Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Day 157

Last night when I was up at 2 the wind had died down and the boat was fairly still, but this morning we were rolling again. We chatted with Say Yes who was similarly unhappy last night and decided to not bother going ashore and we’d head out this morning. But in the mean time Papa decided to tell us that our alternator hadn’t been putting out anything all day yesterday! We played around with that for a while but couldn’t find the problem.

Around 11 we headed out and were doing a short stunt to Shroud Cay (pronounced ‘key’ btw). It seemed like we had only gotten the sails up and trimmed before we were taking them down and heading into Shroud. It was a gorgeous and there were mooring balls to tie up to. We got settled and played some more with the alternator (which was only putting out 25A when it should be putting out 70A!)

We eventually decided to go ashore and explore. It was calm here but we wanted OFF of the boat! We dingyed around and found a little cove to explore. It was low tide and the marine life was soo neat =]. We found starfish, conch, hermit crabs, sand crabs and some sort of underwater white caterpillar. Then there was all the coral and the mangroves!

Once we were through exploring there (a big rain cloud overhead and the still outgoing tide made us nervous) we headed back towards the boat and noticed Dave and Wendy over on a little beach where we joined them. The rock here is VERY coarse and sharp and we scaled some what appeared to be steps where we found a sign that read <-WELL. Of course we went to explore, all of us forgetting the past 24h. The terrain here with all the coarse rock and the mangroves was like, as Wendy commented, was like walking on the moon! We made our way to the salt flats where there was fine sand and salt and from there we followed a little creek where we met some boaters. 3 guys from the Beneteau that came in shortly after us, the owner of the boat, his son and his brother. Apparently they live just across lake Erie from us back home.
Papa and I decided to cross the little creek and we noticed a channel bouy sitting high and dry on a sand bar lol. I decided before we left to leave my shoes behind in the dingy but with the coarse rock Papa had decided to wear his crocks...well the mud bottom on the far side of the creek was like a suction cup and Papa lost one crock, fished it out and then lost the other and ended up very wet and had a muddy butt by the time he got the 2nd one out lol.
When we got back to the beach we explored the shallow sand bar at low tide and all along the sides of some rock was very young coral starting to grow. It was neat and I got a few pics =].
Eventually (not very willingly but we were exhausted) we went back to the boat and we just got nicely onboard when WINDSWEPT motored up to the mooring ball next to us! And when we looked around we saw Brandaris tied to a mooring ball just off our starboard quarter! With the gang back together we HAD to have a happy hour and hear about the crossings and tell about our anchoring up at Normans. Brenda wasn’t very happy and was going to pass but Dave got on the VHF and coaxed her to come and relax. Apparently they had the same crossing as us and hearing that Grama and I were just as upset as she was made her feel a bit better I think =]. Her big comment as was ours was We would NOT sail in this at home why the **** would we do it on vactation!!! Bob on the other hand *rolls eyes* had a GREAT DAY!! If you know Bob you wont be surprised but I swear he NEVER has a bad day lol. He is always high on life and today was soo much fun for him lol. Margret was made for Bob I think because she was sitting there trying to get him to hush about the great day as we were all glaring lol but she had just as much fun as he did. By the time everyone went home (lol it seems weird typing home still but that is what our boats are now) we were all in better moods (after today I was in a GREAT mood lol) and even Brenda had a little smile on.
Niki

1 comment:

Sammeh said...

ooers
:]
glad that it was better for you that day
and you totally pronounce cay has 'kay' not key >> I can't see it
and lol
crocs.
xD
ily♥