the fuel dock or dinghy dock, and I couldn't see any activity at the Pusser's restaurant. Turns out they just weren't busy. Marina Cay is a small island, with a large reef extending out from it. This reef makes it possible to have a good sized mooring field behind the reef in relatively calm water. We picked up a mooring just on the edge of the reef, and were one of only three or four boats on moorings at the time.
As we were approaching Marina Cay, we were treated to a sighting of the Maltese Falcon. They were sailing from Virgin Gorda towards Marina Cay as we were approaching from the south. By the time we got to the channel between Trellis bay and Marina Cay, they were dropping their anchor. We have seen Maltese Falcon may times, but it never gets old seeing her. I'm guessing they were dropping guests off at the airport. They stayed anchored there until late afternoon when they weighed anchor and motored over to Virgin Gorda, probably to check out of the country. (The next day their tracking on their website showed them 200 miles north of the BVI headed for Bermuda.) Seeing Falcon again prompted me to do some research on her. She was built by Tom Perkins, a venture capital broker who made his fortune financing little startup companies like Google and Genentech. But, she was sold a few years ago to a Greek hedge fund manager. I found that there was a book written about Tom Perkins and the building of Maltese Falcon. It is called Mine's Bigger. Having a good internet connection, I downloaded it to my nook.
At noon we dinghied to the dock and went to Pusser's for lunch. There were only a few tables occupied, and several waitresses standing around. The service here was what we've come to expect in the islands - slow and indifferent. A waitress finally took our order. Barb got a Caesar salad with grilled shrimp, and I ordered a burger and fries. Barb's salad was ok, although it was pretty small for an $18 salad. My burger was good, but the fries were cold and soggy. Overall, the place gets a low grade. One of the reasons to spend a night at Marina Cay used to be the happy hour entertainment. Years ago, this was where Michael Beans did his Happy Arrrr show, which he now does at Jumbies at Leverick Bay. The past two seasons, our friend Eric Stone has performed at happy hour here. It appears this year they don't have any entertainment.
While we were sitting at lunch looking out over the mooring field, we were startled to see four flamingos fly by. It looked like they were coming in for a landing around the corner from where we are. I have never seen flamingos here, nor have I ever seen them flying. There is a large population of flamingos on Anegada, about twenty miles north of here, but I didn't know they came here too. After we paid our bill, I walked up to the top of the hill to see if I could spot them on the other side of the island. Unfortunately, I couldn't find them.
The boat on the mooring next to us has four young French guys on it. For reasons only they knew, one of them climbed the mast with a FedEx envelope in his hands. At a couple of points along the way he stopped and posed for pictures, clearly making sure the FedEx envelope was prominently held. We have no idea what that was all about.
When we returned to the dinghy dock, I went to the fuel dock hut at the end of the dock to pay for our mooring for the night. As I was coming back, Barb was gesturing to me to get the camera out of my pocket. There was a large ray swimming around under the dock. We can now add rays to the list of critters we've seen this season.
The mooring filed did pretty much fill up by dark. We enjoyed leftover chicken enchiladas for dinner. The wind has picked up considerably today, as forecast, but so far still no significant rain has gotten us. That is forecast to change soon.
GPS N 18-27.588 W 064-31.692 Nautical miles traveled today 6. Total miles 10453.
May 8
We listened to the Coconut Telegraph today and heard lots of our friends moving south quickly as the weather allows. A number of friends have already hauled their boats and gone home for the summer. It's always been one of the dichotomies of cruising, that you make so many new friends, but then you say goodbye never knowing if your paths will cross again or not.
I was still below checking e-mail and such, when Barb called to me to come above. There was a Sunsail catamaran on the mooring behind us, and she said the guy on the boat looked like Kenny Chesney. I looked and saw a guy wearing just a flowered bathing suit and a cowboy hat. It definitely was the style of cowboy hat Kenny wears. I took the binoculars from Barb and had a closer look at the guy. If it wasn't Kenny, then it was his stunt double. This was not some big fancy boat. It was a bareboat Sunsail cat, with two couples and this guy aboard. One of the ladies was taking a video of the guy standing there looking out to sea, as if he wasn't just another family member. I kept watching for a few minutes, and the gestures and body language of everybody certainly seemed as if this guy wasn't just part of their vacation group, but rather was an honored guest. I checked Kenny's website for his tour schedule, and today is in the middle of a week off between shows, so maybe? Shortly after we noticed them, they dropped their mooring and left before I was tempted to dinghy over and ask. Kenny is known to spend a lot of time down here - he has a house on St. John - and he hangs with the locals unlike most celebrities would.
