Well, the thrill of Regatta in Georgetown faded away and we looked forward to my brother and his family visiting. Peaches and I moved the boat to a mooring ball in the bay near St. Francis Resort where they would stay. Sunday afternoon, into the dock they came, brought across Elizabeth Harbor by Greg, the son of the owners in his speedy boat (no wet dinghy rides for the company, at least not yet). This was the start of a very busy four days with brother Bob, Annie, Matthew and Andrew!

They'd just gotten into their rooms with a view of the beach on the sound side when it was time to go back down to St. Francis for a quick dinner. As we walked out onto the deck, there were Ken and Connie with Sally and Reto, getting ready to compete in the traditional Sunday night Trivia Contest. Brother Bob's wife Annie wanted to compete so we put our $4 down and started the questions with the other five tables as we ordered dinner from the bar menu. We had a slight advantage (two teen aged nephews with lots of trivia in their heads too). SO, it was a head to head competition with our friends and.....well, we didn't do bad, but didn't beat the OZ/LaDanza team. It was still fun, and an interesting way to get reacquainted with Bob and his family since we saw them last summer at home.

We completed the night with Matt and Bob trying to reteach me to play darts and teach Peaches how to throw them. "They didn't have these in the convent!" Peaches said. Bob said he thought she'd played quite a bit of softball, because when the darts hit the board (rather than the floor), they buried themselves! Matt and I were awesome, well, mostly Matt. They trundled off to their beds up the bluff. We went down to the dock and into the dinghy, back to Star of the Sea.

Back at the boat we both were acting like children at Christmas tearing into the package of mail he brought from the states (sent by her sister Susanne, from Buffalo). I can get used to no radio, no TV and even no phone while down here, but mail, the kind you hold in your hand is great. We got stuff to complete our income taxes and/or get them ready for Bob to mail back to Susanne in Peaches' case. The other thing brought to us in their suitcases was a replacement faucet for the Culligan water filter installed in the galley sink. This further purifies the water we make for drinking water, ice tea mix and for coffee in the morning. The old one broke about three weeks ago and with that open small water line, we couldn't pressurize our water tanks so water would come out the other faucets. So, for instance, when Peaches wanted to take a quick shower, I had to stand at the sink in the galley and catch the water from this broken pipe into bottles. So, normal things like washing your hands or brushing your teeth took two people, one to do, the other to catch the water overflow. I replaced it first thing Monday morning. What a difference. I noticed that we didn't use half the water we do now when you can just turn it on and don't need someone else's help.

We walked the beach in front of their rooms. Annie is a born artist with an eye for the unusual. This makes her a very experienced beach comber, finding little shells and corals we hadn't seen. She told us she has perfected the "Sanabel" stoop, the best position to see and pick up the shells in Sanabel Island, Florida where they vacation every Thanksgiving.

Starting Monday morning, Bob did his early morning run on the beach, managing to get lost on the trails a couple of times. Then he would take one of the resort's kayaks and paddle out to our boat for some real coffee (they only served instant coffee there). It was a tricky manoever to get out of the Kayak and into our dinghy so he could come aboard, but he managed. We went to see the small blue hole and feed the fish, first with Bob, then with the boys and finally, with Annie. We then motored, very slowly and carefully (five big people in a small 10 foot dinghy) down to hamburger beach where we had lunch at Alvin's Beach Bar......all in Bahamian time. I might have used this phrase a time or two, but it means when you order lunch at 12:30(before you walk through to the great shelling beach on the sound), and you get server at about 2:30, it's okay. After all, where are you going to go so fast?

We had lunch eventually, talking to lots of others and got over to the beach. Doreen and Rick were there from Breathless, going for their daily walk for shells for her next jewelry masterpieces. We also ran into Jonathan from Calypso who beat us in the race last week. Bob said, "You know everyone around here". That was when I realized that Peaches and I (and all our friends) are the cruisers we were worried about turning into last year (you know, the ones who go to trivia, Texas Hold Um Poker, the regatta races, the dinghy poker run...................). We have morphed. No longer individuals pushing the envelope to explore new worlds, just one of the boat people in Georgetown in the middle of winter enrolled in adult day camp, playing nice with the other cruisers. We all fell into bed exhausted and ready for another day in paradise.

Tuesday dawned clear and beautiful. We decided to let Bob and family run and explore the beaches themselves and Peaches and I did taxes. Whew, hard enough to do at home where all the papers are, but on a boat, with limited internet, it's a huge wall to climb over. We managed and when our papers were done, we checked with Bob. He has one of our VHF radios and is going by his old CB name of Albatross. It worked well, like a telephone conversation on a party line where everyone else listens in (while we are into nostalgia, you probably remember 8-track tapes too).

