April 3-4

April 3

The unfortunate thing about salt water is it never dries on its own. No matter how long you leave stuff hanging, if there is salt water in it, it will always be a bit damp.

The weather s beginning to change, and as the weatherman put it on the local TV station the other night, “This nice weather won’t last long folks, it’s going to get hot again.” Storm clouds are building up as well.

Liz and Patrick can’t get out this month so we are going to wait to see when Doug Ryan gets over here. We are going to head up to Allen’s Cay to help with the tagging and measuring of the iguanas. After that we will go to the Abacos and visit Nipper’s, before heading across to the States.

Yesterday morning while Rick was making coffee, he scalded his stomach with boiling water when the glass jug he was rinsing broke.  Yeah, Heavenly Scents because it stopped most of the blistering and is healing up fairly well with the Healing Balm and DermaCure.  He was also using the auto grinder the day before cutting up some conch shells and the blade shattered. Part of it hit the base of his throat and went straight in. Luckily the sternum stopped it going in any further. Once again, Healing Balm and DermaCure to the rescue after a little Hydrogen peroxide first cleaned it up.

Today was a great day. I didn’t do any work at all. We took chairs, my paints, snorkel gear and lunch to the beach and spent four hours there.

Rick missed the turtle in the morning. He surfaces about 100 feet behind the boat, waves a flipper and as soon as the camera turns on he dives.  BUT...

This afternoon after we got back to the boat we went for a swim to the big coral head about [coincidentally!] 100 feet behind the boat and guess who was lurking there! Rick got some film of his swimming around. He is small and shy.  The fish in that coral head are amazing too. There is so little growth here but every once in awhile you find a spot where there is a great coral head.

Yesterday someone else found one too, with the bottom of his boat! He missed the mark in the harbour and ended up on the bank. Partly sand, partly reef, so he was stuck there all day. When he got off he came back into the anchorage to check out his bottom and re-set his waypoints!

Today is Good Friday so all the businesses are closed, which is fine because we all need a holiday! Right? But that means no internet access until tomorrow.

April4

We helped someone out today by giving them a connector for their AIS. Now we need to get our SSB hooked up.

This morning the turtle came by and waved but by the time Rick got into the water he was gone.  We swam over to the reef to see if he was home.  But we couldn’t see him. We are going to shore first to see about some internet hook-up and a few fresh vegetables; then find a water shirt for Rick and a bathing suit for me that doesn’t look like a dress. [The ‘old lady’ suit I have is too big now –yay!!! And is too heavy a material]

The weather here has been “less hot” but believe it or not, when you guys get crappy weather, it extends down here too.  It cools the area off by about 10 degrees. The locals love it, but they aren’t walking around in shorts and swim suits. They still work for a living.

Eleven years ago today we left Grenada to start heading home for Liz & Geoff’s wedding. That was an epic trip.  Maybe that’s why today I’m feeling particularly homesick.  But I’ll get over it. 

I just wish the grandkids could jump on a plane and come down here for awhile. There is so much more of the world here... kids from Australia, Ireland, and England, all of whom have sailed on the ocean. The local kids here are cool too! And they could all learn so much from each other.  This is where explorers landed! This is where you look out on the ocean and see nothing but water and can really imagine what it was like. This is where science is put to work preserving the fishing and farming, and where you learn to live without being hooked up all day and still survive! 

That being said, I have to go now and find some internet so you can all read about this, and check out the pictures!

Tonight we might go to the “Rake and Scrape” at the Chat’n Chill. At first I was worried about what kind of food that was, but it’s not food...it’s music! It’s played on saws, goatskins, maracas, accordians and guitars.

Later... :)

 CRAP the internet here sucks!!! I can't download the pics. Will try again later

April 4-8

April 5

After we got back from shopping yesterday we went for another swim just to cool down. No sign of turtles. Today, also being a holiday and Sunday, we will take the dinghy to a different spot and go snorkeling further up the island. We also have to run the motor for  awhile today so we may just go up to the marina at the north end of the island and stay there for a couple of days. It’s only 50 cents a foot and we can get free internet ALL DAY if we want. Not sure how good it is. But when we go to a restaurant for “free internet” we end up spending $10.00 for two drinks; or paying $26.00 for two chicken dinners, two beers and two juices, which is a really great deal!!(Rick can’t drink beer or pop).