The wind is honking pretty good this morning, and the forecast is for it to get stronger and for strong squalls to show up later today and overnight. Even though we are behind the reef, we are bouncing around just enough to be annoying. So, we are going to make the whopping passage to Trellis Bay this morning. It is a whole half a mile across the open water where it looks like it's pretty bouncy judging by watching other boats out there. We secured everything as if we were going on a multiple day passage, with the exception of hoisting the dinghy. Even if it's rough, it can handle being towed half a mile. A small shower came through before we left, and it looked like another was coming, but then it seemed to dissipate. So, we dropped the mooring about 10:30 and ventured out into the choppy water. It wasn't nearly as bad as it looked, and we were across and into the protected waters of Trellis Bay in seven minutes. Last time we were in Trellis, we were bothered by the wakes from the ferries that go in and out all day. This time, we moved as far into the bay as we could, hoping that the island that the Last Resort restaurant is on will block the wakes.
The wind continued to increase, and got very gusty. A huge gust would come blow easily over twenty knots for a few seconds, and then just abruptly stop. A few seconds later the wind would slowly come back. It was pretty weird. I finished the book about Maltese Falcon. It was interesting because it was not only about the building of the boat, but about the high flying financial world that gets somebody to the point where they can build a $150 million toy.
At 16:00 we went to Da Loose Mongoose for happy hour. We found the outside bar closed, as the season is winding down. We went inside and got drinks to bring back out and sit on the deck. Our friend Ron who lives here appears to be away. His boat is here, but it looks like he's been gone for a while. There are only a few people here, and we chatted a bit with them and played with the cats that live here. A shower came while we were here forcing us to move around to the far side of the bar to keep from getting wet. Once it passed, we paid our tab and went back to the boat. For dinner Barb made our last batch of jambalaya for the season.
GPS N 18-26.769 W 064-31.911 Nautical miles traveled today 1. Total miles 10454.
May 9
We awoke to rain this morning, and it rained pretty steady until mid-afternoon. It is also pretty windy still. It was a slow day excitement-wise. I wrote logs, we both read a bunch, and we stayed aboard all day.
GPS N 18-26.769 W 064-31.911 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10454.
May 10
The weather has cleared up nicely this morning, although the forecast is for more squalls tonight. About noon, we went ashore. We dropped off a bag of garbage at the big public dumpsters, and then went to Trellis Kitchen for lunch. We had a few beers here last time we were in Trellis Bay, but have never eaten here. We were the only customers, but they were serving. Barb got a burger and I ordered a chicken parmesan sandwich. I am curious how the "Italian" food might be from a restaurant in the Caribbean run by someone from India. The sandwich was good, but nothing like it would be in the US. It was grilled chicken, with parmesan cheese liberally sprinkled on it, with lettuce and tomato. I thought it was a perfect example of how you have to open your mind to other possibilities when you travel.
We had thought about taking a walk along the beach that rings Trellis Bay after we ate, but we were both full and decided to save that for another time. As we went back to the dinghy, we stopped at the grocery store to pick up a few items we need. We are trying not to buy anything we won't use soon, as we only have one more week of eating on the boat ahead of us. Back at the boat, we read and napped for a few hours.
At happy hour time, we dinghied in to Da Loose Mongoose for a few drinks. We had only been there a few minutes when Ron, from Island Siren, came in from the road. He had been away delivering a boat to the Bahamas from here, and had just flown back. We visited with him for awhile before he went out to his boat. It was starting to look a little like rain again, so we made it a short happy hour and returned to the boat ourselves. We had left over jambalaya for dinner, again, in an effort to get rid of all our food before we haul out.
