Sailing on Lucky Duck: Steve and Lynn on the High Seas

Psychlaw to the BVIs: Guest Entry from John Flaten

Lynn and Steve admirably hosted Steve’s co-investors from his Psychlaw Associates Investment Club for a whirlwind tour of the British Virgin Islands (actually sunny with gentle breezes) for a week at the end of April, picking John Flaten (which would be me) up early Sunday evening at the airport at Beef Burger Island. (“BBI”) adjacent to Trellis Bay, Tortola.

John is not an experienced international traveler (prior longest trip being to Fargo, ND in the early 1960s), so managed to send his passport through BVI Customs and Immigration ahead of him in his checked luggage, making for an extended and rather interesting entry. But, John claimed an ESE (Entry Stupidity Exemption) which was granted after 25 minutes of fast talking (yes, John is also a retired lawyer with little to do these days, but argue with the Man) and it was onward and upward from Trellis Bay aboard Gustie.

You all know about Gustie by now, so I won’t retrace prior descriptions, except to say that Gustie is indeed a beautiful boat and special environment, especially for those grasping the Six Right, Twelve Left, Six Right combination to her forward biffy. Given my propensities in the biff (I read the Wall Street Journal cover to cover there for 35 years), I took to the secret combination rather readily, such that my biffy pumping forearm is now noticeably larger. As they say in poker, “a straight flush beats a full boat any day”.

Gustie’s other obvious traits are that she is well designed, compact and can be sailed largely by automatic remote control. This is an absolute necessity with a trial lawyer at the helm assisted by an attorney crewman, the very definition helplessness. Actually, as you all know who have followed Gustie’s Blog, Captain Steve (or as he is locally known, “wdc 8408”) and Mrs. Captain Steve have learned a great deal about sailing and survival in a very short time. I know that after a couple of evening libations, I felt quite secure aboard Gustie, especially with her back up GPS device.

From Trellis Bay it was off on a five hour sail to Anegada, a relatively large flat vegetated island (its height of land only 12 feet above sea level) surrounded by coral reefs. Captain Steve expertly negotiated the circuitous entry to reveal a lovely harbor with many available buoy balls for mooring. Unfortunately after briefly running aground we learned these buoys were set only for cats drawing four feet, not for keeled vessels drawing six to seven feet. So, Captain Steve moved outside the Buoy Field and expertly set anchor as Mrs. Captain Steve manually maneuvered the shoals. I closed my eyes and prayed and in the end Gustie’s anchor held fast.

There followed a half hour of snorkeling instruction for my benefit. Over the next hour I discovered my natural buoyancy, but did not conquer my fear/flight tendency when faced with water in my lungs and, so, was unwilling to let go of Gustie’s dingy line. However, over the ensuing six days, I became a snorkel ready guy and really enjoyed looking down on all of those creepy things that live in the sea.

We spent two days at anchor at Anegada, had several wonderful restaurant meals and took a couple of thrilling taxi rides on the Anegabound, seated in the box of an ancient pickup truck driven by an islander doing on the job training. The snorkeling and reefs were great. So was the crab cake salad.

After two days at Anegada we headed back to Trellis Bay at BBI to pick up Joel Peskay, one of the two psychologists in Psychlaw Associates. The other, Roger Sweet, stayed in the Twin Cities to keep track of our massive investment portfolio. He did a darn good job and managed to pay for the cost of our BVI trip while we were away.

I seem to have lost a day here somewhere. I think my snorkeling instruction actually took place at an anchorage at Virgin Gorda where we spent my second night aboard Gustie. Virgin Gorda is more typically mountainous and has several good harbors, all with top restaurants featuring local fish and Red Stripe beer. Delicious.

With Joel aboard and relegated by me to sleeping in the settee bunk, we headed back tothe Baths at Virgin Gorda for hiking the wilderness trail up the mountain side to the local Chico's outlet and exploring the large sea side boulder and coral reef formations. Joel is a national class masters swimmer with bad knees, so he occupied himself with swimming back and forth to Gustie and the beach while the rest of us hiked. The shortest way back to the dingy, which was moored on a buoy 100 yards or so off shore, was to swim several hundred yards off the coral reefs. Sporting my Teva sandals instead of flippers, I soon exhausted myself (fortunately Lynn and Steve, though similarly encumbered, did not). I took refuge atop a subsurface coral reef and stood there balancing against the waves until Steve and Lynn made it back to the dingy and came to my rescue. Fun if not frightening.

