Salvio Sails!

A bit overcast this morning, which sets the mood of the harbor fairly well. Yesterday, shortly after hearing him chime in helpfully on the morning’s Net (our daily VHF Cruiser’s Net/local info session), we learned that the unofficial mayor/commodore/harbor master of Hope Town died. He was found in his dinghy with the engine running, and I’m assuming heart attack but do not know for sure. Will was a staple in Hope Town, living aboard his sailboat Antares here in the harbor, and until we laid eyes or ears on him upon arrival, we never really felt like we were ‘here’ yet. (Last year they skipped their first winter in the Abacos in decades to stay in Maryland, and it did NOT feel right, much akin to this morning.) 

Will and his wife Muffin (and their ‘little dog Sophie’, as he signed on with every day) were/are (how do I convey this now, again?) characters. Will and Muffin each have/had their own dinghy, which I always thought was brilliant. No need for coordination throughout the day, simply one tied to port and one to starboard and do what you need to do when you need to do it. He preferred the standing-up putt-putt, so always had a tiller extension and a fixed post of some sort for his non-steering hand. He ran the Net most mornings, with humor and patience, and he loved entertaining any boater kid who had a good joke for the listeners (although he’d Dad-groan if they deserved it). He would come boat to boat on trash days to help out newcomers or those who didn’t have their you-know-what together in time to get to the ‘Sunshine Freight Dock’ before the truck left, he could recommend any person or business for any fix or boater’s need, he apparently was a great dinghy racer, and he was always ALWAYS wearing a white tee shirt and sporting his amazing mustache. We Chickadeeans affectionately referred to him as The Lorax, since he had a passing resemblance with his ‘stache, but also because he had a great little whistle when he spoke, and he was certainly a man of justice and oversight in his unofficial role of taking care of his beloved Hope Town Harbor. 

Our hearts are with Muffin and Sophie, and this harbor is certainly in mourning for the loss. Fair winds and following seas, Will. 

We’ve just realized that this is our tenth year aboard. Time for a tin can to celebrate! (Or an aluminum boat?)

So far our celebrations have mostly only involved the comfy routines. Games, snacks, reading, painting (for V), and an afternoon spent swimming and lounging with friends. Without a grand plan for our sail this year, we’ve just been weaving in and out of general ideas of moving to this island or that without much conviction. Friends are here and there, and moving around on their own schedules, so the lining up of the various meet-ups while also taking into consideration the forecast and its subsequent need for protected anchorages, etc. is making the task feel like something that requires more than two brain cells. And unfortunately for planning purposes, this time we left ours in Maine. 

Lily did go swim a practice set in the pool, and I pretended to be her coach while walking back and forth and just generally spacing-out. I’m not sure I was inspiring. It was cold and shallow and had more than one dead spider (one would have been quite enough for me, thanks) piled up on the bottom in one corner, but she swam and checked that box. 

Yesterday included a bike ride to the south end of the island to dip and lounge at Tahiti Beach before lunching on our way back to the harbor. After tucking in on the boat, we gamed (Lily and I taught another poor soul our favorite Banagrams, since Andy and Violet generally refuse to play with us), grilled pizzas and even managed to stay awake past cruisers’ midnight (ahem, 9pm). A full day for sure.

Today will include some amount of actual work for all of us, and then possibly some destination/route planning, but, at our current rate… probably not?

(A day off here in reporting…)

Back on board with the girls, after a day of travel from the bitterly cold and very windy northeast to the calm warmth of our Bahamian nest. A delayed flight prompted running in the airport in DC at a speed and distance I hadn’t attempted since high school, this time with a backpack and a full bladder for extra resistance. I felt like we were in a movie, complete with the ‘making it to the gate JUST in time’, and I for sure at one point looked back and asked if we still had Kevin with us.  

