What's Up in Nanny Cay

Roger here.

First I promise never again to publish such a long posting as my last.
Those who know me to keep busy may be wondering what I've been doing down here since Tuesday, especially without the ever entertaining Ilene the Lady ("lady" is much better than "woman"), who is nursing kitty back to good health. I'd like to say that I have been converted to Island Time, with its manana attitude, but that would be only about 1/3 right, so far.

There were receptions. The first was a warm "congratulations and welcome to paradise" from the rally organizer by VHF radio when we reported that we had crossed the finish line. then we were received by Customs who charged only $15 plus ten cents for each of the cards that each man had to fill out. This, done permitted us to haul down the yellow flag signifying "Q" for quarantine, and run up the BVI flag. A bottle of Korbel "Champagne" was given to each captain at Tuesday night's reception. The final nightly reception, Thursday, was the awards ceremony: a Caribbean 1500 pewter plate was presented to each boat and a good buffet dinner celebrated after the cocktail hours. There is room to engrave 'ILENE" on the plate and "first place"; just kidding about the latter.

Bob and Peter had left Wednesday and Dave left the boat for a hotel on Friday and for the states on Saturday. It is amazing how much room we have aboard without the three guys and their gear. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed and needed them, but the place seems roomy with most of Lene's stuff and the cats' stuff already aboard.

The days are warm and sunny, tee shirts and shorts, with the nights cool enough to want a top sheet if you sleep without pajamas. It rains about five times a day, causing me to run topsides to close the four big opening hatches that provide ventilation (by the luck of the draw, we are docked facing east -- facing the wind -- for good ventilation) but the rain usually lasts about three minutes and so far has not been heavy, just wind driven.

I have gone for a couple of swims from the small beach that they have created here and then sat in a chair under a palm frond covered shelter staring out at the water until I dried off before showering.

I had a friendly visit from Tom Anderson, a longstanding friend of Bob Osborn of Pandora. Tom knocked on the hull and requested permission to board. He had learned that ILENE was here in Nanny Cay from Bob's Blog. Knowing the distinctive look of ILENE from having sailed on Pandora, he walked the docks until he found us. I had never met him before; he gave me several tips on places to sail to and anchor in this area.

On Friday I sailed ILENE with Hans Mertins. He is a retired Canadian air traffic controller who Lene and I met at the course in Annapolis and again in Hampton. He owns a Saga 35, little sister to ILENE, that he wants to sail down here in next year's rally and mentioned that he had never sailed a 43. And of course I needed him to take her out of the Marina, well not to take her out but to back her up into her slip at the end of the sail. We went out for about five hours, beating east through Sir Francis Drake Chanel almost to The Baths and then broad reaching back. The channel is what might be called the "inland sea" of the BVIs if this was Japan. It is bounded to the north by Tortola, to the east by Virgin Gorda ("The Fat Virgin"), to the south by a whole chain of small islands and to the west by St. John, USVI. Hans crewed down here on Zafu, a J-44 (race boat) from Toronto. He is a good sailor.

I had also met another of Zafu's crew, Ed, at one of the receptions. Ed sought me out because he had heard that I knew and had raced with Julien Dougherty, my late son in law. Ed sails a Beneteau 36, like Julien's boat, in Rhode Island, and told me that Julien was his hero because he followed his racing dream and won! Ed is the fleet captain of his Club and we traded tips on Club cruises.

Finally, through Hans and Ed, I met Zafu's captain, Mike Scott, retired physician, from Canada. He told me that a Zafu is a Japanese meditation cushion. Saturday night I invited him aboard for a semi-home cooked meal. I have so much food left and it will eventually go bad if not eaten up. He is a Mark Twain look alike, but taller, and very soft spoken. We had chardonnay, tilapia crusted with pesto, ravioli, grilled onions and salad and I finally had a chance to break into that fruitcake which had survived the voyage, with proper Canadian tea (they put in the milk before the hot water!).

I also acquired a postcard and a stamp to mail to our granddaughter, Alexandra, who lives in Portland Oregon and may possibly be available for a week aboard this spring. And I did some marketing, for bread and fresh produce: expensive.

Bur mostly I do boat work -- not Tuesday or Wednesday -- then I just crashed and recovered from the passage and wrote the long blog posting and other emails. I have cleaned the boat's interior and exterior, obtained and installed the missing clevis pin, block and shackle; rebuilt the starboard traveler sheave (good thing I bought two instead of only the one I had needed); rebedded a leaky starboard side opening port; reattached the blocks for the auxiliary small jib sheets, hung the dinghy from elevated davits, took down the pole that permitted lots of wet foul weather gear to hang in the aft shower and repurposed it as a flagpole lashed to the radar arch, starboard side, remounted the 2 x 12, put anti microbial poison in the diesel fuel, etc. I also contacted ICOM, the SSB radio maker, to figure out whether the corrosion damage can be repaired and if not to order the new part, and contacted the vendor of the watermaker, which currently beeps "salinity probe failure" and will neither make fresh water not purge itself every five days, like it should. Thank goodness for Skype: one call was to the vendor/installer in Rhode Island, who tried a few things with me by phone and then referred me to the manufacturer in California. My call to him was shorter: he seemed to know what was wrong and said that there were several such failures of late and referred me to Lincoln, of Aqua Doc, who I walked 300 yards to meet. Lincoln is coming tomorrow with a replacement part. The repair requires him to crimp on the type of jack with which you plug a phone or computer into a wall.

So I'm not bored.