We then headed to another Virgin Gorda harbor for the night and dinner and then on to Savanna, also at Virgin Gorda in search of the BVIs most expensive restaurant which we found. Captain Steve’s anchoring was masterful, managing to hook the anchor chain at right angles around two coral outcroppings. Our snorkeling here was tops, both around Gustie and the next morning off shore. Joel chose to swim to shore rather than ride in the dingy. All was well until he swam over and hit several patches of Fire Coral which turned his skin to red pulp for a time.

After an interesting and expert anchor rewind we headed out for several hours of sailing off the Tortola coast, returning to Trellis Bay for the third time for a final dinner ashore.On each of our visits to Trellis Bay, we had numerous “ST” or sea turtle sightings which cuts down on the skinny dipping. Notwithstanding the ST threat, the ladies one buoy in front of us really offended the men aboard Gustie by showering nude off their stern. I for one got a sore neck averting my gaze.

Sunday morning after a French toast Joel prepared breakfast aboard Gustie, we said ourgoodbyes to Lynn and Gustie and Captain Steve delivered us back to BBI International for our flight back to Puerto Rico and further adventures (which can’t be recounted here due to their profane nature -- suffice it to say that the PR government, which is bankrupt, went on strike on 5/1, the day after we arrived). Joel and I returned home 5/3 tired, but with lots of good memories of a great time in the BVIs shown us by Lynn and Steve aboard Gustie.

Cruising Yachties Under Assault by Bob

Lynn and I were stuck in a marina in Tortola for 5 days last week waiting for generator parts. We certainly missed our almost daily snorkeling adventures. So we bugged out and headed for St. John as soon as the repairs were completed (Which is another story--suffice it to say that tomorrow we head back to, guess where, Tortola  because the generator isn't working right after all). In any event, we were anxious to jump in the water this morning to see if we remember how to snokle. We were anxious, that is until be noticed Bob lurking under our boat.

Lynn has wanted to have a boat pet so, as it turns out, she now has one. Bob is a 30-inch barracuda with about 400 teeth that he likes to show off. He has made the underside of the boat his home. We were about to jump in the water, fins on and all that stuff, when we noticed Bob. We quickly left the swim platform to consult our handy fish book to see how much danger we were in. It turns out that the book must have been written by an ex-lawyer because it equivocates like hell. Like "the barracuda is USUALLY a docile fish that is USUALLY not inclined to injure swimmers." Oh, thanks a lot, that sure helps. There was also stuff in the book about barracudas being real nice unless provoked. I suppose me trying to chase off Bob with our boat hook might be construed as provocative, at least in barracudaville. Did I mention that Bob likes to hang out at he back of the boat, where we jump in, and that he likes to stare at us (from about 3 or 4 inches under the water) and size us up for his next meal? After our less than fully reassuring study, we were about to give up on going into the water but then we realized that it was about 90 degrees and that we would die from heat prostitution if we gave into Bob's demand that we stay away from (at least the underside) of "his" boat. We finally agreed that we wouldn't give into a terrorist, so we said our prayers and jumped in. Needless to say, that after causing us much mental anguish, Bob gave us a reprieve and let us do our thing.

It's a Beautiful Morning

It's a beautiful morning on the island of St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands. It's 8am and 88 degrees. That probably sounds hot to you but its quite nice right now because there is a nice cool breeze blowing and we have a little cloud cover (the cloud cover will probably be gone in another hour or so). We are is a beautiful little bay called Leinster Bay. It's one of my two favorite bays. In the U.S. Virgin Islands, many of the designated anchorages have a "bay host". Basically they are people that live year round on a boat and act as goodwill ambassadors to cruising yotties like us. In any event, the bay host here is Kathy. She lives on a lovely schooner with her husband and her dog. The husband teaches school on St. John. Kathy gives him a ride in the dinghy each day to a place where the Park Service lets him keep a car. The dog, Hope, loves to ride around in the front of the dinghy and wears a scarf around her neck that designates her as a deputy volunteer.