As it got dark, we could again see lightening in the distance. The lightening was the kind that just lights up the clouds, not visible bolts to the ground. Initially it was to the north of us, and I hoped it would stay there. Then I started seeing flashes to the north west also. Since they were still in the north also, I wasn't sure if the storm was moving or growing in place. The flashes continued to get brighter and were eventually close enough that we could hear the rumble of the thunder that went with them. More flashes started happening to the east of us also, so I figured we were not going to miss this, one way or the other. At roughly 21:00, the wind, which had been moderate from the east as usual, suddenly turned north and picked up dramatically. It also got noticeably colder when that wind hit. We braced for the rain we knew would come next. We got all the hatches closed and sat in the cockpit waiting. The rain came with a vengeance. It was coming down in sheets, flattening the water, as it blew through. Barb went below but I stayed up sitting in the companionway so I was protected from the rain but could keep an eye on the boats around us. As far as I know, the only anchored boats are behind us, and everyone in front of us is on moorings and should be secure, so I was kind of just enjoying the show instead of worrying as I would have if we were in an anchorage without moorings. This was not your normal blow-and-go kind of storm that only lasts a few minutes and is done. It had been blowing and pouring for at least twenty minutes, when I first thought something up ahead of us might be amiss. I could see a sailboat, about the size of ours, that had somebody on deck with a flashlight. That usually indicates something is wrong while a storm is raging. As I paid attention to this boat, I wasn't sure if it was moving or not, as there were several other boats between us and them, but I did notice all their lights go off and on a few times. By all their lights, I mean their anchor light, and all their cabin lights which I could clearly see. The only way I could explain that would be if somebody was turning the master battery switch off and on. About this time, I was pretty sure this boat was moving, although I wondered why they would in the middle of a storm. As we had taken showers just before the storm started, I did not have any clothes on as all this was unfolding. It occurred to me that perhaps I should throw my shorts on in case I needed to go outside quickly. I dashed below and grabbed my shorts (should have gotten my bathing suit), and pulled them on. As I passed through the main saloon headed back to the cockpit, Barb handed me my foul weather raincoat in case I needed to go out. Even in the tropics, cold rain beating directly on your skin is not pleasant. As I rose into the cockpit, I looked forward and saw a monohull, about the same size as MoonSail, broadside in front of us and drifting towards us. I yelled down to Barb that they were about to hit us as I pulled my jacket on and ran forward to the bow. I got to the bow about the same time as they did. I grabbed their lifelines and pushed, although that's a pretty useless effort at that point. Our anchor hit the side of their boat right at toerail level, about a foot forward of where their standing rigging attached to the deck. This made their boat pivot to our starboard side and come around against us. I could have just fended them off as they drifted by at that point, but their were other boats behind us for them to hit, and only another thousand feet or so before they would be on the beach. I grabbed the extra end of our mooring line that was laying on deck, and quickly wrapped it around one of their stanchions and brought it back to our cleat. This stopped them for going further, but I wasn't sure how long their stanchion would take that stress. Their were two guys onboard, one on deck and the other at the helm. We had quickly learned that although their engine was running, they had apparently fouled their prop with a line, so they had no propulsion. I directed the guy on deck to get a line from their forward cleat, under their lifeline to me. When he got that line to me, I quickly undid my line that was around their stanchion, and put the new line on our cleat. While this was going on, Barb was amidships with the other guy, trying to get some fenders between the two hulls. They had just been banging against each other initially, as we don't normally keep our fenders over the side when we are moored or anchored. (Maybe we should.) As soon as we had them semi-secure, I turned my attention to looking through the rain to the other boats moored near us. I wasn't sure that our mooring was designed to hold two boats in a storm, although I thought it should since they are designed to hold boats almost twice our size. After a few minutes I was convinced we were holding, so my attention went back to better securing the new boat alongside us. With them unable to drive their boat, it seemed that staying rafted to us until morning was the best option. We added a second line from their aft cleat to our mid-ship cleat, although in their haste, this line went over their lifelines and around their bimini frame. It was holding though, and at this point I wasn't worried