Sunday, February 12, 2012 Lucaya

Today was definitely a day of rest!

After my final email yesterday, my head hit the pillow around 4-5 pm and I slept until 2:30am. Then something nudged me as being unfinished and I woke myself up remembering that I left my computer on and a game was running…I shut it off, then sank back into oblivion until 8:00 this morning. The winds were howling and the halyard was slapping against the mast. It felt cold and I thought, man I should have thrown the covers on the bed. So like any good first mate, I grabbed the blanket off the floor, near the berth. I’d thrown it there while looking at the mess in the berth after the hammock holding various supplies broke during our merry ride yesterday. The supplies were still in the berth and we’d slept with them piled around our feet (I think they kept our feet warm through the night). Now I had covers up over us and the snuggling was good. So I went back to sleep for another hour before getting up to make coffee and some orange sweet rolls to go with the coffee. I wasn’t really feeling like a home body but had an ulterior motive to heat up the cabin with the little alcohol oven. The orange rolls were a double bonus…I got heat, a good smelling boat and sweet rolls to go with the coffee. I considered running over to Azaya to see if they wanted some but thought – Heck if they were as groggy as us, they’d still be sleeping. Plus it was too cold and windy to run across the dock in my pajamas…hmm looking down at myself I realized I’d slept in the same clothes I’d had on all day yesterday. Sigh… I was realllllly tired.

After Wayne got up, and I got his one eyed grunt good morning, we chatted and had coffee and rolls and wondered how cold it was here. Brrrr…. At least it’s warmer here than where we’d left. At least I told myself that as I was shivering… I asked Wayne if he was sure that he’d filled the water tanks because when I turned on the water pump, it sounded empty and no water came out… oh ohhh….he’s going to have to take a look at that.

Mary and Axel came by a little while later (unfortunately those rolls were really good and gone by the time they got here) and we were chatting about yesterday’s events. Half way through the night their auto helm had broken and they’d lost steering until Axel had gone down and disconnected it. It sounded harrowing and I’m glad he didn’t get hurt while trying to disconnect it. He had to dismantle it from below while Mary was trying to steer a boat that didn’t want to steer… This had been when I’d seen them getting further away from us in the night. I’d thought maybe they were heading to West End or on a different course than we were (it happens sometimes) but it turned out that they’d had steerage problems. I know several times during the night, I’d thought about what it would have been like without our auto helm, but they actually had to steer in the rain and wind all night… ugh… sounded like we both had fun last night. Axel’s going to look at that today, and Wayne’s going to have to look at our water pump. It might be nothing more than a clogged filter or pinched tube from all the rocking and rolling we did.
After thinking about the events over the last 24 hours, Wayne and I were both glad that Klaus and Barbara didn’t make the trip with us. Between the winds and the crazy currents they would have fared much worse than we did. Azaya is a bit bigger and heavier than us and they had a wild ride. I couldn’t imagine being in a lighter boat than ours. It definitely would not have been fun. So Klaus and Barb - I’m glad you didn’t make it to Lake Worth to join us. I know if this would have been my first time crossing over to the Bahamas, I for one, wouldn’t do it again so someone was smiling down on you!

The rest of the day was kind of lazy for us. We stayed below most of the day playing cave dwellers. The winds were still howling (they’ve finally died down as I write this) most of the day and they were cold. We picked up most of the mess, cleaned up the dirt from all over the head. I’d forgotten about my aloe plants George and the juniors. They were scattered all over the sink and counter, so I had to salvage what dirt I could and replant George and the junior George aloes… They look a little beat up, but I think they’ll make it. Wayne discovered that the water pump hose had been pinched by some of his sodas and mixers that we store in the bilge. With all the rocking and rolling we’d done, the sodas had toppled onto the water pump hose and no water was getting to the pump. So he had an easy job and not a major one.

We did venture out to hit the showers. This was at low tide and our boat was about 2-3 feet below dock level. When it’s like this, it’s an adventure getting on and off the boat without getting dunked into the water. I’d forgotten how much I love floating docks and how much I really wished they’d had them here. Needless to say, it was fun trying to get back on the boat too.

So when Mary came by to see if we had the correct ratcheting wrench and to invite us over in a bit for some beers we took a rain check. Between the cold and the climb up and down from the dock to the boat (big tidal difference), we both decided to stay cave dwellers for the night.

It’s a good night to read and maybe do some more snuggling. Dang… The broken hammock over the bed is still in the bed…