Leinster Bay is lovely because on one side you have St. John. It is lovely because we can't see any development. Nothing. Just beautiful green trees on hillsides with cactus interspersed. I don't know how the cactus does so well on these slopes that obviously get adequate rain, but there are many things out here that are uniquely wonderful and strange. On the other side of the boat I can see four islands of varying heights. They are to the west so when the sun goes down they get misty and yellow/orange/gold. They look slightly mysterious. I want to break out singing "Some Enchanted Evening" or "Bali Hai" from South Pacific. No kidding!

The waters here teem with life. We are almost constantly witnessing a 3-sided spectacle. There are millions and millions of iridescent minnows in the water. Then there are various fish that come in schools to feed on them. The fish are 8 to 10 inches long. I don't know what they are but I call them "blue runners" because they have a blue stripe an the upper side  of their flank. Anyway, the blue runners start to crash into the minnows from below and start eating with glee. This forces the minnows to come closer to the surface and then the terns (and sometimes pelicans) swarm in and start picking off the minnows from above.  Like I said, this is quite the spectacle. Sometimes this takes place within 25 feet of the boat. Sometimes the fish come right out of the ocean when they are scooping up minnows.

Life is good. Our generator is generating. I'm in the nice cool cockpit typing away. Lynn is suffering from an attack of ambition. She is below decks cleaning and dusting her cute little heart out. The iPod is playing some cool music. We will go snorkeling a little later. There is also great snorkeling in this bay. Kathy told us about an area where the starfish have congregated. We will check that out.

Lynn and I have become fish. Joel gave Lynn a pair of swimming goggles. She now looks and acts like Esther Williams. We now swim for exercise. I can't believe how far we can now swim without getting tired. When we got here yesterday afternoon we went for a long swim. We relaxed in the cockpit while drinking Red Stripes and while we watched the minnow/fish/tern phenomena discussed above. Then showers and gin and tonics for sundowners. I cooked shrimp on the grill. It was a good day.

Lynn says:  Steve is right, we swim like fish.  I do the elementary back stroke mixed in with my new stroke.  I don't know the name of it but I lie on my back with my feet flipping and my arms straight as I stoke them backwards.  I must have learned these strokes at CYC swimming lessons when I was a tot.  I really don't remember doing them since.  But, they get me from mooring ball to mooring ball in good time.

We are now criminals as we didn't go through immigration and customs when we retuned to the BVIs the other day to get more repairs done.  I suppose we were illegal aliens for awhile.  We also stayed overnight at a mooring designated only for day use.  That was in the bay in which we hung out naked as we were quite alone.  Only Bob, our pet baracuda, was in attendance on the side of the boat. Come to think of it, maybe the folks in charge of the national park sent him over to scare us away. 
Bob was a good fellow and didn't eat us as we swam.

Last night I told my friend Jeannie that we would be grilling shrimp for dinner.  She wanted to know if we bought the critters from someone selling them on the side of our boat.  I sheepishly told her we bought them frozen from a market.  But, they were tasty nonetheless!

We've met some very nice people as we've sailed... as many Europeans as Americans.  We are especially fond of a Dutch couple. Adrian and Bonnie had quite a medical scare a couple weeks ago.  Steve met Adrian on the dock in Road Town.  He was on his way to visit Bonnie while she was hospitalized.  Her leg had swelled up to twice its size and had angry red welts in spots and she had a high fever.  She was diagnosed with cellulitis, probably from a bug bite or scrape that became infected.  The predicament Adrian expressed to Steve was how to handle her medical care.  The hospital in Road Town was filthy and he was worried about further contamination.  After talking to their doctor in Holland, Adrian felt a little better because the same medical protocol would have been
followed in their country as was being done here.  Later Bonnie told us that there was no soap available, therefore the doctors didn't wash between patients.  She was in a room with 25 other men and women with short partitions between.  The hand crank beds were rusty and the call buttons hadn't worked for years.  There was only one shower for the 25 patients and the head had come off the spigot, so the water fell down towards the wall as if coming from a garden hose.  The shower had nothing on which to steady yourself except for the one very loose faucet.  The other faucet was missing its handle.  Only one wheelchair was available to all 50 patients so sometimes Adrian used an office chair on castors to get Bonnie back and forth.  The nursing staff was curt and after Bonnie's IV
was started late once too many times, she had a talk with the supervisor and insisted that the woman be the one in charge of her IV.  Bonnie was the only white person in the hospital and we surmise that most visitors fly to either Puerto Rico or Florida for hospital care.  Although Bonnie and Adrian have US visas it would have been dangerous to Bonnie's health to fly.  While she recovers, they are sailing none-stop from St. John to Trinidad and then onto Venezuela where they will keep their boat over the summer and fall.  We hope to catch up to them next year.