if something on their boat bent. The boat was a bareboat charter from Footloose Charters, which is what is called a second-tier company that is part of The Moorings family. The two guys aboard were very apologetic, and explained that somehow they had come off the mooring, and then when they tried to drive the boat, they didn't realize their mooring line was in the water and it apparently wrapped around the prop leaving them to drift. They had barely made it past at least to other boats before meeting us. We agreed that we should be secure for the night and they went below. Barb and I stayed up watching things, as the storm continued for another thirty minutes before slacking off. About midnight, Barb went below to try and sleep, while I stayed in the cockpit making sure nothing changed. The rain had subsided, but there still was a good amount of wind, so there was a wind driven chop on the bay causing us to bounce around a lot. Had we been by ourselves, we probably wouldn't have thought the motion was much at all. But the charter boat, although being roughly the same length as MoonSail, was not loaded nearly as heavily as MoonSail. So it bounced around a whole lot more than we did, and when it did the two boats jerked the lines and then mashed the fenders quite hard. Even though the line that was from their stern was around their bimini frame, it didn't appear to be hurting anything, I didn't like the look of it, and also thought it might be better if it was on our stern cleat instead of our mid-ship cleat, now that the storm had subsided. Barb had come back up to see if everything was ok, so she helped me snag their line with our boat hook so that as I undid it from the mid-ship cleat, she could pull it under their lifelines as it should be. We got it and then attached it to our stern cleat. It didn't really make the bouncing and jerking any better, but I felt better about the security of it then. About 02:00, I convinced myself that we were going to stay as we were until morning, so I went below to try and get some sleep.
Unrelated to the collision, Barb took a nasty fall. It was after the excitement was over and the new neighbors had gone below. Barb had been in the cockpit with me and was going to go below. For whatever reason, she thought she was stepping from the last step of the companionway ladder to the floor, when there was another step to go. She fell backwards landing on her side, with her butt taking a sharp blow on the corner of the freezer. I jumped below and we quickly ascertained that she hadn't broken anything, and had not hit her head at all. Her back has been bothering her a lot the past couple of months, and this is bound to not help that any. After a good laugh about it, and few jokes about the bruise she is going to have on her butt, she went to lay down.
While all our excitement was happening, we also heard at least two other boats in trouble speaking on the VHF. They weren't in our bay, so there was nothing we could do but listen. One was on Virgin Gorda, near The Baths. It was a private forty-seven foot catamaran. They were on the rocks. I never heard why they couldn't drive off, or how they got there in the first place. After much talking with the US Coast Guard and another vessel, VISAR, the Virgin Islands Search and Rescue folks, got a boat on scene which pulled them off and towed them to Nanny Cay Marina for an emergency haulout. There was another boat in trouble somewhere too, but we couldn't hear many details about that one. An exciting night.
GPS N 18-26.769 W 064-31.911 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10454.
May 11
I did sleep once I went to bed, but I awoke at dawn as usual, even though I was still very tired. I got up and went above to find the neighbors guys already in their cockpit. One of them was preparing to dive under the boat to confirm the prop was fouled and hopefully clear it. While he did that, I went forward to assess any damage. All I could find on MoonSail were a couple of chip in the gelcoat where the anchor probably got pushed back against it. The anchor roller wasn't damaged, nor was any of our stainless steel pulpit or stanchions bent. The rubber rubrail on the side of the hull had a few scuff marks on it, but it did not get pulled out of the metal track that holds it on, so it basically did exactly what it is designed to do. There were no marks on the hull at all from the bouncing together. I looked at their boat, and it was a little different story, but still not bad. Their boat, a Benneteau, had a metal toe rail. It took the direct hit from our anchor on initial impact, and about four inches of it bent over flat against the deck. Other than that, they seemed to have no damage either. It could have been a much uglier story. My first thought was the anchor had hit them about a foot further aft, it would have hit where their standing rigging attached to the deck. It could have easily gotten caught in the standing rigging, and then when they twisted alongside of us, that may have either bent our anchor roller or pulled on their rigging hard enough to break it and maybe take their mast down. If their mast came down, it would have no doubt hit our mast, causing damage, and possible injury to any of us on deck. All in all, we were pretty lucky.
