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You can email us at jj@alshaheen.co.uk

 

  AL SHAHEEN - SAILING 2009

April 2009 (USA)

 

It’s quite a culture shock to jump from the Bahamas to the USA! Apart from the obvious things like deep water as we sailed along the Providence Channel, there’s the additional aspects of more people, more cars, more shops, more restaurants, just more “things” generally.

That’s when you know you’ve gone just a little ‘bush’ and been in the islands for a while longer than expected! The sail to the USA was an easy one: fuelled with fresh home-baked bread from Anju, we took off from Royal Island Eleuthera for Lake Worth, Florida, 170 odd miles east. Goose-winged again as the wind was once more on our stern, we wafted along merrily, enjoying the freedom of not having to watch the depth meter. And enjoying the sudden influx of shipping – zillions of cruise ships to our port side (this is the main route between Nassau and Miami), and as many freighters of one size or another to starboard.

 

Some interesting VHF conversations! The freighter Neli getting very uptight trying to call up the big tanker Blue Easter; “You’re on a collision course! What are your intentions?” No response – eventually a “F...YOU!” from Neli blistered the airwaves, as the skipper went on to berate the tanker. “You’re registered as Blue Easter on the AIS but the name on your bow as we scraped past says ‘Mary Jane’. Who the hell are you?” Meek and mild little voice comes back “Are you calling me, Cap’n?” ‘Discussion’ followed as to the illegality of being registered as one name when the boat shows another – bit like Joe Smith signing his checks as Mike Bloggs!

And the late night chats between radio operators on the cruise ships – all the gossip about the new hot chick and/or cute steward (depending on the speaker’s bent!) and the latest update on the passenger who went overboard from the viewing deck of the Norwegian Star – some 150-180 feet above the water. “Couldn’t find him,” was the laconic comment. Did he fall or was he pushed?? Material for a good yarn there!

We sympathised with m/v Neli – we had a close encounter of the scary kind ourselves mid-passage. About 3am, we were just changing watch (I was coming off, John going on), and I’d been watching a freighter off to starboard for some time, just chuffing along merrily alongside us some few miles off. I’d barely dropped off, when I heard John on the radio, yelling at someone. No reply. More yells. I shot up on deck, to find the blasted thing had suddenly turned across our bows and was close – extremely close! John was still yelling at the guy trying to get his attention, I was yelling at John to get his attention - we needed to change direction – FAST! A smart tack in the middle of the ocean at full speed – I didn’t know we’d learnt to work so well together!! The ship shot past us what felt like inches from our bow (everything’s exaggerated at night in these conditions!!), cursing and swearing we got Al Shaheen back on course – then the freighter came up on the radio and some Filipino voice said “Wassa problem, Cap’n?” Anyone have a gun handy???

 

So to the USA – provisioning in a shop that has so much selection I want to buy everything I see because it looks so fantastic! Knowing we can buy again tomorrow if we run out is such a luxury. We landed in the USA at Fort Worth, N. Palm Beach – Al Shaheen’s first visit to Florida shores. A nasty inlet, lots of pounding sea and big waves and wind in as always the wrong direction, fighting to miss the maniac sports fishing boats that scream out at full throttle and skim just below your bows makes for an interesting ride! And just as we got in, the Coast Guard arrived in their rib, pulled up next to us for some casual conversation – needless to say, this Brit on board was fairly terse. “We’d like to get the sails down before we get into trouble here – can we chat later?”

Spent a couple of days in Lake Worth, provisioning, doing laundry etc etc, and met up with John Coheleach, a medi-vac who lives in the area – he does a mean shrimp ‘n steak barbecue! And is itching to go cruising, so we’ve promised to find him a boat!

 

Then it was off to start “ditch-driving” up the ICW (the Inter Coastal Waterway - below) that runs from Maimi to Norfolk inshore, using a combination of rivers, lakes, sounds and man-made canals to move you all the way up the East Coast without ever having to go to sea. It’s an amazing feat. But of course, it’s a dredged channel, and some places are very shallow – officially it’s all dredged to 12 ft, but some county’s run out of money and the dredging doesn’t get done, and it all silts up ... you can imagine! And it’s very narrow in some places – especially somehow the places that cross the areas that are uniformly 2-4 feet deep for miles on either side.

So, take a shallow ditch, add a narrow strip, throw in a couple of sports fishing boats or big trawlers that push up large wakes as they pass you – we spend a lot of time trying very hard not to go aground! (Right: Dolphins herding).

 

We specifically wanted to do the Florida bit though, having never seen it before, so stuck it out. After all, Al Shaheen’s used to shallow water by now! So we stayed in the ICW all the way to Titusville, entranced with the homes along the waterway (and intrigued by the guy jet-skiing with his bodyguard alongside and an armed guard on his dock – who is he??) And then took a car and did some Space Exploring.

We’d really been hoping for a shuttle launch (the last launch of the current series of shuttles) – had been aiming for an early April one which was postponed to the end of the month – and then postponed to mid-May, too late for us to stay and watch.

 

 

We’d heard about how you could sit in the bay and watch the fish jump out the water as the shuttle blasted off!

The Space Centre was fantastic – well worth the trip and probably worth a 3-day excursion, there was so much to see. Both shuttles (Atlantis and Endeavour) were on the launch pads, ready for Endeavour (left) to be launched to the International Space Station on May 14. She’s due to fix the Hubble telescope, first visit to the telescope in 7 years. And Atlantis is on the launch pad ready and waiting for blast-off if there’s any emergency or problem with the connection or time up there.

 

Fascinating place, fascinating look at men (and machines) that have ‘gone where no man’s gone before’ – what an achievement.

Of course, we both ‘saw’ different things – John was completely absorbed by all the technicalities and mechanics of the various gigantic rockets on show – I was bowled over by the personalities and imagination of the people involved, their ability to step out into an absolutely unknown entity. I mean, even the early explorers who set off for the ends of the world were travelling on stuff that they knew – land and sea etc. This was completely alien!

 

 

April 2009 (Bahamas)

After a bad start, the Bahamas did become more attractive. If somewhat shallow!

Our first port of call after the abortive attempt to land at Mayaguana was Thompson’s Bay, Long Island, an overnight passage in gentle winds that died totally at times. We ghosted along, headsail poled out so we were goose-winged in the pitch black of a moonless night, just missing Rum Cay with a quick alteration in course, to round Cape Santa Maria (right) in the early morning.

 

Of course, all hell broke loose as we rounded! Suddenly we were charging down under 35 knots of wind, desperately trying not to overshoot the narrow entrance to the channel that would take us from the 1900 metre depths of the Atlantic into the 2-3 metre shallows of the Bahamas Banks.

