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2007 Monday JVD
2007-03-08

We got up Monday morning and it was blowing. Lots of winds and a nice northerly cross swell I knew there were going to be issues both on my boat and on thiers. As I would find out later, they already had a bit of excitment during the night. Sometime in the wee hours of the morning Ken heard a pop and was smart enough to check out what it was. The pop turned out to be an improperly tied know that let go in the blow. The knot lead to the mooring ball which was holding the boat in position which they now were no longer attached too. Oops... Then he tried to start the engine with both fuel cut offs pulled oun... Oops again...
Calling on every pirate movie he'd ever seen I guess he screamed all hands on deck. The all hands included two very naked guys who made it all the way up to the main deck before they realized Um opps again... Ken finally realized that the cut offs were out, got the engines started and they managed to tie up again, this time using the if you can't tie good knots, tie a lot of them theory of mooring. We woke up with them right were they started and never knew about the excitement until they told us.
I decided not to have breakfast. I don't usually get sick but don't always handle it well when others do. This looked liek a day where someone could. I was a bit nervous, it looked like the 20 to 30 knot winds were going to be right off the stern and these Cats have huge mains. I could just imagine accidently jibing one of those suckers and taking out the rig... No thanks.
I advised the other boat that they could sail if they wanted, but I was going to motor and so we did. it was about 18 miles down the back side of Tortola to Jost Van Dyke. The motor was uneventful except for a few sea turtle sightings and the other boat losing oil pressure in one engine so they had to shut it down. We called service for them and they said they'd meet us at White Bay. We reduced speed and stayed close in case the other one decided to quit too. It didn't.
Navigation is easy in the BVI's. You just need to keep track of what island your passing and life goes on... well unless you get seasick easy. M.E on our boat and three of the green crew literally were green. To celebrate, I had a beer.
I was really concerned about the notherly swell. A lot of the anchorages just aren't usable in a northerly because the waves wrap around the cliffs and make any activity like riding a horse that doesn't want to be ridden. I was glad I left early and we had options.
We passed Sandy Cay, the island that is always in the magazies. You know the one, ble, ble water, white sandy beach a few palm trees... It was too rough to anchor so we went by. The nearest harbor at little Jost was a mess of waves. No help there. We passed Little Harbor and it was flat. I told my folks that this was our plan B in case White Bay was too awful. it was...
White Bay is beautiful. The beach is maybe a mile long and there are lots of great bars and a nice reef for snorkeling. The last time we were there it was quite relaxing. Not this time. The waves were breaking over the reef and the beach had silted in. The only two open moorings would have pounded us to pieces. I didn't realize this until we were inside. Now there was very little room to maneuver and very little time to get out. On top of that M.E. dropped th eboat pole tring to snag a mooing in all this mess and it was our only way to snag the moorings. She managed to grab it and we got the hell out of Dodge, shaken but not bowed... We trudged back to Little Harbor and peace.
As soon as we were tied up, people began buzzing us in dingys. Sidneys Peace and Love barbeque. Captains eat free... Free round of drinks... Come to Harris's place free moorings plus waht Sidney offered. We grabbed all the offers, had a cold drink and rested.
The ladies and I were hungry so so we took the dingy in to Harris's for lunch. it was run by a lady from New Jersey who would have stood on her head to get a sale. The food turned out to be good and the drinks cold. We made reservations to come back for dinner.
After lunch we decided to walk the seven hills to Foxy's. If it was just M.E and I it would have taken maybe a half hour, but Claudette is not a walking machine and these hills (one mountain) were steep and we kept having to stop. 45 minutes later we rounded the bend and got a table. Cold beer was just what the doctor ordered. To be continued....

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