Hi everyone,

Sandy here...it's been awhile since writing, so I will bring everyone up to date.

We closed on our boat last week, then spent the next two days enjoying it. What a wonderful experience!! We picked up some food and other provisions, pulled out of the marina in Road Town, BVI with our boat broker (Todd) and powered over to Nanny Cay marina to fuel up, top off the fresh water tank and pick up our dinghy. We sat at the fuel dock and a squall came through, leaving a nice, fresh breeze to enjoy. Remember, it's been really muggy, so it was refreshing to cool off. Anyway, Todd waved goodbye and Karen and I set off. It was already about 3pm and we decided to motor the 5 miles across Sir Francis Drake Channel to Norman Island. This is the island thought to be the inspiration for Robt. L. Stevenson's novel "Treasure Island"! We spent our 1st night aboard there, in a bay called "The Bight". We took the dinghy to shore, had drinks on the beach, and admired our boat among the other 30 boats at anchor. The slight motion of the boat rocking is pretty soothing...not sure what it will be like to try and sleep with the boat "rocking and rolling". Our first morning aboard was spent stowing all of our gear, discovering that there wasn't enough room to stow all of our gear, trying to figure out what to do with the extra sweatshirts, heavy coats, foul weather gear, etc. Did I mention it's hot and muggy here? We also snorkled for awhile and discovered that lounging in the cockpit of our boat is great.

Later that day, we set SAIL from Norman Island and proceeded around "The Indians", past the southern side of Tortola, around the East end of Beef Island and then motored into Trellis Bay. We hooked onto a mooring ball (a floating line attached to a heavy weight on the bay floor). We had a nice dinner and settled into the evening. The boat has a number of really cool features...one is a fresh water shower nozzle on the transom that allows a person to shower up on deck...after it's dark ;)

The next morning, we flagged down a fellow boater that was taking his dinghy to shore. He gave us a ride and even took us to the airport in his SUV. We needed to fly back to St. Maarten (SXM) to pick up the remainder of our stuff...why, I don't know, because we haven't the room to stow the things we already have on the boat. Anyway, the trip back to SXM was uneventful.

We have since met some wonderful people here at the apartment complex and had a wonderful meal with them. Today is the first time in a week that we've had reliable internet sufficient to post to the blog and check emails.

We hope to pick up all of our dive gear at the local scuba shop and do a 1 tank boat dive this afternoon. We will take as many good pics as possible and post them, along with the recent boat pics, on the next blog.