As the channel is only about 10 metres wide and only about 2.1 metres deep, it was a fairly tense time. Remember, we draw 1.9 metres!! Bit inconsiderate in the middle of all this to be hailed on the VHF by some folks standing on the headland watching us. “You’re looking great!” they called. “I’m hanging on by my toenails!” was my tart reply.

We managed to drop the sails, get the motor on, find the channel, and with great trepidation nosed in. It’s very disconcerting to suddenly be able to see the bottom just, only just, below your keel. Even more disconcerting to be moving forward at 4.9 knots (the wind was now right on the nose and we had to keep the speed up to remain in the channel), see the depth drop from 50 metres to 1.2, to 1.1, 0.9, 0.7 – as we hit 0.4, there was a frantic radio call. “Mayday, mayday, we’re aground!” A catamaran (their depth was only 0.5 metres!) was stuck hard on the Banks to our starboard. No chance whatsoever of us going to their aid – in fact, they eventually decided to just anchor there overnight (out in the middle of the “ocean” and wait for the incoming tide to float them off later). Took us an hour and a bit to negotiate the channel into “deeper” water and for the next few hours we were cruising with 1.2 metres below us! Considering the fact that coral heads pop up unexpectedly all over the Banks, I have no idea why we were feeling so comfortable! We anchored in Thompson’s Bay with 0.8 below the keel: by low water, we were sitting balanced precariously on 0.0. Oh well, what can I say?

The only time it actually became a problem was a couple of days later when we decided to go over to the fuel dock to refuel and take on fresh water. We waited for high water, and successfully made it into the dock. I threw the lines to Alfred, the dockman, he caught them and started to tie us up – and we hit the bottom. Hard. Abruptly. Much cussing and revving later, we got the boat out of the rut we created – “Come round,” says Alfred, “come round t’other way.” But John already had her in Fast Forward! “No way,” he said delicately. “Take on another half a ton of fuel and water? We’d never get out of here!” So with friends Trumpeter’s help, John jerry-canned something like 150 litres of water from the tap to the dinghy to the boat. Oi vey!

 

We have two problems in the Bahamas: our draft and our dinghy. Size definitely does matter here. Because of our draft, we are generally anchored way out, and have a dinghy ride of anything up to 2-3 miles to get to shore. Fine if you have anything bigger than a little Lodestar with a putt-putt 3 hp motor! Unless there’s no wind at all, anywhere we went entailed getting soaked. Hence the need to get dressed to go to church! (See right).

 

Left: Hard day in paradise

 

We hired a car to explore Long Island – although called Long, it’s only 80 miles from top to bottom, and about 4 miles wide at its widest. Cat Island (next one up) is shorter and skinnier, while Eleuthera (see right - Alabaster Bay) is about 110 miles long and only 2.5 miles at its widest. And all of them are incredibly flat: the highest point in the entire Bahamas is on Cat Island, at 206 feet above sea level. Not much help if there’s a tsunamai! Lots of scrubland, lots of casuarinas trees, lots of magnificent beaches on both the Atlantic and Banks sides. And lots of wonderfully friendly people.

 

 

 

Left:Crawfish Dinner

 

Right:Blue Hole

Long Island

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We met Sara Campbell (right) at the Blue Hole. The World Freediving Championships were about to take place, and she was doing a training dive. The Blue Hole here is apparently the deepest in the world: 203 metres to the bottom, and she was aiming for 96 metres freedive – there and back on one breath, 96 metres in 3 minutes! And she did it – now holds the Woman’s World Record. See her website www.sarafreediver.com.

 

One island is much the same as the other topographically; it’s the people you meet that differentiate them. Miz Knowles, soup-maker extraordinairre in Clarence Town, the old man who stopped and chatted to us about the slaves on the cotton plantations in days gone by, Mikey and Trevor we gave a lift to, two local boys drunk as skunks who spilled the beans about out of country girl-friends (“don’ tell my wife, don’ tell my wife!”), Rosa on Eleuthera with 8 children she has educated and sent off to achieve all over the world (“yes, my daughter, she has an African child, an Australian child – and one Bahamian child too!”). Great people, great attitudes to life and their place in it. As descendants of the original slaves, abandoned by their masters when the plantations failed, they’ve made things work. Successfully.

 

We climbed Mt Alvernia, highest point in the Bahamas at 206 feet, to visit Father Jerome’s Hermitage (left). Fascinating! A tall slender converted Catholic, he rebuilt many of the churches on the Out Islands, and finally created this small chapel and living area, complete with bell tower and ingenious water collection system, and retired there to die. Very spiritual feel to the place.

 

In fact, the Out Islands have had quite a spiritual feel to them all round: we’ve been to the Episcopalian Church on Long Island . . .

 

 

. . . had a Seder aboard the Jewish boat Dovka (below)

and Easter Sunday service in the Methodist Church on Eleuthera.

 

John’s been looking for a mosque and a mullah so we can complete the triangle but they’re in short supply on these islands!

 

 

 

 

 

One of the things you do do in these islands is wait for weather!

 

There’s always another Cold Front coming in from the USA, and the key is trying to find somewhere sheltered that is also deep enough for us to anchor in. Although I have to say we’ve got fairly blasé now – quite happy with 0.5 below the keel. And fortunately the fronts don’t (touch wood) last for long – you can see them building, moving across, the wind leaps from 5-10knots to suddenly 25-30 knots, all is chaos for a while, but 30 minutes later it’s history.

 

And listening to reports from the US East Coast, where the Carolinas are looking at 50-60 knot winds, I’m happy to be here. It’s comfortable in Paradise!

 

 

 

March 2009

 

Friday 20th March

John and I have finally scraped the barnacles of the Virgins off Al Shaheen's hull, and are right now on passage from Culebra direct to the Bahamas, some 500 miles. And I've now definitely decided I am not made for ocean passage-making: in my experience, it's either spit-drying terrifying or downright dead boring. So no round-the-world stuff for this girl - unless it's at age 88 first class on Queen Mary III, assuming I can still do the G&T circuit on my own two pins.

 

As usual - as always! - John meticulously researched the islands, the anchorages, the weather etc etc in planning the trip. Talked to Chris Parker ad nauseum. Read and reread every pilot book and guide on board. Wore holes in the charts studying them. Delayed leaving Culebra twice, but we finally left on dull and dreary Monday this week, headed for Cockburn Harbor, S.Caicos as our first stop. Bit of a swell according to Chris, but should be manageable. Hah!

We made it 6 miles before John finally gave in to my whining - the swell was washing machine stuff, and I couldn't face the possibility of several days of this. So instead we endured a very rolly night on a buoy off Tamarind Beach at the west end of Culebra.

