Pajamas, night clothes, sleeping clothes, jammies, what ever you call them. I love them for lounging, but sleep in them? I have been working on this old tradition. It has been suggested to me by other boaters that sleeping in clothes is a good idea in the slim and rare chance of being boarded by pirates in the middle of the night. I know this to have happened to some other cruising friends, so for this reason I have been practicing. My god tho, the bunching of excess fabric and the heat, my god man, the heat. It is like wearing the damn covers! I continue to try and when I awake in the morning with jammies still intact, I beg for praise like a puppy. But like a puppy, this training will take time.
Onward, Skype.com. This is a VoIP service on the computer. It is just like talking on the phone in real time, but over the computer and it is free. Richard and I are on this system listed simply and Richard & Nicki Pendergast. Some of you may be interested in looking into it. It's just another form of communicating not only with us but with anyone and did I say it is all free, calls to anywhere free! Just tonight we talked with our friends who are anchored down in Grenada and it's a great system.
I failed to mention earlier, in the few weeks prior to coming to Florida, we enjoyed a few dinners with friends and family. Thanks to all who cooked for us (fabulous food) and for those who arranged to meet us at restaurants. Especially Mom, the day we flew here was Thanksgiving. She cooked turkey and dressing and all the trimmings. It was all very good and much appreciated since we will be missing the other Thanksgiving in Nov. Thanks Mom!
Chores: We still have a few. Yep the genoa is still snoozing in the V-birth. I forgot today was Tue. The real dread is wrestling the monster out of there, thru the cabin and out the campanion way. I'm sure we'll get it done tomorrow, we need the space up there for other stuff. I've been told that beer goes for 40-50 bucks a case in the Bahamas, need to stock up here and the paper towels and TP need to go somewhere. Richard wants to use the beer for trading, I just want to horde it. Anchors and their lines. There is the debate, all chain or combination chain and line. We have chain and line, some shake their heads at this. But you have to understand our situation. We draw 3 feet, we regularly anchor in very shallow water, and we do not have a windlas. Meaning we manually pull up our anchors. All chain is sometimes nearly impossible to pull up and other times just a pain in the ass, not to mention the strenuous work out. So the line/chain combo works for us. We detached the anchors and carefully placed them in the center of the dock, not the edge, done that before....SPLASH! Then we stretched out all the line and chain on the dock. We knew we had some frayed and weak spots in one of the lines and a rusty chain. Altho the rusty chain doesnt seem to be weak, it sure makes a hell of mess on the deck. The other line seems to be in good shape. So off we go to B.O.W.(Boat Owners Warehouse) in our hot new set of borrowed wheels. Thirty feet of new chain and 200' of new line and a new shackle was purchased. Also some plastic covered cable and new brass locks for making a dighy lock. Back to the docks batman! We began measuring the line where it meets the chain and measured out 25' increments. At each point we placed a different colored lock tie. This a tip I read somewhere, and I do love a good tip. Usually I am the one letting the anchor out and Richard calls out to me about another 20', come on, I'm a girl, I wouldnt know 20' if he stood in front of me, especially when that 20' is quickly running past. So the colored ties will help me to know how much is going out. Alternator. We also stopped by Jas Marine and Richard asked about an alternator. I am not one to talk mechanics, but I can repeat what I hear. He wants to upgrade to a bigger one to help keep our bank of batteries charged w/o having to run the engine for an hour everyday. I know he wants to find one about 80 amps, we have 40 amps. How am I doing? If he finds what he wants he'll give you an update on the boy stuff.
We are planning a trip down to Sailorman's in Ft Lauderdale in the next few days. Sailorman's is a large second hand and I'm sure third and fourth hand boat stuff store. Those who know me, know I love a good thrift store. It's fun to rummage thru and see what we can find. We have a few things on our list: paper charts, fishing gear and we are always on the look out for some butt bars. Butt bars is a stainless steel frame that is installed near the base of the mast to have something to lean your butt on for support while working in that area. It is only about waiste high and acts somewhat like a cage. I havent yet decided if these would help or hinder, so for that reason we just look for them rather than order them. Oh, Richard ordered a new chip for the chart plotter to cover all of Central America, for our purposes Mexico. We already have all the Bahamas and we also already have all the paper charts for the Bahamas. We need to get current guide books for both areas. Yes Obi-One Petr, I listen and heed your advice.
Okay, enough for now. Miss and Love you Rob.