This morning we went for another hour long swim to see if we could find another reef or the turtles. No luck. But Tempo, another big cat from Toronto, told us there is a reef on the other side of them heading into shore so we will look for it tomorrow.

Today on the Cruiser’s net we heard a boat called “Flamingo”, who announced that he was new to the harbour.  Ross’s boat was from Meaford and he just arrived here. He used to be a customer at our store!! So we called him after the ‘Net and went over to meet him at 2:00 pm on the Volleyball Beach! Turns out he is friends with Amazing Grace!! They met in the Chesapeake and stared travelling together. Amazing Grace is the big Fontaine Pageot catamaran from Toronto we saw in Bimini. He said he heard us on the radio but wasn’t sure if it was us.

We met up with Brad and Anne [Anneteak] again, and Dabulamanzi, Andrea & Garth with the kids & Grandma from Orillia. We met them in Bimini. We met another couple from the states somewhere but didn’t catch the names. He had a drone! It’s basically a toy plane with a camera on it. Hmm...Aerial shots of the harbours for my articles?

Sitting on the beach we were watching the harbour. All of a sudden a funnel cloud started to form. We watched to see if it would amount to anything but it didn’t.

After sitting and talking to a bunch of people, including Cordell, we all went back to Amazing Grace and played Mexican dominoes ‘til 8 pm! It was a hoot! And no drinking involved!!

April 6, 2015

I cannot believe how fast this time is going!  Already April and we will have to start planning to get back to the States to haul out.

Tonight we are going to the Rake and Scrape. We leave the beach at 6 pm on the water taxi and it brings us back at 10 pm. It will be fun! There are 26 people are already signed up for it!

We were going to go into town today to use the Internet. Cordell is trying to connect with us. But tomorrow will be better so you’ll have to wait. I will be able to post the pictures if we go to town tomorrow.

Two days ago we hoisted the City of Thunder Bay flag because our Canadian flag is wearing out. This morning we got a call from Dream Weaver asking what it was. So Thunder Bay has been recognized in Chicken Harbour…I mean Volleyball Beach. We wish we’d had the Navy league flag with us…

Today is very windy and rough here. We’ve moved the boat from Sand Dollar Beach to Volleyball Beach again. It’s closer to the water taxi and we won’t get as wet coming back to the boat when we get back from town tonight. It’s rough enough that we weren’t going to swim today, but we found another reef. It had a stingray hiding under the sand. You could just see his outline, his eyes and nostril, and his tail. We thought the water would be cold today…ok, less warm. But it was alright.  I hear it snowed 10 inches again in Montreal this weekend.

The Rake and Scrape:  THAT was FUN!!! We went over in the water taxi with 24 other people. And we had already met most of them! We walked around the Lake to Eddie’s and got a table outside. When you walk into Eddie’s it looks like a take-out pizza place but with a lot more waiting room, and a bar with bar stools. It only has 2 tables inside and picnic tables on the porch. But when you walk back to the washrooms, there are two more dining rooms, with linen and centerpieces on the tables!

We sat outside with Flamingo and Amazing Grace and a couple of other boas. Rick and I had grouper, rice and peas, beets and coleslaw. Unfortunately the grouper was way too spicy hot so it didn’t have much taste. But the rest of the dinner was good.  At about 8 pm the band started. It was a couple of goatskin drums, a saw, and two guitars. They were really good! We went inside and danced for a bit. Okay, we just moved but one of the locals joined us and we got a kind of dance lesson.   Later on when I was on the way back from the washroom, I got ambushed by another one and boy could he dance!! We did a sort of jive /jitterbug. I felt like I was on Dancing with the Stars! Too bad it was 10pm [boater’s midnight] and we had to catch the taxi or sleep on the beach! I was ready to go for another hour or so! So next time there is a Rake and Scrape we’re going!!