 

Tuesday morning I had no more excuses that John would listen to, so we took off. Bright clear day, the swell was down enough that I could actually walk without hitting both sides of the saloon, there was a good breeze and we cooked along at 7-8 knots. However, Chris was now making lots of noise about "huge convective winds hitting the Bahamas by Saturday". Great! That wiped out S. Caicos - not enough protection. So now it's Mayaguana, 512 miles instead of 440, eta Friday not Thursday. An extra dark night on passage. Oi vey!

 

But (naturally) by Weds the winds had died, and we were down to 'sailing' downwind with main and gib goosewinged but flapping and flogging and achieving very little. Or motoring - bit like sitting in one of those old series one Landrovers - the ones with bare metal sides and no sound-proofing - tiring! And neither way getting us anywhere very fast!

 

So here we are at Friday - our eta to Abrahams Bay Mayaguana is now 3am Sat - plenty of time to duck in before the 'big winds' hit. And the next northerly swell arrives! But of course you can't exactly enter a Bahamian reef anchorage in the dark (at 3am the moon's not even up yet), so we'll be frootling around kicking our heels until the sun is high enough to eyeball those coral thingies.

 

You might be thinking, why's she complaining - lots of time to do lots of things? After all, it is only our 4th year of marriage, and as the poets say thoughts do turn to... But no, our auto-pilot keeps dropping out, requiring an immediate scramble to get to the helm and re-direct the boat before she takes off for Bermuda and the dreaded Triangle.

So, no sex on this boat on this passage - I just know it would be a case of 'autos interruptus'!

 

Monday 23rd March

I'm beginning to regret this 'life on the ocean wave'!! We "tucked into" Abrahamas Bay, this reef-bound supposedly all-weather anchorage. Ja-well-no-fine, to use a South African term. What we didn't know was that this meant all the weather hit it! The last two nights have felt like living in a dishwasher, being bounced, tumbled, shook and swung for something like 38 hours non-stop. The weatherman told us it would be approx 17-20 knot winds - well, he lied! It's never been below 25, and last night's max was 42. I'm exhausted and very snippy this morning. And apparently this carries on for the next 3 days. Oi vey.

 

It wouldn't be so bad if we could even get to shore occasionally - but this bay is 3-4 miles long and about a mile wide, and because of our deep draft we are stuck out in the middle of it. When the wind blows like this, the wind chops the waves up and it's impossible to take the dinghy out - we'd drown instantaneously. So it's read, clean, cook, play Scrabble.

Oh well, at least sex is possible again: just have to lie back, think of England and let the boat go through all the motions!

 

Tuesday 24th March

Couldn't handle Abraham's Bay any longer, so we took a gap between 35 knot winds and 30 knot winds, hauled the anchor up (the snubber has worked so hard over the last few days the rope has actually stretched a good few inches!), and hotfooted it out of the bay and about 5 miles around the corner. We're now hanging by our toenails off a small beach (no palm trees, but the casuarina trees have a decided tilt to the north from all the wind), very close in shore - the wind has "dropped" to a steady 25-28 knots, we're rolling like a drunken sailor, but at least we're not in a dishwasher and the anchor chain is hanging sort of downwards instead of being bar-taut out in front of us. As degrees of discomfort go, this is Paradise!

 

We'll be here until early hours of Thursday; the weatherman says the weather's going to change for the better then. Watch this space!

 

 

January/February 2009 (Jenny)

 

Having put our livers to the test over the festive season in Culebra, it was time to slow down. We sailed across to for Viegues, and motored very cautiously into Ensenada Honda, a beautiful remote unspoiled anchorage amongst the mangroves that we had all to ourselves for the first night. Imagine our horror when another boat encroached on our private space the next day – but we spent an engrossing evening with Chris and Yani learning how to make martinis and play a decent game of chess! Of course, that meant that on our next trip to civilisation, we had to buy a chess board.

 

We fell in love with Salinas – great holding (once you’ve tiptoed your way in through a pretty tight and shallow entrance, see right), lots of space amongst the mangroves, good basic facilities ashore in a lovely little village. We decided to stay for a week or so, explore the island by car, and generally enjoy the land for a while. Boy, did we see some strange things.

 

Our first (and last!) ever cock-fight – what an experience. Apparently Puerto Rico is one of the few places world-wide where this is legal – and it’s b...i...g money! Our ‘guide’ into this lifestyle can make $25000 to $30000 on a good night. That’s not peanuts by anyone’s standards. But it’s a ‘gentleman’s game’ – the bets are placed, and paid, with no strong-arm tactics, no cheating, no reneging on the debt – all paid immediately as they become due. Interesting. And it’s an all-ages event – little kids running around, grannies and granddads shouting the odds as loudly and as excitedly as the younger men – very fast, very loud, very exciting. But very messy and very unpleasant from the cock’s point of view – and I wouldn’t go again!

 

We also landed up in the midst of the most amazing horse event I’ve ever seen – the annual Paso Fino Horse Parade. We calculated there must have been 1500 horses taking part – no or very little organisation, just folks rolling up with their horses in the back of their pick-ups to join the parade – which sort of went from here to somewhere else and back again!

The horses are stunning, more slender and fine-boned than the usual horse, who move in this incredibly fast high-stepping paso fino trot, too beautiful to watch. Many of the riders ride bareback, no stirrups, no reins, just a blanket thrown over the horse’s back and two ropes placed through the bit in the horse’s mouth.

 

 

The riders are a menagerie of shapes and sizes. The horses are the attraction, but I have to say the riders are something to see too!

 

When we were here before, we’d discovered Puerto Rico is the pig-roast capital of the world! The juices had been flowing for days, both of us salivating at the thought, so we took off on a Sunday up into the mountains to go ‘pigging’ again. Wow, what a change from our previous experience! That had been mid-week, quiet, delightful. This was Sunday, and half of Puerto Rico was out eating. I don’t know how many pigs they slaughter per Sunday, but it was a good few dozen! Delicious food (and cheap), loud music (every stand had its own band!), jam-packed with people – what a buzz.

 

Puerto Rican time passed very pleasantly, it’s a beautiful island, but we needed to make decisions about when to leave for the next legs: Dominican Republic, then on to the south coast of Cuba. Well, the closer it got, the more we were both feeling somewhat negative about Cuba right now – add to this the fact that I was getting reports that my 93 year old mother was not doing too well, and the decision was soon made. John would stay aboard Al Shaheen, cruise the Spanish Virgins and I would make a quick flight (well, if you can call 46 hours flying quick!) back to South Africa to spend some time with Mom.  

 

So that’s what happened – I spent 6 weeks back in Johannesburg looking after oldies, chasing monkeys out of the granadilla vines, watching the warthogs browse at the bottom of my garden, taking Mom off to Durban to visit with her sisters for probably the last time and generally tying up loose ends, while John explored St Croix and the Virgins with Steve, a friend from Tortola.

