New stuff and boat woes

Hello everyone...Today is finishing up for us. Actually, Karen is already in bed and I'm still not tired. There's been some neat stuff happening for the last couple of days and I thought I'd share some of the things I've got accomplished. Unfortunately, I had hoped to include pics of some really neat boats we've seen over the last couple of weeks but our internet connection has been realllyyy sloooowwww. It will have to wait until next time.

First, I'm working my way through the nightmare of loading videos onto YouTube for everyone's pleasure. So many error messages, load times that exceed my imagination/patience, etc. Anyway, I have been able to get more of them on the site and you should be able to access them through the link on the upper right side of the blog page. Of course, they are quite "amatureish" (is that a word?) but I hope to improve their quality as time goes on. There is an option for this blog layout that allows the video files to be displayed right on the blog, but I noticed it takes forever for the buffers to load and play...I'm sure there's a better way to do the videos and I will keep looking for it.

Secondly, I've added a section onto the right column of the blog, about half way down, called our "Picture of the week". This week's pic is one we received some time ago in an email. Don't remember who sent the email, nor do I know who should get credit for it. I thought it was hilarious and can't imagine how the shot was made.

We've had some rain the last few nights and this helps to clean off the salt water that's on the boat from sailing in the waves...I know, it's just one of the crosses we must bear...but having the salt washed off allows us to wax the topsides and the cabin of the boat. Last Saturday evening, I was reading a novel (The Rising Tide, by Jeff Shaara) and relaxing. The rain started and I noticed some of the ports on the sides of the cabin top were dripping rainwater. They hadn't before, so I started mopping up the drips, and then it dawned on me that the leaks were probably due to the bug screens being removed that morning...the rubber seal between the screens and windows that closed had been squished too tight and they hadn't expanded back out yet. A little massaging of the seals and everything was fine.

Then Sunday evening, I heard a rattle on top of the boat like someone had dropped a rock on it. I finally found the "nut" after 5 minutes of searching with a flashlight. What kind of nut, you ask? It was a 1/2" nut, and not too many things on the boat take a 1/2" nut, except the bolt that attaches the mainsail and the boom onto the mast! We had just spent the day running with the sails up, under 20 knots of wind and 6 foot waves. The nut fell off after we made it into our anchorage. The fact that it hadn't bounced off of the boat was amazing. Even more than that, if the nut had come off during the sail, I'm sure the sail would have pulled the pin out of the attachment flange and the whole "shootin' match" would've gone: sail, boom, then some shrouds, possibly even the mast itself (like a cascade of dominos). I reinstalled it immediately and thanked the Lord for saving us again. Needless to say, I picked up some Loctite today and will lock it on for good. This is just one of the thousands of examples of how the Good Lord has watched over Karen and I since we've been together. We've been told that these things happen. It's just part of boat ownership.

Karen has been cooking marvelous meals for us, and some of them she has shared with some of you...Chicken over a bed of broccoli...homemade tortillas and refried beans...her famous tacos...breaded pork chops and mashed potatoes...and her fried chicken...mmmm!!! I, luckily, have a fast metabolism; otherwise, I would weigh 250.

Hopefully, I will be able to upload some more videos and pics for the blog in the next few days...and like SM said it all of the time to the pilots....Seeee Yaaaa!

Kings and Pirates

Someone must have let the word out that I can fix heads on a boat...Karen thought I should be crowned the Head King.

Here's the rest of the story: Michael "Beans" is an entertainer/songwriter/musicionary that lives in the bay next to Marina Cay. He has a "pirate" music show that he performs Monday through Thursday each week at Marina Cay's Rob White Bar. A couple of weeks ago, he was laid up due to a back injury and unable to do the show. Since we're retired and gypsy around with few chores of our own, I volunteered to help in whatever way he could use (I thought that he would ask me to sing in his place). He had another, better idea...we were told that his girlfriend was coming in a few days and, that if I really wanted to help him, he had a problem. His head didn't pump the raw water in to flush out the "stuff" and, if I could please help him out, see if there was something I could do. Oh, by the way, there was another head in the forward part of his boat that did the opposite...raw water could go in but the "stuff" wouldn't pump out. At this point, I felt that my singing debut would have to wait, and I said yes. Karen was pleased to get the chance to photograph the initial work progress. Anyway, I ended up removing the 1st head to take ashore to rebuild it and, after understanding the particular design of the older head he had, was able to work on the forward one while in place. Needless to say, Michael was a happy camper when both heads worked as designed.

