4-15-09
We finally said our goodbyes to Hope Town this morning. After two months of spending most of our time on this island it was time to bid all of our friends Goodbye. We have made many and we will cherish their friendship as we travel on. It is just so hard to explain how open these people are to strangers and how much they give us with their kind and welcoming spirits.
We kept busy yesterday getting everything ready to travel again. First we had the bottom of the boat scrubbed. We were going to try and do it ourselves but without air tanks we can't make a whole lot of progress. Every time we get under water and down to the bottom of the boat we have run out of air and already floating to the surface because the water is so buoyant. So we hired the local dive shop to do the job for us. It took two of them about an hour to scrub the entire keel plus change out the zinc. It would of taken us days. And I for one would have drunk half the bay before I finished. My breath control is not too good and never even smoked. So what's my excuse?
Then we participated in our first annual dingy drift. It wasn't new to all cruisers just us. Several dingys from the cruising boats met in the harbor in the late afternoon, rafted up together and then just drifted. When we would get close to running into something or getting in another boats path we just started a couple of engines and moved (as a big blob) out of the way and then started drifting again. We had a couple of fairly large ribs and they became our moving machines. Everyone brought appetizers to share and their own refreshments. It was a lot of fun. Many dinghy's would come by and drift for a few minutes then move on or just stop and say hi as they were going to their already planned activities Not all dingys joined the blob.
Of course we couldn't leave without one more night of dinner and a movie. We went to the Hope Town Harbor Lodge and after eating our dinner we watched another episode of "Gary the Explorer" and then the movie "Marley and Me". What a neat movie especially for dog lovers or just anyone! It was a tear jerker but worth every tear. And Gary the Explorer is a great educational series that airs on one of the local TV channels. It is to help the school kids or everyone understand the ecological system of these islands and how it all works together to keep the land, sea and forest healthy and green. It is not manmade but God made, and it needs not be destroyed by the greed and selfishness of the people living on and/or visiting this wonderful place. They have a paradise here for a reason and it needs to stay just like it was created.
There was a light show last night. It started during the movie and became more intense as the evening went on. There were no sharp spikes of lighting but every flash lit up the entire sky. It went on for quite a while and finally the thunder started followed by buckets of water. It was only the 2nd rainfall we have had here all winter and the islands sure needed every drop. Since most of the water here is rainwater collected in cisterns, many of the island's inhabitants are very close to being out of usable water. So this rain was a well celebrated rain storm.
For the first time in a year, we are now traveling by ourselves. David had to fly back to Atlanta to deal with a family situation. So we are working our way back toward the USA. We will return to New Bern, NC sometime this summer but we do not know for sure when that will be. And even after we arrive in that area we are considering traveling around the Pamlico Sound for some of the summer. There are many places around there to explore that we were unable to visit last summer. So as of now nothing is written in stone.
We have some pictures of the dingy drift but they are not loaded off the camera as yet, so we will have to include that next time. This time I will include the picture of the Easter morning sunrise.