 

Bad weather for Al Shaheen meant he lost the windex and the VHF antenna – it sheared off somewhere between there and somewhere else! So after a glorious sail across to Green Beach Vieques to collect our mail from Badgersett who had just got back from UK, and making a trip back to Culebra to meet up with Belle Brize at last, we hot-footed it back to St. Thomas for repairs. Spent Monday night in Honeymoon Bay at the drive-in – a sheet hung between two palm trees, popcorn and beers from the golf cart, a spectacular sunset behind if you don’t like the movie: it’s really hard to enjoy yourself in Paradise, you know!

 

Weather window looks like next week, so watch this space – we should be off to Bahamas soon!

 

15 January onwards (John)

 

Jenny left this morning from San Juan for six weeks in South Africa to be with her mother who is 93 and declining slowly. As a consequence we have cancelled our plans to go to Cuba and will now sail in mid-March from Puerto Rico or St Thomas to the Turks and Caicos, then the Bahamas and then into the USA.

Salinas (right) is a beautifully sheltered backwater on the south coast of Puerto Rico but with excellent road access to San Juan. After a week on my own there doing maintenance, I took advantage of the weakened trade winds with a SE slant and decided to sail the 100 miles to St Thomas in three stages. Firstly, I sailed 50 miles from Boca del Infierno (mouth of the inferno) to a beautiful beach anchorage at the western end of Vieques where I anchored off the deserted palm fringed beach with no other boat in sight. Wonderful in the setting sun. The next day I beat 25 miles slowly up to Culebra in a 15 knot breeze and anchored in another deserted anchorage behind a reef in Bahia de Almodovar.

 

The third day was a stiff beat 25 miles to St Thomas where I anchored in Honeymoon Bay and stayed over the weekend in order to watch the “drive-in” movie on the beach, sitting under palm trees with a white sheet between two palms as the screen!

 

Then followed a week at anchor in Charlotte Amalie painting the fore-cabin, which turned into a much bigger job than I had anticipated and rapidly had me bored and itching to go to sea again. Fortunately, an American friend, Steve, from Tortola came over and we spent 3 weeks sailing to St John’s, St Croix, Culebra and Vieques. I hadn’t been to St Croix before but it was a disappointment, partly because the weather was poor and the anchorage in Christiansted is very exposed. Still, we had a wonderful 50 mile broad reach from there to Culebra at an average 7.5 knots.

 

 

 

 

. . . where the water stretches out as far as the eye can see.

 

 

 

 

 

 

But the Ditch runs down a very narrow channel and woe betide you if you stray out! Lose concentration, move out an inch more than you should, and the depth alarm is screaming.And the water has gone from the crystal clear blue of the Bahamas and Caribbean to a frothy brown tea-coloured! Al Shaheen has a brown whisker all around the hull, which from what I remember is going to take some serious scrubbing to get off.

 

Every marker post is occupied. The ospreys have decided that the markers make for far safer nests than the trees in the area – certainly no predators can get close.

 

But what it must be like at night when these lights are flashing, I have no idea!

 

 

The parent ospreys are hard at work, some out finding food, some perched watching for intruders – and there’s great chirping and chivvying if your boat gets too near! They haven’t quite dive-bombed us, but they’ve come close.

 

 

As far as I know, there is an organisation that comes along and rebuilds the nests once the birds vacate, in order to encourage them to come back again the following season. But the boats must frighten quite a few off, as sometimes the channel runs very close to the markers. I guess that’s what you get for being in a choice neighbourhood!

 

Arriving in Norfolk, we are tied up to the Naigle’s Dock, right next to NOAA (weather gurus) and PETA (protection of wild animals??

 

I know they staged protests where they threw blood all over fur-coats, and had personal experience of their strong-arm tactics in a showdown with captured elephants in S. Africa), and under the eagle eyes of the US Navy – we’re surrounded by warships of all shapes and sizes here.

 

And we’ll be here for a while – repairs and maintenance calls on the one hand, and John is man-down sick on the other. So, time for some R&R, as they say. That means flat on his back in bed for him, while I wander the bookstores with his credit card!

 

 

May 2009

 

An offshore overnight passage from Florida to Cumberland Island, just to give us a break from the Ditch, then we whiled away some time on the island. Used to be a cotton plantation, many many years ago, Cumberland Island is very special – thick luscious palm greenery, wild horses, a national park with “basic” camping facilities (basic means no hot and cold running water and no shops!).

 

We rented bicycles, planning to do a 10 mile trip up island – well, after 2 miles along soft sandy, very sandy tracks, my thighs gave in and I bailed on the exercise! Made the side trip over the dunes (pushing the bike!) to the Atlantic side to see the horses, then rode down the harder sand along the sea shore. Needless to say, however, we both felt the pressure the next day!

 

The Man has turned 70! Doesn’t look it, doesn’t act it, certainly doesn’t feel it! (And I should know, shouldn’t I??).

John decided he wanted to be at sea for his 70th birthday, so off to sea we went – an overnight offshore passage from Florida to Cumberland Island, Georgia – we celebrated on board with Zoo biscuits specially brought back from South Africa!

 

 

 

Another overnight passage to Hilton Head, Savannah. These 180-something mile hops out to sea make a nice change to driving down the ditch and watching we don’t go aground!

 

We passed the Brazilian Navy on the way in – the US Coast Guards were out in their ribs, machine-guns on the bow at the ready, chivvying us all out of the way, but the Brazilians took great delight in waving as they past! Apparently the International Task Force (who’re they???) have been conducting serious manoeuvres, as we have been hearing them on the VHF for the past few days. “Warship 321 calling Warship 309, go channel 21 alpha.” Of course, they’re always channels we can’t hear – love to be a fly on the wall!

 

 

So into Savannah, and another experience awaited us. Through the OCC, we’d contacted Harvey Geiger, who’d offered us the use of a free dock in his gated community, Wexford (right). Little did we know that Al Shaheen was going to be sitting amongst the rich and famous – never has she had such a cushy berth! Bit dicey getting in though: Wexford has its own lock system just off the creek, once again very narrow (once again very shallow – we went in at 0.2 under the keel), but once we were in it was WoW!! Croquet lawns, glorious mansions – Harvey collected us for lunch in his olde Bentley, polished and chic. Boy, this is the life.

We spent several days in Savannah, staying with old friends at Hilton Head and doing the tourist thing. In fact, between Savannah, Beaufort S Carolina and Charleston, we have been soaked and saturated in Civil War stories and history! It’s been a most interesting and stimulating experience. Also a great pleasure staying on land with Alun and Margaret – the first day I got not only a bath, but a spa bath! Boy, life on the boat is never like this!