The guys names were Chad and Joe, and while I was looking for damage, Joe had dove under their boat. He indeed found their mooring line wrapped around the prop, and was able to unwrap it with surprising ease. Sometimes a wrapped line has to be cut off because it gets wrapped to tight to even unwind. I had them go below in their boat and look at their connection between the transmission and the prop shaft to make sure it had not come undone when the prop jammed. It appeared to be ok, so they fired up their motor and put it in gear. They moved us forward indicating all was well. At this point, we untied them and they went and picked up the next mooring behind us. I got in our dinghy and pulled myself up alongside MoonSail so I could get a better look for any scratches or other damage. Thankfully, I didn't find anything. Joe & Chad came back over in their dinghy to see if I had found anything. I showed them the chips I found, and we exchanged our information, and I got their contract number for Footloose. While we were still talking the people who collect the mooring fees came by. They had apparently been by last night while we were at happy hour, so we had not paid. Chad & Joe insisted on paying our mooring fee, since after all, they had shared it with us. All in all, they were very nice guys, and very sorry that this all happened. They are new at chartering, and we gave them a few tips that might help them in the future.
We had our morning coffee and listened to the radio nets, and then headed out. We left Trellis Bay and motored north between Beef Island, Tortola, Little Camanoe, and Guana Islands. We then turned east and followed the north shore of Tortola, eventually crossing over to Jost Van Dyke. We stopped at the eastern end of Jost, picking up a mooring near Foxy's Taboo restaurant. Back in 2002, on our first charter, we stopped here, and Foxy's Taboo was under construction. We have not been here since, so we have not eaten at Taboo. This is also where a place called The Bubbly Pool is. There are actually three islands here, and they are barely broken apart by very shallow water. On the north side you have the open Atlantic, and on the south side you have this nice bay. Depending on the wave action, you can get in the water in these cuts and have the waves bubble over you as they come in from the Atlantic. It can be like your own personal hot tub, but it can also be dangerous if the waves are very large. We heard someone got seriously injured here this year.
We launched our dinghy and went in to Taboo. We found a nice dock which can accommodate dinghies and small power boats, which regularly bring day-trippers in for lunch. Barb got a pepperoni pizza, and I got a grilled fish sandwich. Both were quite good, the beer was cold, and the service was good. After lunch, we returned to the boat and moved on. This bay is open to the south, and the wind is coming from the south today, making it quite choppy and probably not comfortable overnight.
We are only going another two miles, so we towed the dinghy. The next bay around the corner to the west is Little Harbor. Little Harbor is the home of Sydney's Peace & Love, and Harris's Place. Back in 2002, we spent a night in Little Harbor, and had drinks at Sydney's, but have not eaten at either one. Sydney's claim to fame was their honor bar. They don't serve lunch, but you could come in anytime in the afternoon, and have a few drinks, which you mixed yourself and kept track of. Then when they opened for dinner, you just added them to your dinner tab or paid up. We found about fifteen moorings in Little Harbor, and no boats. We took a mooring pretty close in towards shore to get out of the southerly chop coming in the bay. We had only been on the mooring a few minutes, when a lady approached from shore in a local boat. Cynthia was from Harris's place, and they collect the mooring fees. She asked first if we planned to stay the night, because you only pay for a mooring if you stay on it overnight. I told her we were and gave her the $30. As she wrote out the receipt, she told me all about their dinner options, what the soup of the day was, and said if we came in for dinner the first round of drinks was free since we paid for a mooring. She was very pleasant and I thanked her for all the info, although I don't think we plan on eating ashore tonight.
We read some during the afternoon, and as we planned, stayed aboard for dinner since we have to eat everything onboard by next weekend. One other boat came in to the harbor during the afternoon. They didn't go ashore for dinner either, leaving Sydney's and Harris's with no business. I felt bad, because I always like to support the local businesses, but we have to eat the stuff we have onboard. I wonder how the businesses that are so popular during the winter get by during the summer when the hurricane season pretty much ends the charter season. As the sun started to set, the wind died to nothing. We paid the price for being close to shore by getting visited by noseeums and mosquitoes. We closed everything that doesn't have a screen, but without a breeze, it's too hot to sit inside, so we sprayed on the OFF to keep from getting bit too much. We really can't complain as this is the first time outside of a marina that we have had bugs at all this season. There was lightening in the distance again tonight, and it was close enough that we could hear the thunder, but it never came our way.
