The longer we stay in one place, the more anxious I am to leave. It is a mental state that I call “itchy butt”. The itch is now getting stronger with every day we are here in Simpson Bay Marina.

Each day I analyze the weather patterns of the North Atlantic and things seem to be in the process of settling down. Right now, it looks like the end of the month will be an ideal time to make to jump over to the Azores. Now, all we have to do is to have the pinion gear arrive and then inserted back into our starboard engine this week. I have my fingers crossed that will happen so we will be ready.

Mary Margaret continued her cooking quest today as she made numerous batches of cookies and then a big pot of chili. All are destined for the freezer so they can be taken out and enjoyed during the passage. It was so hot and humid today that with the oven and stove top blazing away, we had to run the air conditioner in the salon. It was the first time we ran it in quite a while. Since I was doing a few little projects out on the deck, it was wonderful to return to the salon and enjoy the coolness. Of course, in the middle of Mary’s cooking, the island had a power outage. Fortunately, it was between finishing the cookies and starting the chili so Mary Margaret opened up the windows and just waited until the late afternoon to start her chili. By then the power had been restored so the A/C was fired up again.