I have to finish my cleaning so I'll say farewell for now.  Stay well and enjoy Spring!

Random Notes and Observations After Living in a 42-Foot Capsule for Four Months

Heat--Our world seldom varies from between 80 and 90 degrees. If someone had told me that it would be 80 degrees at 7am and go north from there, I would have expressed concern that would be too hot for a Minnesota boy. Well, we have not only learned to live with the heat, but we have embraced it wholeheartedly.  In fact, Lynn and I now complain if it's less than 85 degrees. The hottest part of the day is from about 4:30-6:00pm. The last sun of the day is hot, hot, hot! Our strategy is to spend much of that time in the water. When the sun goes down (currently about 6:45pm--no daylight savings time here in the Atlantic Time Zone) it immediately cools off significantly. By the time we have dinner, it's too cool (80 degrees) to eat in the cockpit; the upper settee in the pilothouse is just right. Sleeping takes place on top of the sheets until about 3 am. The temp then drops to an alarmingly low 77 degrees. The top sheet then serves to stave off the frostbite.

Things I Miss--Addy (a/k/a Gumbo), my kids (specifically including my daughter-in law and son-in law), regular contact with Tim, Burt and Mel, the Saturday morning group, condo people, Diet Dr. Pepper, Famous Dave's ribs, Pad Thai Cafe egg rolls, our trash chute at the condo (trash disposal is a pain in the neck out here), and biking.

Things I Don't Miss--Minnesota, snow (we had coffee on a Dutch boat the other morning. They had a picture of their home in Holland showing everything covered with snow. My immediate thought was "who on earth would want to live in such a cold and forbidding place?"), practicing law, TV, news, driving, and Starbucks.

Cruising Companion--Don't' even think about jumping in to this life unless you are absolutely crazy about your cruising companion. I have been fortunate because Lynn and I have always been close but this life has brought us even closer than I could have ever imagined. The best part of it is that she makes every day (well, almost every day) fun and exciting. I don't know how she does that after 38 years except to say that I have been truly blessed. To illustrate, Lynn and I have gotten in the habit of holding hands when we snorkel. Not all the time, but often. Corny? Sure. Priceless? Absolutely.

Costs--Grocery food and restaurants are very expensive. Liquor is dirt cheap. A bottle of premium gin is $13. Rum is $6 a bottle. Cigarettes (Lynn's vice) are 1/3 the cost of the U.S. Cigars (my vice), though, are frightfully expensive; at least $10 per cigar. That prices me out of the market.

Dolphins--Where the heck are they? We have seen a grand total of 1 dolphin in the BVIs. And that was in a busy harbor which kinda spoils the effect.

Sea Turtles--They're everywhere. Have they eaten the dolphins?

Snorkeling/Swimming--We spend so much time in the water that we have become much stronger swimmers.

Trellis Bay--When you fly into the BVIs you land at the Beef Island Airport. It is a really cute little airport. The cool thing is that you can leave the airport and walk to the dinghy dock at Trellis Bay in 5 minutes. If you have a good host, your sailboat will be moored right there in Trellis Bay and off you go.