And we shrimped out every day, every night – I thought I might say I’d eaten enough shrimp, but no – there’s always room for just one more!

Back into the Ditch again, another 35 odd miles up to Beaufort – that’s Bew’fort S. Carolina, not Bow’fort N. Carolina! Again, friends from the OCC gave us the use of their dock at the end of their garden – we’d met Alan and Cathy in Maine last year, and it was a great pleasure to spend time with them – and all the friends and neighbours! Alan’s a pilot with his own small plane – in fact I think he was sorry we didn’t want to just ‘hop down’ to anywhere!! Both John and I keep reiterating how good an organisation the OCC is: we have met some amazing folks through it, and had some incredible hospitality here in the USA. Houses on offer, car keys handed over with no question, showers, laundry, shopping – people can’t do enough for you. Wonderful like-minded adventurous folks!

 

We borrowed the Rae’s “car” to do the touristy thing in Beaufort– an olde banger that at some stage has been completely painted grey – and I mean completely! The chrome bumpers, the door handles, every single spot that is not glass window or rubber tyre has been hand-painted a uniform shade of battleship grey – was that a Confederate statement or was the guy in the Navy???

 

Anyway, she goes like a cracker – so long as you turn off the air-conditioner before putting her in gear: no power otherwise! And the bench seat in the front no longer moves, so if you’re short you have to have a cushion to sit on. And every time you open the door it feels like it’s going to break off, protestingly! But she’s a classic, and a great ride – although she does draw some strange stares when you drive her through some of these very upmarket gated golfing communities!

 

Up the Ditch again from Beaufort S Carolina to Charleston, then on via a couple of stops anchoring just off the main drag until we got to the inlet at Wynah Bay where we planned to do the next overnighter, this time to Beaufort N Carolina. John had talked of maybe getting in the water and washing down the hull a bit – it gets very stained in the tea-coloured water of the ICW – but after passing a flurry of rather large alligators on the banks, decided another day would do better! There’s been a huge variety of birdlife along the ICW; ospreys nesting in the marker buoys, lots of various terns and gulls, red cardinals, and dozens of little things that I cannot recognise. As my son Garth will tell you, I am not the world’s best ornithologist!

 

The weather is definitely changing, and I don’t mean just that it’s getting colder! So often know the conversation revolves around “It didn’t used to be like this” or “It’s not supposed to do this at this time of the year” – global warming or what? And for years I’ve heard this term “cold front” – we’re always running to get away from a cold front chasing us or running to avoid a cold front coming in! But for the first time I actually SAW a cold front coming in – the most frightening mass of broiling black clouds, a long sausage-like accumulation right ahead of us, bearing down on us at the speed of a freight train! Fortunately it was a narrow front, and the big winds and gusts and squalls were short-lived that time.

 

But right now we’re in Oriental, N Carolina, once again hunkered down waiting out a cold front! This one arrived yesterday afternoon, and will be over us for at least another 24 hours – lots and lots of rain, some wind but not too bad – and enough cold that John is right now commissioning the diesel heater in the boat!

 

Still, the cold nights make for warm sleeping!

 

 

September 2009

 

End of the season! It’s finally here – haul-out day and the end of the season. Sad day in one way, but you know what – after 10 months at sea, I guess it’s time for some land-stuff now! And Murphy’s Law, we had some of the best sailing of the season over the last few days – nice gentle winds so we could fly the spinnaker with abandon, beautiful sunny Maine days, crisp and clear (no fog, WOW!!).

 

We meandered along no major pressure to go anyway or do anything, except what came naturally.

 

We popped into South West Harbor – great to see the site of ye olde wedding – and great to meet up with some old and some new friends again all along the Maine coast. Lots of socialising, lots of chatter: that’s been the name of the game lately. Perry Creek – a mini OCC port officers’ rally aboard Al Shaheen, the only non-port officers! And gosh, we met up with John McLeod again, last seen in 2006 up in Nova Scotia teaching his wife to drive his new motor boat!!

 

Winter Harbor, Seal Bay, Cranberry Island – a great dinner with another crowd of OCCers, another mini rally. Then an invite to the CCA Rally and a wonderful spread put on by Susie Hohner (we met her with the Marvins back in Newport in 2006, another raucous evening!). Swann’s Island, in one of my favourite harbours, Burnt Coat, serenaded by the singing pirates drumming up support for the evening’s show of Sweet Chariot. Put on each year by a contingent of professionals from all over the country, we watched a show of international standards – all under the leaking roof of an old community hall they’re trying to salvage. Wonderful spirit.

 

Our last night was spent at Carvers’ Harbor, small (very small!) working lobster boat harbour, no room to anchor as everywhere was swallowed up by mooring buoys. But a welcoming lobsterboat gave us a mooring for the night, and we swung very close to all the others all night long. But quite safe. The same lobsterman came over later, and sold us lobsters fresh from his boat - $4 each!! Best price so far in Maine. He also gave us a crate to keep them in, tied off to the boat, hanging in the water just next to us. All very civilised, dinner on a string. We spent the day in town exploring, gave the lobster crate a put to check all was well when we got back on the boat later. We’d been hearing all sorts of stories about the drama at Matinicus Island – lobster wars, territorial fighting, lobster traps being cut, boats being sabotaged, houses being burnt, and finally the “guilty” encroacher being shot.

 

All very Old Wild West!

 

So, giggling somewhat about all this, John put the water on to boil for the corn and lobsters, put the butter on to melt, and went to collect the lobsters from the crate. Oops. Someone had not only stolen the lobsters, but taken the crate as well! Very carefully and quietly untied the rope while we were aboard – was this a message to us as the lone sail boat in the lobster fleet – did someone think WE had stolen their lobsters and crate?? All very mysterious. But the lobsterman was very concerned – offered us a crate-full of crabs in replacement!

 

Then a last, final gentle spinnaker run back to Camden in order to haul out at Wayfarer. I can’t say I enjoy haul-out time – so much clearing out and emptying of lockers, chucking out of food (although we had pretty much eaten ourselves out of house and home!), deciding which clothes to take and which to leave on the boat. It’s always an issue that – I can never remember what I’ve got where – and always want to wear the one outfit that is sitting somewhere else! The Bruces very kindly gave us the use of their “west wing” for a week or so: bliss to have a shower and a decent bed to fall into at the end of each day! Much backwards-and-forwards discussion about getting Al Shaheen repainted – huge job, John is insistent on being present when it’s done, it all comes down to how to fit it all into our schedule of UK, SA and USA!