GPS N 18-26.385 W 064-43.916 Nautical miles traveled today 14. Total miles 10468.
May 12
We awoke to dead clam. The water was like glass. After coffee and the radio nets, we dropped the mooring. Our plan today is to go to White Bay for lunch, and then back to Great Harbor for the night. White Bay is two miles from us, and Great Harbor is between here and there. We left Little Harbor and turned west, only a few hundred feet from the rocky shore. It has always amazed me at how in the BVI, in most places, you can be so close to shore, yet in a hundred feet of water. Once we were heading west approaching Great Harbor, we saw what looked like a large float in the water, well out from the rest of the moorings. I pointed it out to Barb, and she confidently said it was a mooring for a big boat, and that there had been one on it last time we were here a couple months ago. I bought that, and we carried on. As we got even closer though, I realized that it was not a mooring, but rather a dinghy. We changed course and approached it. There was a floating line off the side, and we approached slowly making sure it was not someone diving from it with one of those SNUBA things where a compressor stays in the dinghy and the air hose goes down to the diver. If it was, they should have had a dive flag flying, and there was none. As we got very close it was obvious it was just the line for the dinghy was a floating one, and Barb snagged it with the boat hook as we came alongside. Most dinghies have no identification on them. The charter company ones may have a number, and cruisers dinghies may have a state registration number like we do, or they may try to avoid paying for state registration and mark the dinghy as T/T Boatname. This means Tender To and whatever the mothership's name is. This dinghy was very nice, and said T/T Asante on it. So, I picked up the radio and hailed Asante. A guy answered, and I asked him if he was missing a dinghy. He had, in fact, just noticed it missing, and was retracing his course to look for it. Asante had left Great Harbor headed for Cane Garden Bay, which is about five miles away. They were over half way there when they realized the dinghy wasn't following them. (When we tow the dinghy, I can't help but look at it every minute at least, which is part of why we rarely tow it.) We took the dinghy in tow and turned around and motored towards them. As we approached each other, I stopped as they came by close to our port side. Barb threw them the line and they were reunited. They thanked us and we turned back towards our original destination of White Bay. Between saving the boat the other night and now this, we are collecting those Karma points. Hope we never have to cash them, but it can't hurt.
White Bay is the home to the Soggy Dollar Bar, Ivan's Stress Free Bar, and several other lesser known establishments. A shallow reef with two entrance breaks parallels the beach a few hundred feet offshore. This leaves an area about three hundred feet wide and half a mile long, parallel to the beach where there are maybe twenty moorings. On a busy day, the moorings will all be full as well as numerous day-trip boats will be anchored. Even with our dinghy rescue side trip, we got there early enough to get one of the moorings on the eastern end of the beach, near Ivan's Stress Free Bar. The Soggy Dollar is down near the other end of the beach. We have been to Soggy Dollar numerous times, but have never been to Ivan's. Ivan is mentioned in the Kenny Chesney song Old Blue Chair. Last time we were here, a couple months ago, we dinghied over from Great Harbor. The surf was breaking over the reef, and beaching the dinghies was a challenge. Today, the surf is nonexistent, but there still is a roll, not to mention the constant wakes from big powerboats coming in for a quick stop who don't give a darn about the boats already parked. Inside the reef, the depth is only ten or twelve feet, which when you can see the bottom is a little disconcerting. Galveston Bay is only eight to twelve feet, but it's brown water and you can't see the bottom, so it might as well not be there.
