January 13, 2012

Friday, January 13, 2012

Wednesday and Thursday were somewhat of a catch up days, goofing around and just “being” in a place where things needed attention or we felt like being.  Wednesday Mary and Roy asked us to join them for lunch at Cheaters, yes, another bar and restaurant.  I had lobster again with the usual, peas and rice and macaroni and cheese.  I was mistaken about that new bridge I mentioned earlier.  It wasn’t the one what connected in Georgetown going into Victoria Lake, the new one was connecting Crab Cay to Great Exuma.  It was really pretty, seemed a bit out of place and pretty fancy for this area.  I am glad they found the funds to do this.  I don’t know much about Crab Cay but I did see a check point from the water to get on to Crab Cay by car.  So there must be something over there.  On the way back to the boat, Fred and I took a detour and went to the end of an island to check it out.  I found at least 30 sand dollars and lots of sea fans.  Someone asked me if I saw any coral but I wasn’t looking for that.  It was a fun afternoon outing. 

Thursday, Mary came by the boat in her dink and asked me if I was interested in going ashore to the volleyball beach with her to play Mexican train dominoes.  Roy was napping and Fred was getting ready to go into town.  It took me about 1 minute to grab my hat and crocks.  Off we went.  I was anxious to get off the boat anyway.  I did and I also won twice.  The good thing about playing here is that there are no rules.  That’s great for me.  I can hardly figure out when it is my turn.  I can’t wait to teach this to my friends at home, no rules of course.  I think they will like it.   Dee and Pete invited us over last evening.  I really like them.  Dee is the first person I met, became close to and traveled with since we started.  I met her on New Years Eve.   We have done some fun things together, shared stores and had plenty of laughs.  It was hard saying good by to them.  As most cruisers, they have their own agenda and are not heading to the same Islands all the time.  They left this morning.  Tears rolled down my cheeks as I waved to “Wind Lass” pulling away from Georgetown.  That’s what cruising is all about though.  People move on.  We will too.  This was my first hard “till the winds bring us together again” goodbye.  She is a keeper!

Fred lost the silicone caulking he bought Wednesday and went back into town to see if he left it in the grocery store Wednesday.  No luck.  He also needs to replace a tubing in the engine, even though it ran yesterday, we only had a tiny bit of hot water.  Hot water is no problem with me, but engine trouble is.  He is investigating the problem as I write.  The dinghy needs a bit of attention also.  There is something to be said about a hard dinghy.  You don’t need to pump it up all the time and they don’t get leaks like rubber tires.  Fred’s dink has a hard bottom but chambers on the sides and is prone to leak from time to time.  We have two leaks, one in each chamber.  I am going to pump it up and have a ball smearing liquid Joy and go on a bubble hunt.  “Safety First”, especially out on the water for me anyway.  It will end up a salt water bubble bath I am sure, another first for me.  Yes, Joy does suds up in salt water.

So...to start the day, we hop on the dink with our two empty containers for water and an empty propane tank because the propane truck, who comes once a week, (if it is not broke down) was coming to town to refill tanks.  As we pulled up to the circle parking lot across from Eddie’s Edgewater restaurant/bar the water front was full of dinghy’s, lined up like little rubber soldiers, all in a row and just up on the sandy landing were other cruisers standing next to their tanks which were also lined up about as uniform as the dinghy’s in the water were, making sure every newcomer knew where the end of the line was.  There were two ends, one to place your tank if you wanted to get hurt and the other if you wanted to make friends.  I am glad I chose the right end.  It was worth a picture but I didn’t bring my camera this trip.  The line grew and grew and finally the truck arrived.  I went across the street to the market to pick up a few things while Fred nudged our tank up in unison with the others.  It’s just what they do instead of just staying there in one spot.  We filled our two containers with water, which by the way is free, although you must bring your containers because the mast on a sailboat would not go under that small bridge into Victoria Lake.  We make it a habit to always bring containers if we are heading into town for anything.  It’s similar to the routine of checking your mail every day.