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Yeah – we are back in the world of computers! Years ago no liveaboards had a pc, and now they are considered essential. Infact we quite liked not having one, but maybe that was because we knew that Ian was bringing us out a new one soon (cheapest option available).
As I remember the last blog was in Martinique, which seems a long time ago. We left Martinique for Dominica, having a good game of chase with John and Sue in their HalbergRassy 49 (they started ahead of us and finished just ahead of us) who organised us a mooring with Seacat – who subsequently took us on a tour of the Island. We spent our first day in Dominica lounging in hot spring water in a tropical rainforest – it was truly luxurious and spits in the faces of spa resorts. The next day was a tour of the island during which Seacat periodically stopped the van and let us out to cut us some sugar cane, or mangoes, or to find almonds on the beach, or Jungle m and ms (cocoa beans) or to pick up another 5 sweet grapefruits. The day was finished off with a swim in the emerald pool – a beautiful fresh water pool fed by a waterfall (behind which lurked a monster crayfish). Anyway – suffice to say that Dominica is Eden in my eyes, and anyone witha chance to go and see it should go.
From there we headed up to the Saints, then anchored off Guadeloupe for a couple of nights before arriving in Antigua. We have been here for over 2 weeks, having just waved off Sarah James, Ben and Lizzie after a great holiday with them, and Ian has arrived – happy but very white looking, laden with our new laptop and disney princess DVDs.
Our trip around Antigua and Barbuda with the Edwards family was lovely – carribean beaches of white white sand in Barbuda, turquoise sea dotted with reefs, and trees laden with coconuts (John and James got a great stash of drinking coconuts and it turns out that I am the only one who likes them! Hooray for me). Lots of snorkelling, topped with Rendezvous bay (only possible because of unusual northely winds) which was like snorkelling in a tropical fish tank – tons of pretty fish, schools of purple floaty things, rays and baracudas as well as turtles. Also loads of ‘brain’ corals which continue to look bizarre no matter how many we have seen.
As far as Double Helix goes, our run of maintenance free cruising has come to an end. We have a small rip in our mainsail (ok to sail triple reefed for now), one of the toilet pumps has broken (curtesy of A. Banana dropping a screw down it), we found a hole in the bottom of the boat during our haul out (well, it turned into a hole when the surveyor tapped a bolt with his hammer – not to worry, it is now glassed in)and we seem to have some moths living in the kitchen!! Still – we have a new layer of antifoul, and a current survey (hull is all in good order) to aid seeling the boat. She is on the market now, and our return seems imminent – Anna is already enrolled to start at school in September, and Ellen is in the process of being registered to start then too. The details of our return to life as land lubbers are starting to take shape, and I am concerned that our boat years memories are going to shrink down to about 5 minutes worth of thinking! However all is not over yet, and we are still enjoying ourselves. We are looking foward to a 10 day cruise with Ian, dropping him off in St Martin for his flight home (to Elaine – soon to be Mrs Douglas just like me).
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