That’s all behind me now as I sit in Hope Town harbor this morning and watch the turtles pop their heads up all around me while the sweet sound of the water lapping at the dinghy provides the soundtrack. (Ironically this ‘sweet lapping’ will no doubt prompt the girls to remind Andy to raise the dinghy in its davits tonight, as they hear it in stereo in their aft cabin. Whoops.)

We have yet to formulate an action plan for our short trip this year, but were greeted by two sets of friends yesterday afternoon, so there is plenty to do, and plenty of wonderful people to see if we stay here in Hope Town for a day or two. The 25 meter pool here, which was destroyed by Dorian five years ago, is now up and running, albeit a bit shallow (it’s been filling with a garden hose, so I imagine it’ll be full by late March). I know that Lily is anxious to keep her practices in before her next meet, which regrettably in my travel planning, is the day we get home. Whoops!

Yesterday was a big one for Lily, as she officially committed to her top choice school, and withdrew applications from the rest. Occidental College gets a good one, that’s for sure. She is excitedly already pouring over packing lists and timelines, with joy and likely a huge sense of relief that this arduous process/part time job of college applications is finally over. 

My emotions are all over the place- excitement predominantly, because I know it’s such a good fit for her, and I have no doubt that she’ll have such incredible opportunities that she’ll be gung-ho to take advantage of. But wow, this next step in general for me, thinking of the fact that we’re on an official countdown of the last months she lives with us full-time is a bit overwhelming and time-flashing in a way that makes me truly wonder if it’s really here already. I am positive that I’ll be an actual wreck when the time comes closer to packing up and dropping her off, so I’m going to do my best in these next six months to keep my blubbering to a minimum so as to maximize the days left. I’ll just join Andy in the financialsobbing taking place as we wrangle how to help her pay for it without leaving school with a loan payment that’ll sink her. So at least THAT’S distracting!

It’s Monday*, and we’re off! We had a really productive day yesterday, and by about 3 o’clock had everything ready for launch. We took the afternoon to take a cart ride around the island, passing one roadside pig and a number of the usual roadside chickens before finding some beachside rum drinks and conch- the perfect reward for our toils. 

We greeted the yard workers with excitement this morning as they came in- Eddie, Craig, Laverne, Casio and Crystal are our steadies here, and it’s always so great to see them after our months away. They were all a bit surprised to hear that we actually were ready to launch as requested. (We’re getting the feeling that they hear a lot of  “We thought we’d be ready to go on Monday, but let’s shoot for Thursday instead”, and other delayed options. ) However nothing motivates us like a plan, and with the vague promise that we have a friend holding a mooring for us in Hope Town, a great weather forecast for crossing the Whale, and Eddie’s insistence that we’d have a whole 6” of water under our keel even at the lowest tide with which to exit Black Sound, there’s no time like the present! We splashed, bent on the jib, topped off our water tanks, launched, kitted out and hauled the dinghy into our davits, and now an hour later we’re closing in on Whale Cay. The day is clear, the seas are calm, and while the wind is a bit on the nose, we’re making good time in our southbound journey. 

Immediately upon launch and exit we realized that there’s only one thing we failed to think of: food. Thinking we might leave the boat out of the water if things didn’t line up to move it, we didn’t want stores to attract critters in our absence, and figured we’d be eating out for most meals anyway. 

I come from a long line of folks who tend to eat voraciously every two to three hours, as if we’ll never see another meal again, so you can imagine my panic when I realized that onboard we currently have three apples, a few peanuts, a half of a box of Triscuits and 4oz of cheese. That will effectively last us to Baker’s Bay, which I can see quite clearly already. I consider myself a survivor-type of character- I love MacGuyvering tools and mechanisms from bits and bobs, my tolerance for discomfort in most senses of the word is quite high (I thank my dentist and her inability to hit the right nerve with the would-be-helpful novacaine before procedures for this) and in general I am a clear-thinker without the tendency to panic in emergency situations. HOWEVER. I am also almost always hungry. (In fact I even own a cookbook that is called I Am Almost Always Hungry.) Also you know what doesn’t help this fact? Writing about it. Also, does toothpaste have calories? Asking for a friend.