Anchoring--Sounds easy, doesn't it! Naw!  Usually there are bunch of other boats around you in the anchorage and you don't want to be too close to them. So you drop your anchor and then put of 100 to 200 feet of chain. When the boat drifts  back on the chain you expect that you will be at point A but you find that you are really at point M. Then, if you decide you can live with point M after all, you have to wait 10 minutes to let your chain straighten out and your anchor to wiggle into the sea
bottom. If you pull back (using your engine, of course) too soon, you just drag the damn anchor and you end up at point Q. So, you tap your foot until 10 minutes has elapsed and then you put the engine in reverse to force the damn anchor to really dig in well in the sea bottom. This is another chance for the damn anchor to drag so you are now at point W next to a boat with a bunch of French people giving you the evil eye for getting too close and/or for not looking like you know what you are doing. So, after all this, lets say you are dug in and you can, after all, live and let  live at point W (evil eyed French people notwithstanding). It's now the middle of the night and the wind shifts 180 degrees. So you have now nicely swung around and instead of being at point W in 30 feet of water, you are  now  at point Z in 10 feet of water (the keel of the boat is 6 feet).The big problem is that point Z is 10 feet from coral heads that would love to eat the bottom of your boat. Oh, did I
mention that when the wind swung 180 degrees it also trebled in intensity? You can now hear the waves pounding on the shore. You also know that if your anchor does drag now, you only have about 1 minute to get your boat out of danger (what this means is that you are screwed any way you cut it). At a minimum, sleep is now out of the question so you spend all night wondering where all the dolphins have gone.

Bedtime--Speaking of sleep, I have at terrible admission to make.  When sleep is possible (i.e. you have paid $25 to be tied to a mooring ball) it comes early after a full day of sun, wind, sailing, snorkeling and gin and tonics. Like 9:30pm. Exciting, huh?

Communications--We expected to get lots of e-mails from all of you. Hasn't happened. Out of sight, out of mind???

Cruising Essentials--Gin and tonics. Ice (for gin and tonics). Freezer (for ice for gin and tonics). IPod/Bose music system (for gin and tonic time). Hot showers (for after swimming). Water maker (for water for hot showers). Affirmations from friends and family that we're really not that crazy for doing this. Greg Foster and Frenchie McDonald for managing our limited resources so that we can continue to do this. Sense of humor.

Tentative Conclusion--This cruising life had clearly exceeded my expectations. I am grateful to God for allowing me the privelege of living this life on the water, and for giving me the ideal cruising partner to do this with.

Still Mostly Smooth Sailing

Steve and I are still roaming around the BVIs and enjoying our lazy days.  Earlier this week we took our dinghy over to the beach on Benere's Bay to scrub off the green scum on its bottom.  That requires that we remove the motor and hoist it onto the rocks on the beach.  While Steve was scrubbing and I was reading, along came a couple strolling towards us.  During our chat with them, we discovered that they along with their two teenage boys have been circumnavigating the world for the past two years.  They home school the children and Laura, the mom, said it takes a great deal of energy.  Their seventeen year old, Matthew, hopes to get into Annapolis a year from now.  He has studied science from a CD and the teacher on the recording is top-notch.  I can see that home
schooling needs lots of coordination.  For instance, they bought a physics book in expensive South Africa and then found out that Matthew first needed to study trigonometry before tackling Physics.  Matthew and Paul enjoyed their big trip but, listen to this, only ran into six kids during the two-year span.  While we were roosting on Benere's Bay the day before, a two large sail boats anchored.  The teenagers on board swam likes sharks and would have been probably been great with Paul and Matthew had they arrived already.  Besides chatting about the children, Laura and I delved into a woman's favorite conversation topics: childbirth, cellulite and menopause.  We had to touch on these subjects as neither of us sees other women regularly. To make their dream possible, they sold
their house and other holdings in Virginia.  After sailing the BVIs they will return home to earn some money for the kid's education.  We really enjoyed our hour with Laura, Bill, Matthew and Paul.