April 7

This week is supposed to be very windy, stormy and unpredictable weather so we will be sitting here for awhile. The winds are gusting up to 40-50 miles/hr. That’s 80-100 km/hr roughly, so we won’t be doing a lot of dinghying back and forth for a couple of days. We had planned on doing some work today but Ross from Flamingo came by and asked if we were going snorkelling, so we said yes because Cheryl [Amazing Grace] wants to snorkel with me. [?] They called us after lunch so we went into the first Hurricane hole in the harbour to the snorkelling buoys. You tie up your dinghy and snorkel there.

It was a Blue Hole. Along the rock wall of the island it got very deep and there were hundreds of fish.  There was a cave that ran under the rock but no-one [not even Rick] went into it. There was enough surge that it felt like the cave went right through to the ocean. If he’d had diving gear, I know Rick would over to try it. Good thing he doesn’t have gear!

After we left the hole we went to another snorkelling spot that was a reef between Elizabeth Island and Guana Cay. That was amazing. It was another wall that held the ocean back. The Atlantic was slamming into the small rock islands and the outside edge of the reef. When you looked up you could see huge rollers coming at you, but on the shallow side it was almost calm. There weren’t a lot of fish there because of the fast moving water. The tide was coming in and pushing us into the bay.  The water on this side of the reef was only 5-10 feet deep, and clear as a bell. The different coral growing was really amazing and we were there for over an hour swimming. Afterwards we all stopped at our boat [we were the closest] for snacks.

We went over to the Chat ‘n Chill to see if they were open. We had planned to get some conch salad for supper but we missed them. They were just cleaning up. Rick talked to them for a few minutes. I was talking to a guy from Island TIme who was curious about our boat. While he was at the conch shack, a shark came in to see if there were any bits of conch or any small rays to eat. Tomorrow we are going to play dominoes on the beach in the afternoon. I never get time to clean or do any work, we are so busy!

April 8, 2015

OK so we haven’t moved to the marina yet. If we go up there we will miss all these new friends!  This is another one of those places that you don’t want to leave!So when we called Flamingo to tell the we were going to move to the marina, he said he had a generator and a charger we could borrow to get our batteries charged. We will get gas for it and borrow it and charge us up so we can stay here a little longer! Yay!

April 3-4

April 3

The unfortunate thing about salt water is it never dries on its own. No matter how long you leave stuff hanging, if there is salt water in it, it will always be a bit damp.

The weather s beginning to change, and as the weatherman put it on the local TV station the other night, “This nice weather won’t last long folks, it’s going to get hot again.” Storm clouds are building up as well.

Liz and Patrick can’t get out this month so we are going to wait to see when Doug Ryan gets over here. We are going to head up to Allen’s Cay to help with the tagging and measuring of the iguanas. After that we will go to the Abacos and visit Nipper’s, before heading across to the States.

Yesterday morning while Rick was making coffee, he scalded his stomach with boiling water when the glass jug he was rinsing broke.  Yeah, Heavenly Scents because it stopped most of the blistering and is healing up fairly well with the Healing Balm and DermaCure.  He was also using the auto grinder the day before cutting up some conch shells and the blade shattered. Part of it hit the base of his throat and went straight in. Luckily the sternum stopped it going in any further. Once again, Healing Balm and DermaCure to the rescue after a little Hydrogen peroxide first cleaned it up.

Today was a great day. I didn’t do any work at all. We took chairs, my paints, snorkel gear and lunch to the beach and spent four hours there.

Rick missed the turtle in the morning. He surfaces about 100 feet behind the boat, waves a flipper and as soon as the camera turns on he dives.  BUT...

This afternoon after we got back to the boat we went for a swim to the big coral head about [coincidentally!] 100 feet behind the boat and guess who was lurking there! Rick got some film of his swimming around. He is small and shy.  The fish in that coral head are amazing too. There is so little growth here but every once in awhile you find a spot where there is a great coral head.

Yesterday someone else found one too, with the bottom of his boat! He missed the mark in the harbour and ended up on the bank. Partly sand, partly reef, so he was stuck there all day. When he got off he came back into the anchorage to check out his bottom and re-set his waypoints!

Today is Good Friday so all the businesses are closed, which is fine because we all need a holiday! Right? But that means no internet access until tomorrow.