*Posting lag for this trip: operator and connectivity errors at play

Aboard Chickadee, and couldn’t be more excited. Andy and I arrived at the boat yard yesterday afternoon for a quick trip to get the boat put together ahead of our trip with the girls next month. It’ll help get us ‘out of the barn’ faster when we arrive, and it’ll also give us time to work on any small projects we want to conquer. So continues the new era of weaving time aboard our beloved Chickadee into our very filled and crazy schedules. Ducking between swim meets and work and board obligations, we’ve found a couple of windows to make it work, and it’s worth every effort, we’ve all come to realize. We all miss our long winters so much. Lily yearns for the Exumas, (as do I), and we’ve [barely] come to grips with the fact that that will be in the next phase, when they’re out of school and when Andy and I are retired and sailing more full time. In planning and theory, it feels like lightyears away, but the reality of already having a senior in high school has reminded me that it’ll actually be here in the blink of an eye.

The first task upon arrival is to unwrap the boat, since we leave the boat covered with a tarp over the companionway, and then the entire boat with a sunshade cover, meticulously wire-tying it down to a thousand points on deck. Over the years we’ve felt like it’s kept the deck cleaner, but also the interior cooler, which makes a big difference when you’re storing so many things in such a small space for a long Bahamian summer. Once we un-snip, fold up and label the pieces of the sunshade, we’re in, which means picking our way through the cabin filled with halyards, jerry cans, our dinghy outboard, cushions, sails, etc. etc. Hatches are opened, and the game of Tetris begins, and I must say, I find myself grinning ear to ear all the while. 

I feel like a kid in a candy store, working with rote memory of necessary tasks, smelling familiar smells, unpacking this in ‘this’ direction in order to be able to get to ‘that’ item with which to do ‘that’ particular job. Solar panels on, bilge cleaned out, water tanks filled, decked and cockpit washed off, rigging items up, salon items out of the v-berth, fridge wiped out. It’s tactical and fun and also gets easier every year as we perfect our stowage and ‘put-away’ routines upon exit. 

Since the ferry dropped us off right at the yard, our quick trip to the store in town for coffee and a few snacks gave us the island overview we love every year upon our return. We get to see which building projects have finished (this category is almost always empty), which have stopped altogether (the bulk), and which houses and businesses are still plugging along, getting closer to their new faces since Dorian wiped out their old. There were new pop-up shops and convenience stores here and there, and this time a new Conch Salad stand, which we’ll definitely be hitting up at some point on this trip.

We had dinner at a familiar spot in town, caught up with the owner and his summertime activities, and then came home to fall into our bunk with bellies full of cracked conch, and, ahem, some rum.

Not having the girls here is definitely odd, and as I sip my coffee in the salon I find myself looking at their stateroom door, waiting for Lily’s head to pop out and wonder what’s for breakfast. (“Coffee” would be my only offer this time around, so she’d be disappointed.) Having ‘the band back together’ in February will be a special time, since it’ll be our last winter trip with the four of us for a while, considering Lily will be in college next year and the break schedules will likely be tough to navigate. Gah! How is that possible? 

Being here is flooding us with memories of the girls onboard. Playing their hide and seek game at anchor with the green piece of glass they’d found: they’d hide it for one another in the sand under the boat, just enough peeking out so the seeker could see a glint. Worlds built on beaches, cafes created with the finest of sea grape tacos and salt water sodas, friends made on remote islands, movie nights squeezed into the settee, dominos on the cockpit floor while sailing along the bank… holy cow we are all so lucky. 

And also so grateful. I’m here for piling on more memories, even if we have to work a bit harder for them these days. But first for now, we’re off to rig the main.

