Dr. Seuss' Protege



Caribbean Booby on our bow being bored


Karen and I have been doing some really fine stuff lately....and you might want to come here and try it sometime too.

Come on! Get your mind out of the gutter...were you thinking I was talking about "wacky weed"..."ganja"..."smoke"...cannabis?

I was talking about spending quality time 24/7/365 with your spouse! We've become really silly lately...that's what happens when you get attached at the hip.

Michael's (Beans) magnificent moored mansion



Photo of floating with a nearly-full moon



Sailing to St. Maarten on a super-sized sailboat

One of the things on our bucket list was to make a long overnight sail. This year, we were thinking of taking our boat to St. Maarten. It is about 90 miles from the BVI and would require about 20 hours of motorsailing in our boat to get there.

We met Jim and Connie Priebe last year and had planned to travel alongside them in our boat. Instead, we were invited to travel there on their boat "Plane to Sea".

"A" really radical Russian rowboat

A ketch-rigged kazillionaire's kreampuff

 We left the BVI, passing between Necker Island and Virgin Gorda under sail, at about 6pm on the 21st of December. We pulled into Simpson Bay, St. Maarten about 4:30am....that's 10 1/2 hours folks. We stayed on a port tack and averaged over 8 1/2 knots..all--the--way!! It may not seem like we were going very fast, but in a sailboat traveling to St. Maarten, this is so rare that it's almost unheard of. Needless to say, Jim and I were absolutely grinning from ear to ear. The girls were not as enthused as we were, though. Raging through the waves, heeled over, occasionally taking water over the bow...for 10 straight hours...wasn't as fun for them. So we slowed the boat down, just a little, to keep everyone happy. We even set out the fishing lines, but no fish...oh well, the sail was still perfect, to us.

The Captain (Jim), Connie and Karen

Great gaggle of glam goddesses going through the gate

 We anchored, then got some sleep for a few hours. After waking, we hurried towards the lineup for the drawbridge to open, allowing everyone to enter Simpson Bay Lagoon. There were about 20 boats of various sizes waiting, but we found it was quite easy to cut in line and go through 2nd, ahead of the rest. No one even blew their horns at us...so no foul!

Simpson Bay's special vessel span 

Our boat is beating the best of the rest

There were so many cool and unique boats. At one point after we anchored inside Simpson Bay Lagoon, I counted over 30 megayachts and 10 megasailboats over 100' long tied up to the various marinas. There were some yachts that remained outside the bridge as they were too wide to enter!

J-Boat jewel

Smokin' through the "slot"

"Holy

Smokin' Spaceship,

Batman!"