After a few more days rest, Michael was able to perform his show for some very happy boaters. His show is the highlight of many charterers that work their way around the BVI for their vacation. We saw Michael perform last November at the Lats and Atts annual convention, but his regular show was completely different and a lot of fun.

Michael has been helping people of Haiti with his charity work for over 10 years. He takes the proceeds from his CDs and t-shirt sales, as well as his tips and donations from his show and donates it to his charity work there. We helped him a little bit during his show and saw at least one donation for his charity given in a $1,000 check. Wow! He refers to himself and other boaters in his fundraisers as "Pirates with a Poipose". Here's his website link that talks more about his work:   http://www.goodsamaritanofhaiti.com/  His latest venture is enlisting the help of some tall ships (square-rigger sailboats) to deliver tons of donated milk and rice to one of the isolated Haitian islands.

We've noticed that there are nightly contests during his shows that bring out the "blowhards" from each boat to see who can win the longest conch horn blowing contest. Karen volunteered me. Of course, I am competetive just a little, so I joined in the fun. There were 4 gals and 7 guys. The record time  for the longest count was about 80 seconds...standing since last year...by a gal. Of course it's due to their larger lungs, so I consider it more of a challenge than defeating a guy. The other guys made it up to 34 seconds and I got all the way to 44 seconds. The gals were no challenge, giving an average blow time of 14 seconds. They did have pretty small lungs, though. Thus, I won the contest, was crowned "King Conch" for the evening, and won a 5th of Pusser's Rum. The record holder gal must have had really big lungs!

Michael, Karen and I sure had a fun evening!! We've made it a point to exchange information between us to ensure we can stay in touch and help when able.

More adventures at The Baths!

During the "Lats and Atts" party last November, Karen and I met the managers of Marina Cay island and resort. Joe and Karen are from the Spokane, WA area. As we talked about each other's lives, we compared notes on people we know and places we've been. Unbelievably, we discovered Joe is a friend of my cousin, Larry Loges, from the Yakima area. We've kept in touch with them over the last few months and promised to go sailing with them whenever they had time to get away from the island. They had some time to get away last week and so we headed over to pick them up.

We sure had a great time...we left Marina Cay on a close reach and tacked our way over to The Baths on Virgin Gorda.

Karen and Joe had never been to The Baths...they were sure in for a treat. We picked up a mooring (much closer to the beach than the one Karen and I used the last time we were here) and snorkled in to the shore.(This little tidbit will become important later). Landing on the beach was tricky as the surf was up...didn't want to get "rock rash" from being scraped along the sea bed.

These are different views of sections of the pathway

After walking our way through the pathways in the boulders, we headed up the trail to the restaurant on "Top of the Baths" for a nice brunch. We spent a nice time talking and sharing stories, not realizing that a "really great one" was in store for us once we got back down to the beach. Although no pictures were taken, let me describe what we went through: Once we made it down to the beach, we saw that our boat was not on the mooring where we left it. We were sure that it was tied to the mooring properly, so could only imagine that it somehow must have broke free and drifted off. There was a similar boat moored off to the North about 150 yards, but none where ours was supposed to be. We talked about trying to reach the "other" boat, in case we were somehow mistaken about where we moored at, but it would mean another epic swim to reach it just to find out if it was ours. Then a young man volunteered to take me out in a dinghy to see what was going on. Notice I didn't say it was "his" dinghy. Anyway, off we went. Sure enough, the other boat we saw was ours...somebody had moved it. Don't know why, Don't know how, Don't know who!!! It appeared to be intact, so I took our dinghy into the shore, following the young man in his borrowed dinghy. The dinghies are not allowed to be left beached on the shore here...instead, they must be moored off the shore about 50'. While the young man moored his dinghy and swam to shore, I contemplated how I was to transfer 3 more people and all of the gear into our dinghy. Then, I remembered reading that waves go in patterns. In between the 4' tall shore-scouring breakers, there appeared to be a few waves that were quite mild. Soooo, after checking behind the dinghy for a rogue wave sneaking in behind me, I scooted on in right after one of the big ones broke. What I didn't anticipate was that patterns aren't always consistant. We got hit...by one of the 4' waves, swamping the dinghy and sending it crashing up the shoreline. The outboard engine's transom bracket broke off, letting the engine go for a short swim. Luckily, we have always kept the engine tethered to the dinghy with a cable. We managed to get the dinghy, engine and bruised people up out of the surf area where we could survey the damage. There didn't appear to be any lost equipment, so we finished cleaning sand and bailing water out of the dinghy and loaded the engine inside. Just then, the "real" owner of the 1st dinghy showed up and volunteered to come back to tow us to our boat, after getting his crew back to his boat. We got our dinghy launched back into the surf without a problem and Joe and I manuevered to the mooring line. Then both Karens swam out and everybody piled in, waiting for our tow. After thanking everyone over and over again for their assistance, we got the dinghy tied up to our boat and headed back to Marina Cay. We had a nice return trip, and hopefully, we can go out again soon. In the spirit of the quote at the top of our blog, we sure are more "experienced".