The more-bitter-than-sweet wake up of our last morning onboard has arrived. Fighting for my last cockpit sunrise moment, I sit tangled amidst removed running rigging (say that ten times fast), the packed-up jib, and the bits and bobs of a boat on its way out of the water. To add to the visual, I’ve wrapped any bare parts in salty damp towels I’ve found up here, because for the first time on our trip, the noseeums have decided that today is their day to attack. I suppose that’s an argument for staying in bed until the sun is up, but tell that to my internal clock, or at least tell it to bring the bug spray. 

As always, we’re finishing here on Green Turtle Cay, and after a couple of nights spent anchored off of the settlement, we came into the dock of the boatyard yesterday for ease of packing up and packing off. Andy stays for a few more days to really put things away, so we didn’t have to spend too much of our last moments prepping for storage. 

My mother’s arrival for their annual trip here has actually overlapped by a day, so after beach picnicking one day and visiting friends for lunch for another, we were happy to be able to dinghy in and meet their ferry as it came over yesterday, and then spend our last night with them. A great cast off for their vacation and our departure!

Nine years we’ve been doing this, which is crazy to think. Every time we come back, I remark that it feels like we’ve been aboard more recently than we have, which just emphasizes to me how natural and ‘home-state’ this wee little vessel feels. Motions of movement and tasks are second nature, and even as I’m thinking ‘wait, where did I stow that ‘x’ again?’ I find myself moving toward it and opening hatches or compartments to access it. 

The girls’ artwork from years ago that decorates the salon has started to peel on the edges, and some of it I’ve taken down to take home for safe[st] keeping. We donated our CandyLand and Chutes and Ladders this year, and gave away a lot of arts and crafts supplies as well; Chickadee is evolving with the family, growing up, I suppose, and simplifying its stores. I retain the hope that it doesn’t mean less colorful, less warm, but so far there is little chance. (For starters, the trails of clothing they leave on every surface are quite literally very colorful.) 

The evolution of our time onboard and its shortening lengths has us getting creative about different trips down here. Lily talks about sailing alone with friends one day, perhaps for a college break, which is fun to think about, even if all I can visualize is the fridge full of beer. Now that the girls are older and Lily is driving, it’s easier to imagine Andy and I coming down for a time without them (although shhh, don’t mention it to them). Barring any major storms, etc., it’s nice to know that short stints are still very much worth it, and that the work needed on either end of the trip is doable, and not overwhelming in its scope. It’s just part of the time, which we cherish. 

The fact that there is even a ‘sweet’ ending to our departure is borne from the length as well. Since we didn’t fully unplug and shift our lives from land to sea this year, there is definitely a feeling of being in two worlds, with one (ahem, land) detracting from the other in ways that more easily signify the time to go. Though the cruiser in me just wants to be floating at all times, the task-master in me is ready to get home and not let the things that I’ve put aside pile up even more. Always with the lesson it seems, all things in balance.  

And speaking of balance, or perhaps it’s very opposite, (madness?), the bugs are literally pinging off of my glasses making it hard for me to see the screen, so my current goal is to focus on not running around the yard flailing and swiping like a maniac. Time to go below and get packing. Until next time!

Our trip this year is so much shorter than usual, we’re working hard to check all of our family boxes while onboard: beaching, snorkeling, visiting with friends ashore and floating, nipping into our favorite shops, beloved walks and dinghy exploits, favorite meals (that we only seem to make and eat on Chickadee, almost as in reverence to).. it’s a lot to cram into just two weeks. A lot but not impossible, so we’re moving fast, seeing the things, and not so much tending to the boat tasks that normally fill the interstices of our days. Like cleaning. Or organizing recently-used gear. Or fretting about laundry, or trash. Throw in a couple of teenagers who change their clothes (usually just discarding old onto the sole to be tripped over by the next passerby) every seventeen minutes on average, and we’ve got ourselves a real scene.