 

But finally it’s all done, boat’s clean as she can be, all is packed and sorted, and we’re on the plane back to a “Family Celebration” – a week in Devon with 19 family members – wow!

July 2009 (cont'd)

 

Gosh, it’s almost time to haul out already! How time flies when you’re having fun. We’ve decided the real translation of the word “Maine” is “fog” – there have definitely been more ‘fog’ days than not since we crossed the border! We’ve used up all the gas in our gas foghorn, and John is now having to resort to blowing the ‘trumpet’ old fashioned style. Travelling from Port Clyde to Camden – 5 hours in pea soup whiteout - there were a few others doing the same.

The sound of seagulls squawking has been replaced by the mournful feeble drone of sailors blowing their own trumpets! Even the osprey chicks are joining in – frantic chirping from the nests to desperately remind their parents where they are at dinner time!

 

Of course, there are zillions of lobster pots to be dodged – but the upside of that is lots of lobsters to eat. Who can really complain of a state where lobster is cheaper than chicken?

 

However, when the fog DOES clear, Maine has to be one of the most beautiful cruising grounds in the world – pristine little harbours and coves by the hundreds, all begging to be explored and gunk-holed.

 

And, for us the most appealing, predominantly deep water! And of course, we’re back in the land of tidal range. Gone are the days of the Caribbean when the difference between high and low was at max one foot – now it can be a good twelve – fifteen foot range. Does leave some folks high and dry!

 

We took the ferry out of Port Clyde across to the artist colony of Monhegan Island, as there’s very little room to anchor safely there. Well worth the $32, as the Captain took us to watch the seals on the way there, and then did a circum-navigation of Monhegan on the way back, and a young ornithologist on board took great delight in showing off the gannets nesting on the dramatic cliff-faces, and flocks of arctic terns. We’ve had a plethora of bird-life, especially ospreys, herons, cormorants and gulls – I’m sure there are several types of the last two, but couldn’t tell you which was which! I just know they swarm around the lobster boats when the pots are being pulled and all the not-wanted fish life is being thrown back into the sea!

 

Monhegan is a delight: probably only 40 odd (some very odd!) folks live there year-round, but a lot of artists spend their summer months painting and sculpting, which gives it a very different feel to the usual lobstermen/fishermen working feel of most of the Maine islands. Lots of galleries to visit. And as 80% of the island is nature reserve, many trails and paths to walk and explore. Unfortunately it had been raining for a couple of days and the trails were waterlogged, so we didn’t get very far! But we did make it out to Jamie Wyeth’s home, stark on the headland. I’d spent the previous day in Rockland doing the Wyeth exhibition at the Museum, so was intrigued to see some of the settings. Certainly Jamie’s gulls were in full throat – suddenly his Seven Deadly Sins series came to life!

You do realise though how difficult it is to live on these isolated islands, when you realise the only way to get stuff is by unusual transport – the ferry obviously brings groceries and mail etc, but anything heavier has to come via ex-Vietnam era landing craft! Some of the islands, like Matinicus, are almost impossible to land on by boat, so access is by small plane only – the islanders are a tough, hardy breed, and visitors are rare! Big puffin colony though.

 

It had been Wyeth day in Rockland, as I also got to see the house above Maplejuice Cove where Andrew Wyeth (father) painted his famous series of Christina Olsen – I’d not appreciated Christina’s World until actually going there! Here was this crippled woman (he painted her crawling through a field of grass towards the house on the hill – very poignant – but walking through her house and being in the kitchen (her world) was very moving. And a little eerie??

 

Camden Maine was as good as always, made the better by visits with Doug and Dale off Bluewater and Paul and Marty – hosts last time we were here. Interesting though – I did find myself spending far less time in the fabulous bookshops here and far more time checking out the baby shops – John’s complaining that we’ll need another suitcase to fit the baby stuff in – that’s what happens when there’s a promised grandchild 9 years after the last!

 

Camden, like so many other places, was foggy when we arrived. Very foggy. And we took off in the dinghy headed for what we thought was the Yacht Club to meet the Bruce’s – only to have to ask a moored boat “Which way to Camden?” Coming back in the fog later that night was quite a circus! This fog is not fun.

We have met up with some fascinating folks here in Maine, and spent many delightful hours swapping yarns and sea stories! Peter and Marina in Wiscasset, on Sea Bear: Peter has taken Sea Bear 125 000 nautical miles, mainly single-handed – that’s a lot of travelling! Dana and Martha in Maplejuice Cove – we met them on Sarah Jane back in Culebra way back in 2007, and have only just now caught up with them again.

 

John and Sue are new friends, met over chowder at Port Clyde, New Yorkers on vacation. Non-sailors, but we’ll forgive them that! Not to mention all the folks on boats we’ve been sailing with: sometimes we sail in tandem for a few days, sometimes we meet up unexpectedly in a little cover somewhere, sometimes we actually plan to meet!

 

Bluewater, Daq Attack, IWanda, Evening Star, Blue Yonder – not to mention all the radio net folks, dispersed now between Sallyander back in Deltaville to Belle Brize down east in Roque Island.

 

The OCC NE radio net is going well: some days there are only a couple of stalwarts around, other days John has 10-12 boats answering the call to check in. It has evolved into an information net, as well as a ‘where are you’ check, which hopefully the people using it find invaluable. Lots of available mooring positions being passed on, information on favourite coves to visit, rendezvous to make. Very useful net. Just a pity more of the folks out there sailing don’t make use of it.

 

One good thing about being fog-bound is that some more jobs get done: this has definitely been the fix-it season, this one. John’s had to replace seals in the heads, both of them, at least twice – nothing worse than wet feet when you flush the loo! And the propeller seemed to be fouled, so John bravely squeezed into his 1972 wet-suit and spent a very short, very cold, period down under the hull checking it out. I stood on deck in full foul weather gear! Took him a couple of cups of hot tea, a hot shower and a brisk rub-down to get his circulation back!

 

We’ve added a new AIS system (for identification), a new VHF radio which gives us a cockpit command module as well – so much better in any kind of emergency to not have to dive below to talk on the radio! And upgraded the radar and chart plotter – bought the latest cruising guides for Nova Scotia and Newfoundland – we’re set to go.

 

Right now though, we’re off to brave the clearing fog through Fox Island Thorofare, maybe aiming for Perry Creek tonight. But who knows? Plans change!!

July 2009

 

It was time to get out of Huntingdon – while we were having dinner with Charlie and Julie Weaner (the nicest OCC Port Officers on Long Island Sound), there was an almighty storm - winds up to 60 knots that caused at least 3 boats to drag and crash into others, and shredded several spinnakers – quite a mess (see below)! So we took off for points further north, doddering around until 4th July.

