ssb when waiting for southbound Herb, then we met in Bermuda and toured
together.
We are back together here in St Martin, they via the BVIs and I via
Anguilla.
About a week ago I was sitting on their boat having the sundowner, when I
noticed some writing on the window of their boat in reverse, something about
laurie's head and a tally under with two strokes.
"What is that writing?"
"We keep a tally of how many days since Laurie last hit his head on the
boat", Dawn replied. "It is no problem for me". (dawn in about 5'3", I don't
know what that is in stones or whatever unit the locals might use ;-)
Laurie went on : "I hit my head constantly moving from cabin to cabin on the
boat, sometimes so hard I see stars. One time Dawn came in and found me on
the floor in the fetal postion. I had hit my head so hard that I had to take
a little nap on the cabin sole"
I saw that it had been two days since Laurie last hit his head.
"What is your record for safe intra-boat movement, Laurie?"
"You are looking at it, tow days and counting".
Well last night, new years eve, I looked and saw a new record for Laurie, 4
days and counting. I am afraid to look this morning because they were having
Ti punch with friends on New Yars eve, and I think his new record was on
borrowed time.
Paul, Joanne, and Valerie (PJV) just left and Dana just arrived. I had a
great time with PJV, and you could not ask for a better group of guests.
Every time I turned around, they were cooking or cleaning or Paul was fixing
something. When the going got tough and we had a VERY rolly night off of
Saba, everyone kept their spirits up and the next morning began a fine fine
day of sailing. This is an accomplishment for those who got little or no
sleep. Valerie gets kudos for being a good shipmate even though she never
seemed to miss her sleep.
Her ability to sleep through noise and motion was the envy of all. Most
nights it rains for a while, so when you feel wet, you have to get up and
close the hatches, ans later, when you get hot, you have to get up and open
them. You get used to it. Valerie could sleep through driving rain and
stifling heat in a rolling boat, no problem. One night, when getting up to
close the hatch in the main cabin where Valerie slept, I accidently knocked
my hardcover book from my bunk flat on the floor - WAP. (Freud may have read
into this, but I believe it was an accident). I thought "that will wake her,
and she will close the hatch". No such luck. We teased her about it to the
piont that later in the trip she started dreaming that she needed to get up
and close the hatch. A 42 boat is tight quarters for 4, but I miss having
them here, and hope they can come again.
We made it to several harbors in St Martin, did some kiting, sailed to St
Barth's, Statia, and Saba, then back in time for their flight. These are
very cool islands and I will write more about them later.
BTW - While in St Barth's, we were in the process of leaving Baz Bar after a
night of dancing when Jimmy Buffet showed up and played a few songs. The
rumor was that he was going to play New Year's eve, but it was too much
trouble to get there and back with the flight schedules. Maybe he will show
up at the next full moon party, as he has been known to do.
ttyl