April4

We helped someone out today by giving them a connector for their AIS. Now we need to get our SSB hooked up.

This morning the turtle came by and waved but by the time Rick got into the water he was gone.  We swam over to the reef to see if he was home.  But we couldn’t see him. We are going to shore first to see about some internet hook-up and a few fresh vegetables; then find a water shirt for Rick and a bathing suit for me that doesn’t look like a dress. [The ‘old lady’ suit I have is too big now –yay!!! And is too heavy a material]

The weather here has been “less hot” but believe it or not, when you guys get crappy weather, it extends down here too.  It cools the area off by about 10 degrees. The locals love it, but they aren’t walking around in shorts and swim suits. They still work for a living.

Eleven years ago today we left Grenada to start heading home for Liz & Geoff’s wedding. That was an epic trip.  Maybe that’s why today I’m feeling particularly homesick.  But I’ll get over it. 

I just wish the grandkids could jump on a plane and come down here for awhile. There is so much more of the world here... kids from Australia, Ireland, and England, all of whom have sailed on the ocean. The local kids here are cool too! And they could all learn so much from each other.  This is where explorers landed! This is where you look out on the ocean and see nothing but water and can really imagine what it was like. This is where science is put to work preserving the fishing and farming, and where you learn to live without being hooked up all day and still survive! 

That being said, I have to go now and find some internet so you can all read about this, and check out the pictures!

Tonight we might go to the “Rake and Scrape” at the Chat’n Chill. At first I was worried about what kind of food that was, but it’s not food...it’s music! It’s played on saws, goatskins, maracas, accordians and guitars.

Later... :)

 CRAP the internet here sucks!!! I can't download the pics. Will try again later

March 31- April 2

March 31 cont’d

On Tuesday, after we came back from town, we were getting ready to move the boat back over to Sand Dollar Beach for the night, figuring it would be more protected from the strong east wind. AS he was pulling in the dinghy, Rick saw three dolphins swimming by. They swam around the boat once and then again, so he jumped into the water with the GO-PRO and they swam right up to him. It was very cool!!

We parked at Sand Dollar and went to the beach to climb over the hill and check out the ocean. It was still pretty rough! The hill is about 200 feet high but almost straight up. There is a well worn path up and over. The other side is a cliff. There are other paths down to the rocky beach but we didn’t go down.  ON top of this 200 foot high hill there are shells. We gathered some so Rick could start constructing his shell butterfly/angels. He found a Queen Helmet shell [looks like a conch] that is in perfect condition...no cracks or scratches on it [dead, of course].  In the Shell Collecting book that he bought the thing is valued at $30-$50!! Who knew!!

April 1 Happy Birthday Joe!!!

It’s kind of scary to think we’ve been here a month because the time goes so fast and I can’t remember what we’ve done from day to day.

I spent the morning organizing the information I already have on the T&C’s. What a chore! Not sure if it’s because my brain is rebelling at actually rebelling at working or if I just don’t want to do this particular job.

We went swimming for an hour just to get the fuzz out and we swam and snorkelled along the beach but there have been so many boats anchor here that the bottom is all torn up and only bits of grass grow.

After supper we went to the dance [nobody really dances much] at Volleyball Beach and met another Prout [1998] boat. They bought theirs in Turkey and they came over from the Mediterranean to Grenada. Now they are heading up to the continent to do the Great Loop.  Chris Gooch writes for a British sailing magazine and he is recording their trip.

April 2

Every morning at 8:00 am we listen to the Cruiser’s net for weather and other information. So we are sitting in the cockpit and watching the boats wing around and behind us is a big patch of sea grass. Every morning we watch a sea turtle or two come up and look around and wave a flipper, but as soon as Rick picks up the camera, it ducks down and stays down.  So tomorrow he is going to take the GO-Pro and see if he can catch it with the underwater camera to add to his list of underwater wildlife movies!

we have pretty much decided to not go to the TCI's. We can't seem to get a good weather window, so I will do this with phone calls and website searches. we will stay in the Bahamas somewhere for the remainder of the spring. Darn, eh?