 

The best place to spend the 4th July has to be in America! Friends, fireworks, festivities, food – everything that goes to make for a great day. Especially when you’re travelling with a British-flagged boat on the day the Yanks declared their independence from Queen and country!

 

We spent this 4th July with great friends Stan and Julie in Pocasset, anchored at the bottom of their garden. They had a houseful of guests, lots of young ones, and the name of the game was combining everyone’s talents to decorate the float for the Pocasset/Wing’s Neck 4th July parade.

 

 

 

Stan was banned from winning this year, as he takes the prize every time (in the name of his young grand-daughter of course!).

 

But it was a good show of co-operation between Brits and Yanks – just shows it can be done!

 

From Pocasset through the Cape Cod Canal, spat out doing a fine speed of 10.2 knots over the ground! This time the exit was calm; the last time we hit wind over tide and it was a hairy few minutes fighting the bucking waves and big seas.

 

 

 

 

For the first time in ages, there was some wind, so the planned trip to Provincetown was abandoned for a sail through to Gloucestor – have to grab the wind when it comes these days! Of course by midday it died, and we motor-sailed in to tuck behind the breakwater wall for the night. Anchoring, as always, requires my being up on the bow, doing my thing. As my grand-daughter Jamie would say “Gosh, Nana, your butt does look big!” Jawellnofine, as we say in South Africa!

Next day Bentley on Salty Paws enticed us out on a grey gloomy morning by telling us about the glorious sunny sail they were having – we had a foul wet cold miserable cracking sail all the way to Richmond, with me muttering imprecations about never listening to other sailors about sunny days!! Richmond was cold and miserable, and we tucked behind the causeway for the next day or so. Somewhere along the way we cut through about 80 boats all under spinnaker, the start of the Marblehead to Halifax race. Quite a spectacular sight, although they were all only doing about 2-3 knots.

 

Portland was our next main port of call, and we spent almost a week in and around these environs. Once again met up with some great people – I find it is so special, all the incredible characters you meet travelling like this!

Like John Flood, ambulatory vet – has a practice in town, but twice a week or so takes his specially fitted motorboat/surgery out to the outlying islands and sees furry patients ‘on the fly’. What a brilliant idea!

And some fancy machines. Huge fishing boats in the harbour, some beautiful sailboats! These East Coast folks really do like their boats, and the designs are quite spectacular.

 

 

And some very interesting “other” boats – take a look at the guy who decided to combine his love of boating with his love of his Sunbird car! Quite a sight to see, a car screaming across the water!

 

We’ve just installed a new radio, one that gives us a second command mike at the helm. So we have constant entertainment from channel 16 – it is a circus sometimes! Like the recent one we listened to while cruising under spinnaker up Harpswell Sound, from the very panicked old lady who called up “anyone, anyone, we’ve run out of gas, help us.”

Coastguard did their usual efficient “Give us your position” call.

“Wait, I need to find my glasses first...We’re next to a little island, it has a white house on it...” Most useful in this environment of zillions of little islands with white houses on them!

Her husband was yelling in the background, she was getting more panicky by the moment, not helped by the Coastguard insisting they all put their life-jackets on and their (practical I thought) suggestion to drop an anchor.

“But please ensure the anchor’s attached to the boat,” says the CG – voice of experience obviously.

“Please hurry, it’s getting very bumpy out here!”

In the middle of complicated manoeuvres in getting a tow, her final comment was a querulous “Well, what’s life without a little excitement!”.

 

Of course we are decidedly eating our way through Maine at the moment – pigging out on shellfish whenever possible. Especially lobsters!

And it’s interesting watching the whole process – from dodging lobster pots (which are like confetti scattered on the water), watching the lobstermen pick up the pots, buying the creepy crawlies from the dock – to the final and most pleasurable part, the eating!

 

 

We’ll be pottering around here until we haul out mid-August, stuffing ourselves on seafood.

 

 

 

We do love Maine!

 

And even more excitement – we’ve just heard that my daughter Tracy is expecting her first – wonderful news!

 

 

 

 

 

June 2009

 

New York, New York!

A sea entrance a la the old emigrants past the Liberty lady, a skyline missing two towers, innumerable bridges, screaming sirens, an incredibly busy waterway with ferries, tugs, all sizes and shapes of tourist boats, garbage barges, motor yachts, sailboats, fishermen – oi vey, does this place make an impression! We eventually switched off the AIS system, because the alarms were screaming non-stop “Dangerous Target! Dangerous Target!”

 

But to backtrack slightly! We had a good rest in Norfolk, met up with a lot of other OCC boats who were making use of Gary and Greta’s dock facilities, did lots of fixing of things (including the engine which suddenly decided to give up the ghost!), and generally spent some good time with some great friends.

We took off for a few days to sail a few miles up the Chesapeake with S African friends Jan and Terry (left), down from a conference in Washington. Introduced them to southern hospitality on the Poquoson River – Stephen Ross Hogge, a “river hippie” as he terms himself, tipped a bucket-full of live blue crabs into our boat with instructions to “rip off th’ penis, rip off th’ back, rip off th’ face, shake out th’ goo and you’all got yo’sel sum good eatin’!”

 

John spent a hilarious half-hour trying to get these pincer-waving, nipper-snapping things out of the bucket and into the pot! Several escaped and hit the galley floor, creating some serious mayhem. Jan, who likes his food pre-packaged, neat and tidy, did a sterling job “ripping” the various bits off! But what a bargain, 28 blue crabs for the price of a promise to send Stephen Ross Hogge a postcard from some exotic place!

Back to Norfolk to re-provision for the OCC Chesapeake Rally – some 16 boats arrived in Fishing Bay for a few days exploration of the Rappahanock. The anchorage at Jackson Creek/Deltaville has a somewhat interesting entrance – the red and green buoys take you through an extremely shallow (for us!) channel which puts the boat almost on Mr. Benton’s front porch before making an abrupt turn to port – judging by the position of his porch chairs, he takes great delight in watching folks foul up!

 

We managed that one quite easily, but then had to call Towboat US out the next morning to haul us out of the mud. Several of the boaters had tried to assist – we had dinghies hauling down on the halyard to heel Al Shaheen over while Dovka steamed full ahead trying to pull us out – no chance, we stuck tight! Needed those big diesels to pop us off.

The rally was great fun – organiser Bob Crampton gave us some culture by getting us to museums and art galleries and providing some very interesting after-dinner speakers (see left!) but fortunately fortified us with a visit to a vineyard and some good cocktail parties too.

 

Sadly not much sailing – the weather wasn’t very kind, but the scenery was beautiful and encouraged us to come back.

