Adventures with David & Gail

Vessel Name: Wildest Dream
Vessel Make/Model: Caliber 47 LRC
Hailing Port: Dallas, Texas
Crew: David & Gail Dodgen
Home Page: http://www.sailblogs.com/member/wildestdream47
15 June 2013 | Dinner Key Marina, Miami, FL
20 May 2013 | Dry Tortugas Nat'l Park, Florida
18 May 2013 | Dry Tortugas, Florida
14 May 2013 | Puerto Isla Mujeres, Q. Roo, Mexico
10 May 2013 | Lighthouse Reef, Belize
05 May 2013 | Guatemala
01 May 2013 | Ram Marina, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
26 April 2013 | Livingston, Guatemala
23 April 2013 | French Harbor, Roatan, Honduras
20 April 2013 | Le Bight, Guanaja, Honduras
18 April 2013 | Vivorillo Cays, Honduras
10 April 2013 | Providencia, Colombia
01 April 2013 | Providencia, Colombia
23 March 2013 | San Andres
22 March 2013 | Off Nene's Marina, San Andres, Colombia
12 March 2013 | Red Frog Marina. Bastimentos
10 March 2013 | Boquete, Chiriqui, Panama
10 March 2013 | Cruiser Casa, Panama City
10 February 2013 | Panama City, Panama
02 February 2013 | Red Frog Marina, Bocas del Toro, Panama
Recent Blog Posts
15 June 2013 | Dinner Key Marina, Miami, FL

My how time flies!

My how time flies! – Well, I must confess to being a little overwhelmed and getting mixed up into the real world pace again faster than expected. Here it is mid-June, we have been back in Miami for almost 3 weeks, back in our house for almost a week, and I have not updated the blog. My sincere apologies! [...]

20 May 2013 | Dry Tortugas Nat'l Park, Florida

Back in the US, kinda!

Back in the US, kinda! - We are on US soil! There is no immigration or customs office out here so there is no way to clear into the US. So we are kinda' illegal aliens! But we are flying our Q flag and no one seems to care. Or maybe they don't know what it means. Anyway, we are getting closer to [...]

18 May 2013 | Dry Tortugas, Florida

Isla and beyond!

Isla and beyond! - We stopped in Isla Mujeres to officially clear into Mexico, wait out some weather and do some provisioning. Actually US immigration really doesn't care about where we started from to reenter the US, and they don't ask for a Zarpe so we could have gone on to Florida without stopping [...]

14 May 2013 | Puerto Isla Mujeres, Q. Roo, Mexico

The last flag!

The last flag! - Having skirted along the outer cays and atolls of Belize, we headed north to Mexico. I went to the flag bag that we have been using for the whole trip to store our courtesy flags for each country and it only had one flag left. It was the Mexico flag. All the others had been used and [...]

10 May 2013 | Lighthouse Reef, Belize

Belize it or not!

Belize it or not! - Sorry. I could not resist! We planned an 18 month trip and we are now into the 18th month so it is time to head home. We have about 800 miles to go with Belize and Mexico yet on the itinerary. We could go nonstop or we could take our time. Or we could stop a few places as we [...]

05 May 2013 | Guatemala

Guate!

Guate! - The ride into Guatemala City, or Guate for short as the locals call it, takes you along the Rio Montagua river valley as it winds is way up to the mountains. The Rio Dulce is at sea level and Guate is at about 6000 ft. so the climb is steep at times. Plus it's mostly a rural two land road [...]

St. Thomas in the rearview mirror!

22 April 2012 | West End, Tortola, BVI
David
St. Thomas in the rearview mirror! - If you check main picture on this blog, you will notice two things. One, we are not in a marina and two we are successfully attached to a mooring ball! These are two things that we have had trouble doing the last few weeks!
Well, the repairs are done. In the end, it seems as though the fix of the rebuilt transmission boiled down to a very simple adjustment. Actually, the end of the output shaft need a few shims to move it a few thousandths to take up some slack. Go figure. The mechanics finally resorted to calling in a known tranny "guru" and he made the adjustment. It also helped that Gail went around the boat with a red bag calling "Go away, bad juju! Go away, bad juju!" per her friend Sheryl's advice!

Of course, when we went out to test the tranny, the engine cooling water was not coming out! Ugh! Maybe the juju shifted to another part of the boat. But we're tough! And we figured out how to finish the sea trial and later replace a broken seacock on the engine water. We treated the tranny pretty rough and shifted back and forth for over two hours. We felt pretty confident that the fix was in place. Maybe now the juju is gone!

So, since you never leave on a trip on a Friday, we spent one more day reprovisioning and running errands for a Saturday departure. We knew it was about time to leave anyway because we were getting to be regulars at the Laundromat, at the K-Mart, the Budget Marine, and other hot spots around St. Thomas. And we were getting invited to join some of the local boater's events around the marina.

Now we have finally left St. Thomas and are now on a mooring again in West End, Tortola. As Yogi said," It's like deja vu all over again". We are in a similar situation to the March 3 blog and the April 16 blog where we left Saga Haven and were on our way to the BVI's. But this time we are in a mode of making sure all the repairs are successful and everything is working. We have picked up 5 moorings successfully in the past two days!

This is a good time to thank everyone who made our last six weeks as enjoyable as could be expected considering the circumstances. First and foremost, our biggest thanks go to Georgeann and Jimmy for all their hospitality, the time spent together and the loan of the Jeep! We enjoyed participating in some of their events and got to meet a lot of their friends in the process. It made the time on St. Thomas almost seem like home. We really learned to our way around and saw the reason that St. Thomas is such a beautiful place to live.

Also, thanks to Jack and Merle Cohen and all the staff at Saga Haven for letting us hang around for the month. We were in a slip next to the fuel dock and met a lot of interesting folks as they came in to fuel up. We will miss (or not) all the steps from the parking lot to the dock and the lone "facility" in the marina.

Another big THANKS goes to the guys at All Points Marine especially Glen Kranig who did the repair. I am sure that their bill did not cover all the phone calls to find my parts. But in the end the bill was reasonable and the time required was probably in reason considering the location.

And finally thanks to a few of our new friends that we made over the past month like the staff at Budget Marine where we visited many times (sometimes more than once a day) getting stuff for our projects. Also Victor and Chris around the marina who helped watch WD while we were out. Grant, Neal and Landy at Tropicom who helped with our electronics issues. Evelyn at Custom Canvas who repaired our sails. And Jay and Ian at Island Rigging who repaired the boom and outhaul. And to Alli at East End Florists who found our lost phone at the movies. Sne found the phone, called the last number which was Mitch's. He gave her Georgeann's number (and they already knew each other. It's a small island) and we got it back! She really saved the day!

There were others we met as well but we did not get their names. Just a big thanks to everyone else.

I also want to thank my co-brokers in Miami who sold three of my old listings last month and some add on options to another boat that provided me with enough of a commission check to cover the expenses! I would have rather had the commissions without the expenses but the check really came at the right time. Thanks, guys!

Where next? Our plans are somewhat open but we will spend the next few days in the BVI's catching up on the places we missed the first time and then on to Anegada, the forbidden island, and points east.
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