It’s actually amazing how quickly I allowed my anal-retentive tendencies to fall by the wayside. Instead of sweeping sand from the companionway and salon a few times a day to tamp down the beach encroachment, I just spend a few extra seconds brushing it from my feet before I get into bed (always a habit, of course, but more time and attention is clearly needed now). The cockpit is strewn with our snorkel gear from days ago, little bags of trash that haven’t seem to have found their place in the locker, and sand, sand sand.. I’d be living my nightmare if I wasn’t living in my dreamiest setting. I should think I’d want to be able to bring this attitude home with me for maximum chill vibes, but… dirty secret revealed, I actually enjoy cleaning and having clean spaces, when I have the time.

We’re in Hope Town once again, and have swam and dined at our favorite pool bar, walked the beach (and subsequently watched a shark threaten to ruin a body-boarder’s day), shared dinners with dear friends and even spent a day racing (an unexpectedly fun activity for buoy-to-buoy-adverse me). It’s been only two days, and we’ve packed them to the brim.

• – – Turtle Interruption….. I don’t know what it is about the turtles this year, but they’re starting to feel like labradors. As I’ve been writing, a decent-sized green turtle has been coming up all around the cockpit; I keep hearing the ‘pfff’ of its breath as a funny little ‘hello’. And then I swear it’s looking me in the eye- is it expecting breakfast? Doesn’t it know that this is MY cockpit time?! Sheesh.

We’ll need to round the Whale today (staying in the Abacos is definitely a time to recognize this ‘hurdle’ of movement as a constant in our journeys), but we have time to do so, so we’ll leave here and head to Guana to play on the beach and wander around until later in the afternoon. I’d like to think that I’ll also spend some time tidying and perhaps polishing our very rusty stainless (“It’s stain-less, not stain-never!” as Andy says, groan..), but it’s more likely that I’ll… not. We’ve got paths to explore and games to play!

The band is back together! Oh my heart.. thank goodness. Since anthropomorphizing is a speciality of mine, I’ll just say that I think Chickadee is as pleased as we all are. 

Stepping from the ferry onto the yard dock and having Chickadee already in the water was such a treat this year. Andy had come down in December to rig the boat, replace our leaking fuel tank, and prep and work on a few other projects in advance of our return, so it certainly made us feel like fancy boat people who greet their crew, walk aboard and unpack their bags. It wasn’t quiiiiite like that, but a major step in a different direction, and the arrival chaos was tamped down to only mid-level messes and gear upheavals before everything was stowed and ready to go. 

Another marker of the start of a new season was to be onboard and hear “Yay, Chickadee!” from fellow yard customers walking by. Since we’ve been at AYS (Abaco Yacht Service), it’s largely been the same group of sailors here, who sail from roughly November to May (our future agenda, most certainly). We’re usually the final boat in, and the only one with kids, so our last place finish in the reunion each year feels like it has a lot of anticipation and excitement, which is more than heartwarming. A welcome back reminder of our wonderful community here on the island. We had lovely catch-ups with each group, and learned the routes and plans for their winters, promising another visit on the back end of our all-too-short cruise this year. 

A Chickadee record this year- we were stowed, fueled and shoved off of the dock a mere 23 hours after we arrived, in order to maximize our time adventuring while also taking advantage of wind forecasts in the coming days. It’s been a really windy winter here in the Bahamas, according to aforementioned sailors, with winds clocking all of the way around every few days. While that could certainly hamper our adventuring progress, we saw a window to get us around the Whale that next day, so we jumped on it. 

We anchored off of No Name Cay for the first time in Chickadee record, and went ashore for a drink at Big O’s, which is a one stop shop (bar, restaurant, pool, gift shop and most importantly perhaps, pigs on the beach) for weekenders wanting to plop for the day, or better yet for Big O’s, tour groups dropped for lunch and plenty of rum before their next snorkel.