 

 

We finally left all the fun and games behind, and motored straight out through the Chesapeake entrance, off to sea again bound for New York. Hoping for a sail! Thwarted hope, however. We motored in dead calm seas and 1-2 knots of wind for 30 hours, eventually deciding to take a break (from the noise of the engine more than anything else!) and overnight at Cape Henlopen on the Delaware bank. Quiet night, except for the weirdest noise for several hours – audible when we were down below, but not when we were on deck, it sounded like either frogs or myriads of birds settling in for the night – but why couldn’t we hear it on deck??

 

Then off again, once again motoring – occasionally in desperation John would put a sail up, but would furl it a short while later as it simply flogged around, doing nothing. Still, we got to play with our new AIS system quite a lot; quite fun being able to determine what that light off to port is! AIS, for those who don’t know, is the Automated Identification System, law for all vessels over 300 tonnes and being used more and more by smaller vessels too. It throws up a little purple triangle on our chart plotter for every target it finds. When you click on the triangle, it brings up all the information on that vessel: name, tonnage, destination, speed it’s going at, etc etc.

And sets off a very strident alarm when the vessel comes into your ‘danger zone’. Of course, the commercial fishing boats (who are a real hazard up the New Jersey coast) don’t have AIS – and no military vessels show up (for obvious reasons!), and only a few yachts like us have it – so you’ve still got to keep your wits about you and your eyes open.

And finally New York! Nothing much has changed (apart from the obvious missing towers); it still hums and throbs and buzzes, the city that never sleeps – not surprisingly, because the blanket of light that surrounds it blots out the stars completely!

 

The weather was foul, cold, pouring with rain – but it stopped enough for us to sneak in an outdoor concert.

 

Chuck Brown playing some foot-tapping hand-clapping fusion and blues.

 

Even the youngsters got into the groove!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And we had an unexpected visitor in the shape of my eldest son James from Vancouver, who sailed with us for a few days up Long Island Sound. Well, motored up part of it, then sailed for two days at least! He did a great job helming for the first time – I could see him on the first day going “This is a doddle” – no wind, flat sea.

 

 

 

 

 

Then the second day, the wind picked up, the sea kicked up, and suddenly he was having to hold a course in 25 knots of wind and doing 7 knots over the ground. Couple of moments of panic crossed his face, but all in all, I think he had a ball.

 

We’re off Huntingdon Bay Yacht Club (very nice, wifi, launch, showers etc etc – all for $45), waiting for John to see the dentist this afternoon – he broke a tooth eating potato chips! Well, also waiting for some wind! We’ve decided this motoring is for the birds, so we’re sitting tight until enough breeze comes along to sail. Then we’ll make for maybe Mystic or straight to Cape Cod – we’ll see.

 

May 2009 (cont'd)

 

The ICW has been a fascinating experience –

not one I would like to do regularly, as there are too many days of taut tense “driving the Ditch” and trying not to go aground - but also long days of absolute pleasure in the surroundings. The stretch up to Norfolk has been a lot like that: one minute it’s vast grassy wetlands, then it’s quiet secluded backwaters of green fairy banks. And lots of sounds . . .

 November 2009

John just stuck his head out and very seriously remarked "This is such a great life, isn't it?" I can only concur! Here I am, sitting in my brand new "love chair", lounging on the front patio in glorious sunshine, only the hum of bees and various birdcalls to break the silence (very occasional hurrumph from the lions, but being cats, they're asleep most of the day!) - using our newly installed wifi net to connect with the world. What a life! Of course, that begs the reality that we have to have wifi because the landline cables keep getting stolen, but why quibble??

 

John is, as usual out here, up to his eyeballs in projects: so far he has created new seating for our barbecue area, built a new barbecue, started a new toolshed (he got tired of the locals helping themselves to the tools in his workshop, so this will now be under armed guard!!), hung new curtain rails in the 2 bathrooms, collected and carted 2 loads of sand, 14 poles, one load bricks and one of manure - the latter being direct from the cows on the neighbour's property, under their noses so to speak.

 

 

 

Bit of a problem when the bakkie got stuck in 18" of wet cowsh...t, but a few good pushes from our local crew got it slurping along merrily again.

 

 

 

 

Also extended the front patio(below right), covered it with new lattes and shade-cloth - he's been a busy boy! And is now busy putting electricity (limited!!!) to 2 of the staff quarters - the third needs solar power as it's too far away from any electrical supply.

And just in case you think I've been sitting on my butt all the time - I've created a new veggie garden (5 metres by 8 metres with 5 separate beds), dug down to 2ft, composted and manured and planted - we ate our first lettuce for lunch today and the tomatoes are going rampant!

And moved 32 trees so far - that is, dug up baby ones from elsewhere on the property and replanted in appropriate places. It's always a bit hit and miss explaining to the locals here - they look at you with great willingness shown, lovely black faces breaking into great white smiles when you say "OK?" and much nodding of heads and grins of agreement - and then go off and do something completely different!!

But with such enthusiasm you really can't complain - I mean, so what if a proposed 10" hole turns into a 6ft deep pit - it's only a hole isn't it??? Find something big to bury in it!

 

And of course I've had my 94 year-old mother to look after (I bring her out to the farm in 3-day doses - anything longer than that and both of us are ready to kill each other!), and the two grandkids to fuss over as much as possible - ballet, horse-riding, scouts, just general living.

 

There's just so much for a Nana to get involved in!

 

And cat-fights to monitor - had to salvage a feral cat from the claws of my own FatCat the other night - although FC's feeling the effects of trying to do the pugilistic thing today - at 8 yrs old, he's not exactly in the prime of youth anyway and his painful progress around the room today shows it! And my pregnant daughter to organise - she's still teaching and hubby's flat out at work, so somebody had to take on the job of moving them!

 

Talking of moving, the roads here in Johannesburg surrounds are an absolute nightmare - everywhere has been torn up, is being torn up, is being (supposedly) rebuilt, all for the 2010 World Cup soccer event in June next year. The resulting chaos has people getting out of cars and walking to work because it's faster!! Any 30 min trip now takes a minimum of an hour, if you're lucky. I spent 35 minutes and moved 300 metres across a bridge the other day - none of the traffic lights work, so everything is a 4-way stop (which the local black taxis treat as their God-given right to blast through anyway!), there's a breakdown or a bumper-bashing every 500 yards or so - it all makes one long to be back on a boat on the open seas.

 

And fit in a trip to the Kruger Park to do some serious animal watching - first time in years! And a couple of 60th birthdays - such youngsters! And a Canopy tour - more adrenalin than us oldies need, but I had to check it out for the grandies' Christmas present!! The things we do for our kids. Needless to say, we're running up to Christmas and the chaos/enjoyment that brings, 28 for Christmas lunch being a starting point - maybe 2010 will be a bit calmer. She says in hope!