We decided rather than mess with having to drag the dinghy up on the beach, we would just swim in to Ivan's. I have confirmed on the chart, that the distance we swam (with the assistance of noodles) was on about the length of a football field. But for my old out of shape self, that was plenty. When we got to Ivan's we found what looked like it could be a cool funky beach bar. There were lots of pictures on the wall of the dark bar. The fun quotient went down hill fast though, starting with the feeling that I was disturbing the old woman in charge to get up from her book and fix a couple of painkillers. Determined not to let her sour attitude upset, me, I pleasantly asked if they were serving lunch today. She grunted a negative answer like I was stupid for asking. (I'm sorry, I guess I misread that big sign that we could read from the boat that said "Look at our lunch menu". Guess you can look at the menu, but not eat.) Then I asked if I could run a tab, since I thought we might have a few drinks. She looked displeased with this and sighed and said ok if I left her a credit card. I just decided to pay her for that round and leave it at that, and when I found the drinks to be $6 each I was just as glad we only had one round. Ivan's Stress Free Bar has done nothing to relieve any stress I may have had. The painkillers were ok, but not as good as Soggy Dollar's. We sat outside at a picnic table and enjoyed the beach view. There was a boat near us called Saltwhistle III that we had seen somewhere before. The couple aboard had come to shore behind us on a paddle board. I asked them if the boat had been in Jolly Harbor on the hard. Turns out it had and that's probably where I remembered it from. We chatted for a bit with Tony & Rachel about where they had been and where they were going next. They are from Europe and are headed back later this week via Bermuda. We noticed that despite the fact it had been clear when we left the boat, and left all the hatches wide open, it now looked like it could rain any minute. We excused ourselves and began the swim back to MoonSail. It seemed to go a little faster, and amazingly, the rain didn't start until just after we were back and got everything closed. Since we didn't find lunch at Ivan's, we were going to warm up left over pizza before going to Great Harbor. But, there was a boat looking for a mooring, and they hollered at us asking if we were leaving. We thought a minute and said sure, so we got going and they snagged the mooring as soon as we left it.
Great Harbor was a whole mile back to the east. There were plenty of moorings available, and we took one out away from shore in the hopes of not repeating last nights bug experience. Barb warmed up the pizza, and we had lunch. After lunch, we were reading, and the later it got, the more boats came in for the night. I looked up and saw a Footloose Charters boat, and sure enough it was Joe & Chad from the other night. They waved, and Barb yelled in jest for them not to moor near us. At happy hour time, Joe & Chad came over with four beers to share with us. We invited them aboard and had a nice chat with them. Funny how what could have been a very ugly experience turned out ok, and we made new friends. They were both very interested in learning more about the cruising lifestyle, and we were happy to answer their questions. It occurred to us later, that it was here in Great Harbor, where we met our first real cruisers in 2002, and we were the ones asking the questions.
After Joe & Chad left, Barb warmed up the last of our leftover chicken enchiladas. We read some more after dinner, and then were entertained by loud music from ashore. We could hear music from Foxy's, although just barely and not enough to be annoying. But this was coming from a bar on the other end of the beach by the ferry dock. I'm guessing it's not a place cruisers normally go to, but the DJ had a speaker pointed out to the boats, and he was directly inviting boaters to come in and celebrate Mother's Day with them. This music went on late into the night, although about 22:30, I suddenly hit the wall and had no trouble falling asleep despite it.
GPS N 18-26.476 W 064-45.118 Nautical miles traveled today 3. Total miles 10471.
May 13
We had more wind overnight than I thought was forecast. The wind is coming from the southeast, resulting in a pretty good chop in the bay. We intentionally took a mooring out in the bay rather than be close enough to shore that we might get bugs. Everything is a tradeoff. I had terrible interference on the SSB this morning. The next boat over has been running a generator all night, probably so they can run air conditioning, and that is probably the source of the interference. This boat has eight young guys on it and when I went to bed last night, they were still out partying. By noon, we had only seen two of them. Chad & Joe on the Footloose boat left and waved as they went by.
