Things have gone about as expected so far. The flight down was great. The plane flew over several of the islands and we looked down at other boats anchored in that beautiful aqua water and said, "Yeah, that's us in a few days." We landed, they pushed the rolling stairs up to the plane, and we stepped out into the thick, warm Caribbean air, very much over-dressed from NY. That was the end of fun for a while.
One of Sue's bag's went missing, the same bag that Southwest managed to lose between Tucson and NY. Of course it was the one she wanted most as it had all her warm-weather clothes and personal items. Outside, the cabby said, "Where to?". I asked how much to Spice Island Marina. He looked at me for a long second, repeated the word marina, and said, "Ahhhhh, $40." I realized my mistake but it was too late. Tip? He just priced in his own tip.
We got to the boat around 4PM and opened her up. This has become a bit of a ceremonial event with us and all "Openings" are compared to The One back in '03 when we returned to Nova Scotia and found a carpet of mold and mildew thick and stout enough to challenge a weed whacker. This time didn't seem quite as bad. Sure, she smelled moldy but that was to be expected, wasn't it? The long streamers of cob webs and generous sprinkling of dead bug carcases would clean up fairly quickly, right? Hey, we're in pretty good shape here. Well we weren't but we didn't really have the time to find out. It was all we could do to get her in good enough shape to sleep in before dark. We couldn't run any lights or water as the batteries were flat. Sue was clever enough to bring fresh sheets which she fitted over very 'fragrant' cushions.
One bright spot was the fact that the marina has a restaurant overlooking the water so after a long dinner there, we returned to go to sleep. Closing the hatches was out of the question because of the moldy, stale air. Of course the marina mosquitoes know easy pickins when they see it. I managed to swat a few during the night but this was due more to sheer numbers than to my aim.
The next day I went to find out about the new engine being shipped from England. Long story short, it arrived 3 weeks before we did but the local agent gave customs the wrong address and now they say it will take 3 or 4 business days to put new paperwork together. That puts delivery off until next Wednesday at best.
Meanwhile Sue found the hidden mother lode of treachery the boat had been up to while we were away. We keep lots of canned and other food items in lockers below the berths. There, through the magic of biology, chemistry, and 10 months of time in the Caribbean weather, the various item combined with a dash of salt water, rain water, mold, mildew, and various assorted bugs bodies to form a brown pool of slimy muck so thoroughly vile that I can honestly say I have never seen anything quite like it before. Many of the cans had rotted right through and added their contents to the mire. The stench was intense and not unlike a smell of a week old dead animal on a hot summer day. The flies apparently thought it was great stuff as evidenced by the mats of maggots here and there. Sue almost threw up several times kneeling over and reaching into these lockers. Of course I would have loved to have helped her out with this hideous job but I was on deadline with some pictures I had shot for a client just before leaving and had to get them done quickly. Darn those badly timed photo assignments. Sue knew this and took it like a trooper but when I tried to close a partition to keep the smell away, she shot me a look that said my lack of sharing, however symbolic, was not a healthy idea.
It is now Saturday and after 3 full days, the boat is only half cleaned. There are still unexplored lockers to deal with. Coincidently, my Photoshop work is about half done. Darn those files take a long time to get right. On the plus side, the engine arrived after only one day. Go figure. Looks like we will install her on Monday. Luckily for Sue, I should be done with the photos by then.

The photo above shows how small AVOCET looks amongst all our neighbors.