James teaches coconuts

James is the groundskeeper/garderner of Marina Cay. Among his duties of the island, he entertains selected boaters (like Karen and I) with his prowess as a coconut getter. I am so humbled with my efforts after seeing his technique. He steps into a 2' diameter loop of nylon line, jumps up onto the tree with the line wrapped around his shoes, and proceeds to shimmy up the tree like a monkey. My most recent efforts involved rotten coconuts thrown up into the tree in a almost-failing attempt to knock some down. Needless to say, I was keeping a keen eye on his actions.

After watching James open the coconuts, my embarrasment was complete. He held them in his hand while whittling away with a machete that I'm sure was much sharper than mine. Whack, whack and voila! We were treated with fresh coconut milk and jelly coconut. We have always gone after the dried, brown coconuts and I most certainly never held them in one hand while chopping at it with the other. The locals consider the dried coconuts as rejects...the green ones are fresher, the meat isn't hard yet and the milk is sweeter. The texture of the meat in a green one is like jello that's almost set.

One of his whacks shaved off a sliver of the husk that he used to scrape the coconut jelly out of the shell. Karen and I agreed that we prefer the coconut meat that is firmer, although the jelly coconut is tasty...and it would probably make a much better ingredient than hard coconut in a blended drink. Hopefully, a future blog will talk about our success at getting coconuts rather than the cuts and bruises from the attempt.

Finally...a cat to love!

The next day (after my Birthday party), we sailed around the islands again and dropped the anchor where it suited us. We chose to return to Lee Bay (Great Camanoe) for the evening. There were two other boats already there, which crowded the small anchorage a bit. Lucky for us, one of the boats pulled out and we only had to share the bay with a very large Catamaran. We did find relatively good holding for our anchor and I snorkled out to look at it to verify we would be ok. A lot of the sea floor in this bay and others, we have found, have hard flat limestone. Although from the surface looking down it appears as though the sea bed is sand, anchors won't set in the limestone...it feels like you're dragging the anchor across rough concrete! But we did find sand and the hold was great. Anyway, one of the boats was a catamaran...

Mmmmm...the smell of new car. Is there anybody who doesn't like that smell? I asked an F-18 pilot once whether the new aircraft he was flying smelled like a new car...he said that all he could smell was the oxygen mask, but the aircraft was absolutely pristine...everywhere. This is a BRAND NEW Robertson/Caine catamaran. When finished checking our anchor's set, I swam over to the catamaran to thank them for advice on the anchoring. When told the boat was new, I asked what it smelled like and they said "new fiberglass". We were invited aboard in the evening to check it out and it was pristine!! This is Dave and Janice...

And below is Sue and Wally. They flew to Tortola to see their new boat they purchased and to take it out for the weekend, prior to the boat going into the charter fleet.

Purchasing a new boat (sailboat, powerboat, etc) and putting into a charter fleet can, evidentally, have many benefits...it's kind of like owning a timeshare property. An owner may use the boat for a negotiated time frame, receives an income that covers most if not all necessary maintenance and insurance and a residual income that covers most if not all of the principal/interest payments. Hmmm, use of the boat, someone else maintains and pays for it and tax write-offs to "boot"...very interesting.

Spending the evening with Wally, Sue, Dave, and Janice was so much fun. Those folks sure know how to party! Lots of food and drink! Karen told them about the last time we were anchored here....the great score we recieved from a charter boat wanting to give away their leftover provisions. They thought that was great and said they paid $7000.00 for four days provisions (i'm sure that was a slight exageration) and would love to give us their leftovers if we happen to be at the Bite on Monday. It appears they were eating quite well and it would have been great to see them again, but we weren't at the Bite. Hopefully some other well deserving folks got the leftovers!

The next morning "Snow Cat" pulled out and left us alone in Lee Bay. OUR OWN PRIVATE COVE!!!! So we stayed another night! Luckily, no one came to join us. We certainly are not loners.....but sometimes it is fun to be alone!

After taking more pics of the catamaran, we went for a dinghy ride. We always see so much...the dinghy only drafts about 16" so we can get into some neat areas, close to shorelines.

This is some of the shoreline along Great Camanoe Island. There were some fairly large waves coming in.