Another delicious hour was spent yesterday with a lovely couple from Holland.  A blonde man arrived on the side of Gustie in his dinghy and after a short conversation invited us onto their sailboat for coffee.  The man introduced himself as Woolfkung.  Of course there were some other sounds or burps intertwined with the Woolfkung pronunciation.  Steve and I spent a while trying to get his name out of our mouths and for some reason, once he told us he shares his first name with Mozart, we were more adept at pronouncing it the Dutch way. Before we left to gab with the Dutch, we called Danielle to find out how to greet them in their native language.  Danielle studied Dutch a UW-Madison for a semester before she declared Russian as her major.  She gave us the greeting and I
mumbled it non-stop as we dinghied over.  I told Wolf and his wife to bear with me as I gurgled and hoiked out the greeting.  Amazingly, they knew what I said!  I thought they would make a big deal over my attempt at politeness but what really got their attention is the fact that Danielle had studied Dutch.  Wolf mentioned it to us three times. They have been sailing for two years with short trips back to Holland to visit their children and parents.  The woman (whose name we never gathered, although she told us twice) apparently put her foot down and from now on they will be home six months and sailing the other six.  Their sailboat was roomy but not as bright as Gustie.  They don't have a water maker or a freezer.  They don't mind stopping in ports for water but miss a
freezer.  We all agreed that Europeans don't need ice as much as Americans so it was vital for us to have a freezer and just optional for them.  What's-her-name had recently bought a sewing machine (are you reading this Barb Foss?) in the Caribbean and was making a navy blue, canvas cover for their anchor.  It occurred to me that I, too, could sew useful items. Then it dawned on me that I used to sew quite a bit, but cursed my way through facings and darts. It was anger sewing, a challenging but not restful hobby.  I think I would be more inclined to try meditation or yoga.

Today we leave Marina Cay and will tottle over to Village Key Marina in Road town.  I deplore staying in marina slips but Gustie's generator needs some fine tuning.  I'll have some wash done in their reasonably priced laundromat and we will wash the boat and polish her stainless steel fittings. We have been cooking dinners all week to make up for all the meals we ate out with Joel and John.  When in Road Town we will eat at a local spot called C & F that serves great Caribbean food.

Joel Peskay, if you're reading this, please know that I am thrilled with the goggles you gave me.  Joel is a national masters swimming champ and while here, he gifted me his favorite goggles to enable me to backstroke longer without damaging my eyes.  When I snorkel in my full-body wet suit I look just like Ursula Andres and now when I swim, I look just like Esther Williams.  There is no end to my imagination.

To everyone who has emailed us notes, thank you very much.  We are too lazy to respond but hope you read our blog entries.  To our sons in Colorado, keep catching the trout.  Beck, you are the best daughter-in-law and I know you and Steven will enjoy your trip to California next week.  To Danielle, we hope you enjoyed the sunny farmer's market yesterday.  To all of you, Steve and I send our best!

Psychlaw Guys on Gustie

Happy May Day!

Right now I'm sitting on our back deck with the laptop, where it belongs ... on my lap!  Gentle waves are lapping against our dinghy and the sun is just a bit hazy.  It's about 2 PM and already I'm into the sauce; Steve just brought me a Red Stripe beer, which is intended to make my blarney all the more colorful!  There is always a good reason to drink!

Steve is in an investment club with three other guys.  Joel and Roger are psychologists and John and Steve are lawyers.  Therefore, they call their group Psychlaw.  Every year they take a trip together paid by their stock earnings from the previous year.  In the past, they have biked around the big island in Hawaii, rafted the Grand Canyon, biked and kayaked around the San Juan Islands and biked in the MS Tram.  The MS trip is in our home state and they do that when their earnings are paltry.  This year the four of them planned to spend a week on Gustie.  Roger couldn't make it so in essence, I took his place.  John came aboard last Sunday and Joel arrived last Thursday.  Before Joel got here, the three of us sailed to Anegada.  The BVIs are mountainous but Anegada breaks the rule by being a flat island.  It reminds me of the desert islands in cartoons.  It's decked out in palm trees and green foliage with bouganvilla thrown in for good measure.  The water around the island is
exquisite because it's ringed in reefs.  I suppose it could be described as a kaleidoscope of turquoise. The down-side of the reefs is that the approach is VERY shallow, especially for a mono hull with a six foot keel. We tip-toed Gustie through the water and had the experience of grounding
her in the sand twice.  Because Steve was moving Gustie very slowly, it was easy to get her off the sand.  I found the whole event exciting but our new passenger, John, just about dirtied his pants. We anchored in about seven feet of water and she held steady for the two days we were there.

