GEORGE TOWN

GEORGE TOWN:

Next stop George Town: We arrived the day before Dick’s plane came in. In George Town sail boaters come from all over to sail in the Regattas. 250 boats are anchored in the anchorages throughout town. They have volleyball, softball, basket weaving, card playing activities scheduled for everyday. A cruiser net is on the VHF every morning @ 8:00am to tell the cruisers what’s up for that day. It’s wild. We paid for a slip at the only marina in town. It would be so much easier for Dick to find us there. As Carl was walking Tara by the marina office, Dick’s Taxi pulled up, we couldn’t have planed it better if we knew the exact time he would be arriving. We are glad that he is here safe and sound! It really was a good thing that Carl found him so quickly, because Carl gave Dick a long list of things he needed for the boat. Carrying his bags with that stuff inside would be a chore for one person. Dick is our 1st guest aboard. It’s great to have him here!

For those of you that don’t know, Dick and his wife Terry joined us in Florida to take sailing classes with us. “Great people.” We will put Dick to work sailing as far as we can go in two weeks. Lets see what he remembers!

Having Dick aboard is purely a pleasure. He has been out sailing with other friends a number of times. He is a natural, just a few lessons on navigation he will be ready to rent the catamaran that he has his eye on and sail it with no problem. We found Michiel & Robert from the Pas De Deux sailboat. We have become great friends. Carl, Robert and I are trying to fish. We all caught one about 4” long. We just through them back. We are learning. George Town is fun but there are to many boaters. They are continently on the VHF radio calling someone, it drives me nuts!
As soon as weather permits we will be heading out to Long Island. We will follow Pas De Deux for a while south. They have been sailing for many years and are so helpful with anything on the boat. I just feed them and supply the beer or Rum. They are happy to help out with anything!

Long Island then to Conception Islands: just two small anchorages to drop anchor spend the night and leave early in the morning. In Long Island, our windless motor broke down. This is a automatic motor that lets your chain down and pulls up. Without it you need a lot of mussels to pull it up by hand. Carl & Dick took turns I drove the boat toward the anchor. More snorkeling, Carl is practicing spear-fishing. He speared a Parrot fish big enough to eat. Robert & Carl tried to cut it up but had some problems. I ended up boiling it and feeding it to sailor. Robert is a great chef he makes us dinner quite often, he cooks I do dishes. He knows his way around my galley better then Carl does.

Rum Cay: Is our next stop it has a small little village. We all went ashore to explore. We found a little store, church and Ocean View Restaurant. Owned by Ruby Bain a genuine local Bohemian. We had to order our dinner four hours in advance. Ruby cooked a real Bohemian dinner for us it was great. We all got to try some turtle it was really quite good. The people here are really nice we met some of the local children, they asked me lots of questions. They feel blessed that they can go to school and they love to learn. I bought eggs from the local chickens.

Tonight we are preparing for our 1st over night sail to Mayaguana a stepping stone to the Turks & Caicos Islands. More reef snorkeling, I found another huge beautiful conch shell. It’s great to have Dick here to help out he and Carl enjoy sailing at night. I can’t see anything at night and it scares me. Karie & Alex downloaded music on my I-pod, it sure comes in handy on over-nighters helps the time pass quicker. Our passage was a success smooth sailing. It was great having Dicks help aboard.