We had a pre-dawn start to head around the Whale (this time behind it through Don’t Rock Passage, which proved to be a little harrowing in its narrow track, shallow points and decent-sized swells making the draft a lot more variable), and worked our way into Man o’ War Cay to make our annual visit with friends there. Two nights on their dock included walks and boat rides into town for ice cream, beach days, full moon rise walks and Lily turning into coconut-opener extraordinaire (who needs tools?!). We left the island with far fewer coconuts, sweet memories with friends, lighter on dental floss (fresh coconut is a bear on the chompers!) and about forty games of Mexican Train under our belts. 

We had a great motor sail south to Little Harbor, an anchorage we hadn’t been in since 2017. (It’s tidal-dependent to get in, and they have only a handful of available first-come first-serve moorings, so it’s felt like enough of a challenge that we’ve bypassed for other easier options when we’re down there.) We’re so glad we made the effort this time! A delicious Sunday brunch at Pete’s Pub on the beach in the harbor, and then a fun adventure on the beach on the ocean side afterward. As much seaglass as we remembered from our first visit and a beautiful beach (once we trekked over the razory limestone, in flipflops, to access it) for lounging and playing in the surf. Andy and Lily walked further on (my current book is too good for such time-consuming exertions), found a piece of a SpaceX something or other in the sand, and also met some people who gave them the literal inside track for getting back to Pete’s. A path with a touch more poisonwood and termite mounds, but a lot less skin-tearing limestone. It’s all a fine balance here in paradise!

A tough Chickadee decision was made (to stay or to go) yesterday morning as we woke in Little Harbor, and after Lily joined in on her first class of the day (wah wahhhhh, break is over!), we decided to head out and see what we could see. Remarkably despite the recent history, the weather has been fairly settled with agreeable wind directions, so we have had great options for both activities and overnight anchorages. 

On our way south the day before we remarked on a sandy spit on a little uninhabited island that we thought we might like to explore, so we dropped anchor for the day. It was very close to a place we’d snorkeled before, so we used the window between Lily’s classes wisely- in the water. Naturally in my hasty stowage I didn’t pull a fourth mask from our stores (we only had three people on board last year!), so rather than tear apart our entire bunk, I watched from above and enjoyed bobbing in the dinghy while the girls pet the treat-greedy green turtle that knows a good group of snorkelers when it sees them. 

The island itself (one of the Pelican Cays) was lovely, and we felt like we were in the Exumas… long stretches of white sand reaching out into the bank, and most importantly, no one else around.  

In order to get closer to a morning Hope Town approach (for both service purposes for Lily’s classes and to get a jump on other would-be cruisers vying for their limited moorings), we steamed north after our Pelican Cay day, and dropped anchor off of Tilloo Cay, where we now sit. I came into the cockpit for a sunrise viewpoint, as I always do, but this morning I was thwarted by clouds and a few raindrops. The front looks small though, so I’m sure we’ll have some sun as we sail north in a short while. 

Meanwhile, I hear dominos flipping on the table below, which means Lily is awake and ready for another game. Time to go!

While our exit from Chickadee was a swift and efficient process this year, filled with time with dear friends, fun activities and good food, leaving the boat had its usual cloud of melancholy and sadness that plagues our late-March. For a fun levity boost to counteract it, we quickly got excited about seeing things at home. We have had a LOT of projects that have been going on while we were away, and while the management of those from afar kept us in the loop, coming home to actually see everything underway was like coming downstairs on Christmas morning. We skibbled from house to house, room to room, oohing and aahing over upgrades and new shiny things. And then a transitory ‘ewww’ when I sat down in my office to open mail and pay the bills for those shiny things, but everything in balance, yes?

Lily, after a host family switch, has returned to herself again, which is an immense relief. While working for the Spanish Chamber of Commerce is not likely on her career horizon, her life there seems much more comfortable, and her new family and their space and ways was the major contribution to that. A giant ‘WHEW’ on the parental end of things. She has been asking me for a wrap-up post, and here it is, Bird! I’ll end with a photo dump of our last days, plus a shot of one of our first days back. We were greeted with grey, cold wind and snow, and while visiting Andy’s dad, his usual views of the harbor were hidden by the ick of it. We decided to see what Chickadee looked like in Southwest Harbor, and.. she be cold.

