From the Pitons of St. Lucia to Bequia what a sail. Winds were ESE at 16 knots, seas were 5 - 6 feet and, with a slight reef in our repaired, batten-less main and a reef in the jib we flew along only occasionally dropping below 8 knots. Waves were flying over the boat and we were laughing at the waves as we read and observed tucked snugly in our cockpit enclosure. A couple of biggies went right over the top of the enclosure, wow. I can't image how wet we would have been without it. It would have been a foul-weather gear trip. Instead with the autopilot steering, we read, watched for porpuses, whales, birds, turtles and other boats. A really great sail. Lucky Bird's bottom is clean, the prop works, the watermaker is putting out 8 gallons per hour and the wind generator and solar panels are helping run the fridg. Ah, back to normal.

Today we'll check-in with customs and immigration and begin touring. My sense is we will stay hear at least through the week end. The forecast is for very strong easterly trade winds, 20 to 25 with higher gusts. Just might be a good time to beach it, do some more touring and do a few small boat projects, you know, varnishing, polishing, cleaning, stuff like that.

Bequia is part of the Grenadines, a collection of small islands between St. Vincent and Grenada. We plan to touch them all and then continue south to Grenada and then over to the ABC islands. That's Aruba, Curicao and Bonaire. But that's still a month or so away so for the here and now it's time to get in the dink and go explor'in.

By the way, IT RAINED YESTERDAY!!!! hurray. Believe it or not Alice woke up around 04:00 to the sound of gentle rain. We did the hatch drill and both us were thrilled to hear the sound of rain once again. Its been since Antigua since we've had any rain. It washed off the dirt from St. Lucia, some of the remaining ash from Montseratt and the caked on salt. Oh for just a little more; maybe with this upcoming weather change we'll see some Atlantic moisture come in across the Grenadines, I hope, I hope.

Meanwhile the water is beautifully clear and so, so warm. Yup life's still good aboard the s/v Lucky Bird.