This is Long Bay Beach on Beef Island (right next to Trellis Bay and the Tortola airport). Heading over to this beach from Great Camanoe, I saw a spout of water shoot into the air about 1/4mi to the East. Karen and I looked for more, but didn't see anything else. I believe it was a whale as this is the time of year that humpbacks start showing up. Maybe if we keep a good watch out, we will be able to get some pics to share.

A birthday to remember!

After we left the "digs" on the hill, Karen and I spent the day/night in Benures Bay, on the North side of Norman Island. This is the same place that the "pelican video" was shot, as seen on our youtube link. Our friends Ken and Joyce happened to be anchoring in the same area and ended up right next to us. Ken told us about an unimproved road system that had been "pioneered in" (an old logging term) so we set off. In the above picture, Karen is standing on part of the road just off of the beach.

As usual, I have to try a different path. I had decided to go up above the road in an attempt to get a photograph of our boat in the bay below us. I could have gotten back off of the bank the way I went up, but what fun is that?

That's our boat on the right. You may have noticed our stern line tying us to a tree on the shore. There is an anchor set off of the bow also. In effect, this keeps us angled out towards the opening of the bay and any oncoming waves. If just an anchor was used, we would be swinging in the direction of the wind (like the other 2 boats are) with the waves being abeam, causing quite a bit of unnecessary rocking motion. The boat in the center is Ken's; he was set up like our boat overnight, but chose to prep his boat for leaving in the morning and released his stern line. His boat is the same model of Beneteau as ours, except 2 years older.

Upon reaching the crest of the hill, this was our view looking to the Southeast.

We walked further up the road and turned to look towards the Southwest.

We needed to get back to our boat to raise anchor and head to Soper's Hole, Tortola and a birthday party, so we were unable to see much more of the island, but did stop to take this photo of the Eastern end of Norman Island.

I'm standing next to my favorite Caribbean tree, a turpentine tree. I really don't know if it has any market value, but it sure has cool-looking bark...they look like they've been painted with varnish that's been peeling back off in strips like a paper birch.

Me and my princess, enjoying a wonderful hike!

Ahhh, a painkiller for Karen and Crown Royal on the rocks for me. We ended our day at "Jolly Roger's" in Soper's Hole. The bar "wench" gave me an extra shot to top off my cup! Thanks for telling her it was my birthday, Karen!! Crown Royal tends to make me turn misty-eyed to the past...it is the choice of ex-loggers, hunters, brothers and dads. Even horsemen and "spud" farmers, like Gene Miller, one of my dad's dearest friends.

Thanks for all of your stories and friendship...may you rest in Peace, Gene. You were the true definition of a friend to others...a gentle, caring man.

Our lives just keep getting more fun...and it sure shows on our faces! We told you all that we feel younger in the Caribbean...Karen is now about 39 and I'm celebrating turning 45.

Left to right...Max (Australia), me, Karen, Joyce, Ken (Tennessee and Alabama), Sue and Toddy (Wales, UK). Ken bought everyone their 1st drink and pizza for everyone. We spent the evening talking and laughing. What a great birthday! I think the only thing that would have made it better would've been if all of you could have joined us. Cheers to all of you.

Real life "Creepy Crawlers"

Sue took this photo of a butterfly while wandering the garden areas around the home they are watching. There are so many different species of butterflies and moths in the islands...I don't, unfortunately, have any of the moth we saw that was black and as big as a small bat.

As with most things to do with bugs, bigger doesn't mean better. We have already blogged about the mosquitos and termites we've seen.

This millipede must have been the papa of the thousands we've seen that are only an inch long. This fella is about 3 1/2 inches long. I found one similar to this that I wanted to pester. It immediately turned over, placed all of it's feet in a grappling hook array and I thought I saw fangs. Karen told me to leave it alone before I got bit.

This photo was taken on the trail Karen and I took up to the top of Norman Island. We saw many butterflies, large black bumblebees and a few spiders. Although you may have thought the photo has nothing in it...you are looking through a spider web about 2 feet across and the spider (blurred) is in the center. It was black/white and twice as big as your typical garden spider.

This here little fellow is a tarantula. One of the dogs, Nemo, found it trying to get into the house

 and had it in a corner by the door...gooooodddd Nemo!

Karen decided it would look good to give a better size perspective by putting it on Toddy's hat...we didn't tell him though.

Here's a closeup of it on a rock. I thought it would be fun to hook up a small string on it and tie things to it to see how much weight it could pull, but Karen told me to just let it go. Maybe she was worried it would get mad and bite me.