Just booked flights to go get Lily in June and have an adventure before we head home. Maybe a bonus SALVio-not-sailing post to come.

• 

Much like making up stories about people while in crowded places with interesting goings on, we like to wonder about our fellow boaters a lot. The working title of my book would be “What’s Going On Down There? and Other Questions About Anchorage Neighbors”. When a new boat comes into any place we’re already sitting, Andy first wracks his brain for his comprehensive rolodex of boats he knows. (It’s incredible, really. He often can’t remember what his last meal was, but he’s never forgotten a boat build, its designer, and usually its name and where we saw it last, if at all. My data is in and out like the tides; his is there to stay.) Once he’s identified it (whether out loud or not), we start making assessments, which then lead to either known facts, or amusing-to-us stories.

If there is netting on the lifelines, it’s usually a couple and not a single-hander, and that means they either have kids or pets. (Further sussing would dictate a kid boat if there are water toys of any kind, or clothing drying on the lines. For some reason, couples don’t expand their laundry drying out into the world like we families do.)

It’s mostly retirees we see, yet the younger ‘we’ve sold it all and bought a boat’ couple/family scene has made its increase in the last few years too. This leads to ALL sorts of stories, as you can imagine.

We speculate and create stories about jobs, personalities, habits and hobbies, and sometimes it can get weird. Trimarans, for instance, are only owned by murderers. They’re creepy and make me feel icky and like I never want to get closer than 100 yards and thus, obvious link. Andy isn’t exactly on board with that one, but the girls get it, anyway.

I’m also always wondering how and what people are eating, as it’s one of my favorite things to plan, cook and do, and knowing the confined parameters of my own galley and my interest to expand options as much as possible, I love hearing about others’ onboard meals. (This requires actual discussion, mind you, which then puts this info into the ‘facts’ pile, a slightly less-exciting, but still important category.) We’ve gotten favorite recipes from beach parties with shared nibbles, so it’s the only real detective work I enjoy doing. Otherwise we can just assume that that Tartan 37 we saw last night (single-hander, no pets) was making ceviche with a conch he dove for recently. That would explain the banging, and also since we’re saying he’s an artist (boat wasn’t too tidy and put together, couldn’t have been an engineer), he’ll use the shell to carve trinkets that he can sell later.

The one set of boats we never have to wonder about are charter boats. Dorian took care of most of the charter companies’ fleets, so for a few years there anchorages were free from the bulked up catamarans, but this year they seem to be back in force. Charters seem to fall into one of very few categories: The Family Affair, which is sometimes multigenerational so that the grandparents can also enjoy the stress of learning a new boat in six days, The Couples’ Retreat, where two to four couples share their vacation experience, or The Bro Week, where college buddies adventure on the briny sea. We’ve seen them all, and we try to steer clear, because it’s never quite apparent if they had the skill to have a boat signed over, or just the checkbook. At least the boats are newer these days though- four or five years ago we saw a Bro Week lose their propeller as they tried to leave their mooring in Warderick Wells. As in, one of the propellers left the shaft and fell to the bottom. So in addition to worrying about nautical awareness, we also always wonder how the boats are maintained. Either way, ‘steering clear’ is the course of action.

Violet has spent so much of her time below on passages, and even for hours after we drop anchor, we assume that if anyone is assessing US in any way, they just see a middle-aged couple, doing their thing. When she DOES pop up to jump in the dinghy, we hope that people are guessing that that’s when we let her out of her cage to go ashore, or something exciting like that. My guess though is that they’d just be correctly thinking that she’s a pre-teen with a ‘tude, and her sour face in the dinghy is less the acclimation to the bright sun and more her displeasure at being asked to see the world in real time.

As the anchorage wakes up, a number of boats have hoisted anchor and set off. Where are they going, I wonder, and to do what?