Barb made us breakfast mid-morning. About 13:00, we went to shore and walked down to Corsair's to make dinner reservations. They close between lunch and dinner, and leave a pad on the bar to make your reservations. Even though Vinnie's truck was there, they were already closed up, so I wrote our name on the list for 18:30. We went back to Foxy's and got beers. While we were enjoying our beers, Foxy sat down in his chair and started singing. It was hilarious to watch the tourists who are here because they know they have to go to Foxy's, but don't have a clue who he is, or what he does. This is Foxy's act. He sits and sings stories, most of which have a sexual or racial storyline. Some people just walked by him not knowing who he was. Some stopped and listened, and then when he engaged them in conversation, they asked "Are you Foxy?". We waited until most of the folks left, and then as we were ready to leave, we stopped and said hello. I mentioned that we had seen him last weekend at the dinghy races, and he said it was his eight-year-old grandson that was a participant. One of the stories Foxy tells is about his dog, who is always present at the bar. The dog is large and black and looks like a Lab. He will ask an unsuspecting person what kind of dog they think it is, and they always say a Lab. He says, "No, it's an island dog." He then ask if you know how you can tell. When you say no, his answer is because it has the unmistakable traits of an island dog; 1. It's big and black. 2. It just lays around all the time. 3. It doesn't know how many puppies it has. And three more traits that could be the dog or an island guy.
When had brought a bag of garbage in with us, and the dumpsters are around at the other end of the beach by the ferry dock. So we dinghied around the bay to drop the garbage off. This meant to return to the boat from there, we were going straight into the wind chop. We stayed drier than I would have thought, but by the time we got to the boat, we had decided to move to a different mooring. The crowd has left for the day, and tonight's boats haven't come in yet, so there are lots of empty moorings. We went across and go the one closest to the eastern shore as we could. This was somewhat protected from the chop coming in off the open water.
About 18:00 we went in to Corsairs. They don't officially open until 18:30, but we got a couple of drinks and sat at the bar. Vinnie doesn't seem to be working tonight, but Deb is. We were seated a little after 18:30. One of the specials tonight is a seafood feast for two. It was expensive, but we have not had lobster all season, so we went for it. It was served on a big boat. There was half of a huge lobster tail, scallops, and shrimp in what was called a Hurricane Sauce. The sauce was a little spicy but not really hot. There was also linguine with the same sauce and steamed vegetables. It was delicious. For the price, I would expect it to be great, and it met expectations. We thought we had finished and the waitress inspected the carcass before taking it and found we missed a shrimp under the lobster tail. We assured it is was by accident, and I ate it.
The ride back to the boat was much nicer than the earlier one, as we were close to the shore and protected from the waves.
GPS N 18-26.476 W 064-45.118 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10471.
May 14
The wind continued, and even though it was better than last night, it was still bouncy in Great Harbor. Our plan today is to move over to Cane Garden Bay for a couple of days, so after the radio nets we took off. It was five miles straight into the wind, so of course we motored. We found very few boats here and picked a mooring near the beach. Since the wind is blowing offshore from here, and there is a large hill that surrounds this anchorage, the wind and water were almost calm.
We stayed aboard all day reading, and never even launched the dinghy. The mooring filled up by dark with the standard crew of mostly charter boats. We had hot dogs for lunch, and tilapia, green beans, and left over stuffing that had been frozen from Easter, for dinner.
We were entertained by a couple on a small chartered motor-catamaran next to us. They had been ashore most of the afternoon and came back to the boat to freshen up for dinner I think. They had obviously been over-served already and after a short break on the boat, which included the girl hurling over the side, they were ready to go again. It's tough having to pack all your fun into a one week vacation.
GPS N 18-25.556 W 064-39.525 Nautical miles traveled today 5. Total miles 10476.
May 15
We had a quiet morning aboard, watching the anchorage clear out as the charter boats moved on to their next must-see place. Mid-morning, there were about half a dozen boats here, and we all appeared to be private boats as opposed to charters. About noon, we launched the dinghy and headed towards the dinghy dock. I spotted a dinghy floating several hundred feet from the dinghy dock, slowly heading out to sea. We went over to it and towed it back to the dinghy dock where I retied it. It was a Moorings dinghy. More Karma points! It was gone when we returned from lunch. I wondered if the people realized it probably wasn't in the same place they left it and it was tied better.
We went to Myett's for lunch. There were only a few customers there, and our service was quick and the food was good. After lunch, we stopped at the grocery down the street for a couple of staples (rum and beer) and then went back to the boat.
The afternoon was spent writing logs and dinner was a taco-seasoned ground turkey burrito concoction.
GPS N 18-25.556 W 064-39.525 Nautical miles traveled today 0. Total miles 10476.