During our stay, we took a jitney to one of the best of beaches and saw turtles, a few fish and a lobster.  The snorkeling didn't beat St. John as far as fish sightings but the beach was a beaut. After paddling around in the water we knew a lunch in the beachside restaurant would top our outing.  Between the three of us, we had $54 in our pockets.  Before we ordered, we pooled our $$$ and figured the bill for our crab cake salads would be under the amount of our walking around money.
To be on the safe side we shared a coke.  Much to our surprise and eventual chagrin, the bill came to exactly what we were carrying with us! We are such funny folks.  One evening we ate at the Anegada Reef Hotel and feasted on tender lobsters.  The next night we dined at the Neptune's Treasure and I ate wahoo for the first time.  It was enormous and I almost ate the whole thing! We all agreed that Anegada was a huge hit and I can't wait to take our kids there next year.  Our son, Nate and son-in-law Nathan, will like bone fishing on the reefs. 

By the way, we ran into two young guys from the Netherlands who were smoking and drinking in a beach bar.  They were fishing the reefs on their own because to hire a guide it would have cost $650/day.  One of the guys was covered in colorful tattoos.  Because I know how important it is to keep the butterfly tattoo on my neck covered with sun screen to maintain its color I was wondering how he was coping.  He of red hair and very white skin (I'm kind of guessing at his normal skin color) was very busy casting and coating!

Joel and John were great guests. We talked, swam, snorkeled and ate like troopers. One night we were at the Last Resort for dinner and music. The band leader (the band was very hip and British) had me and a few others get on stage and say what we did in our "other" lives.  I said that until two months ago I worked for an AIDS organization.  A very sexy British woman introduced herself after me and said she worked doing voice-overs for lesbian porno films.  Perfect! I have to get the hang of bar life.  We each were given a tequilla shot when we were done giving our audience our BS.

Back to Joel ... Joel was raised in the Bronx and regaled us with tales from his youth.  He brought us a large, dark chocolate candy bar, which I enjoyed as much as a kid getting a sugar treat during the Great Depression.  He left behind a New Yorker for my reading enjoyment and we laughed when we realized it was the very same issue Danielle and Nathan had left behind two weeks before. The cool thing about that particular issue is that it had a review about a non-fiction book I had just read (courtesy of Danielle) about French Gypsies and their music.  What a literary convergence!  We said goodbye to our latest guests yesterday afternoon and they are now spending a few days in Puerto Rico at The Conquistador.

Later yesterday, Steve and I anchored outside of Marina Cay.  We spent the morning doing wash at Pusser's Resort in an outside laundromat, surrounded by the kind of foliage sold at Bachman's in small pots. The resort was almost deserted as it's off-season and it has the feel of the 1930s.  Excluding the washing machines, although they were old, I felt like I was in an old novel.  I loved it!

While I was putting away the laundry, Steve fixed a leak under our kitchen sink.  We are hoping his repair does the trick as its hard to get to the plumbing.  Unbeknownst to me before we started sailing, I married a handy guy.  I guess home repairs aren't as compelling as those on Gustie.  We are finding sailing to be exciting and my pre-sailing butterflies have turned into healthy adrenaline. The last night John was here, he told us he was impressed with Steve's sailing know-how.  Steve has always read a lot about sailing and learned so much from Jerry on the way down here from Florida.  He isn't a fool and takes things slowly.  The learning curve is high and a fool could sink this ship easily.

I am running out of typing steam and will next start a West Indies-style lamb stew originally created by a woman from Belgium and taken from a cookbook written by a Brit.  I will make Jasmine rice with currants to serve alongside.

Steve and I wish we could have a good dose of our friends and family.  We hear that Addy, the beautiful, has two teeth and along with her loud babbling, is getting on her haunches in preparation for crawling.  Danielle told us that Nathan, the brilliant, also got the same scholarship offer from Hamline University that William Mitchell gave him.  Nathan will start law school at Mitchell sometime in August.  Lee Haugee is proud of her brand-new grand son, Liam, and driving all night from Minneapolis to Indianapolis, arrived in time for his birth.  Congratulations to Molly and Sean Conley, the esteemed parents!  Our son, Steven and father of Addy-the-beautiful will arrive in Colorado and spend time with our darling son Nathan this coming weekend.  Becky and Steve entertained a friend from Switzerland in their home last weekend.  Our friend Nancy Winter bravely battled two 8 inch rats a couple weeks ago and eventually came out on top.  They had traveled into her house via a vent left open during a construction project.  This would only happen to Nancy because she is so negative about pets.

Hey, I'm starting to babble and ramble.  Know we are well and starting to read AA literature.  Take care of your fine selves!