It was decided that dinner on the boat was the thing to do, so we invited Ken and Connie too. It was fun to get some nice appetizers together and I did a Moroccan Chicken dish in the pressure cooker. New potatoes topped the main meal off. A mixed frozen fruit cobbler was for desert. Everyone seemed to love it, as there were few leftovers. A pre-dinner game of Nufie Poker got everyone acquainted, happy, frustrated, and hungry. So, it was a success. In the light of a full moon, everyone had a nice dinghy ride home to the dock, and Connie and Ken back to OZ out by Monument (more about Monument Hill later).

It was Wednesday, their last full day in paradise, so we decided on a sail in Elizabeth Harbor on Star of the Sea. We were planning to leave the following morning at 0700 for Black Point, about 54 miles north of Georgetown. This is the start of the northward journey, ending up in Charleston, SC sometime in May. It makes me a little sad, but we have all of the northern Abacos to see before we cross back over the Gulf Stream to Florida. So, all the putting things away and making everything safe to use Star as a means of transportation rather than a home was dual purpose. The decks are clean, the generator put away, the dishes out of the sink into the cupboards and finally a big pillow is pushed in front of the flat screen TV.

Before we picked my family up and took off for the afternoon, we went into Georgetown one last time. Our propane tank was in to be filled, but wouldn't be back until later in the afternoon. A minor glitch. We loaded up with fresh vegetables and fruits (not many in the central Exumas, where we were heading), and came back to the boat. Ken, ever our friend and helper offered to go back over in the afternoon to get it for us. What a guy. SO, we brought Bob, Matt, Andrew and Annie out to the boat and took off to buzz OZ first near Monument Hill and then an about face and a nice sail out through the shoals toward Long Island. We went out to the sea, and then returned through the Harbor. We ate fruit and potato chips (you need something salty when you have that much fresh ocean air up your nose).There was lots of talking and joking and then we pulled up to the mooring ball, sort of like parallel parking a car, and were done. Dinner reservations were in a half an hour.

We had a nice sit-down dinner at St. Francis, the fresh Mahi-mahi was great. We took pictures and it was over way too soon. Peaches and I got hugs all around and then left for the boat. Bob and family would fly back out to Ft. Lauderdale and then Houston in the early afternoon, long after we left the harbor. We had one more thing to do, use the motor lift Ken fabricated from a 2x6x8 foot piece of treated lumber and some hinges. A dry run of lifting the outboard engine out of the boat and up on the rail in the morning when Bob was there went well, but we didn't really do it. As the sun was setting on the harbor, we go it off the boat, up against the rail and never lifted anything, pinched a finger, or shouted a command, it was so smooth! I'll get pictures of it when we do it again..........a real McIver tool to be sure!

Since I wrote this, I haven't had internet, but hopefully tomorrow. We are currently sitting in Staniel Cay, Piggy Beach. It is Saturday and we came up to Black Point from Georgetown out in the bounding sea on Thursday in about 7 hours. It was wonderful sailing, just perfect. We went into town Friday to do laundry (all the bedding that doesn't fit into the Whuppa-whuppa and more), get a haircut for Peaches, and walk through town. What a nice day. We all think we like this quiet, friendly town the best. The internet is free in the restaurant and bar and life is sweet. The town has few cars, lots of children, and 20 or so boats of cruisers who are renewing old friendships and not being pushed into an artificial network like in Georgetown.

We had our belated St. Patrick's Day feast of corned beef, cabbage and potatoes on OZ last night.................sooooo good! We played a round of Neufie Poker then took a crash course in Texas Hold-Um Poker from Connie. That is a very addictive card game! This morning Peaches and I took Star of the Sea to Staniel Cay and anchored in Piggy Beach. I used a lookey-bucket and checked the anchor so we could feel safe leaving the boat and going into Staniel Cay proper to fill 2 diesel cans and one gas can with fuel. We also took Peaches' scuba tank to be refilled in case she has to dive on the bottom of the boat or the prop. We treated ourselves to lunch at the Staniel Cay Yacht Club, so low key that it didn't matter that I forgot to throw my shoes into the dinghy when we left. So, bare footed, I had a Kalik and the best cracked conch that I've had in a long time. Peaches had another Gumbay Smash and a cheeseburger. What a nice time. The place was getting ready for the annual 007 Festival tonight, something that draws a lot of motor yachts and people flying in for the night of festivities (Thunderball was filmed here you know). It is also the night of the full moon, the fullest one in a long time (closest to the earth in many years). I got a picture of it early Friday morning setting at about 0530. It was brilliant, and looked more like the sun than the moon. Tonight should be almost like daylight on the water.

So, all is well on Star of the Sea, except I miss my family and feel a little homesick after their visit. We are heading home sort of, so as soon as we cross northeast over the sound to the island of Eleuthera (due east of Nassau), I'll forget the homesick feelings I am sure. A new adventure. Star of the Sea, Out.

PS: I almost forgot my reference about Monument Hill. My brother tried on three separate mornings to find the path up to the Monument from the beach. The first morning, he puffed his way up the sandy path, only to find the monument one hill to his left. The next morning, he bypassed the first trail and ran up another promising but very steep sliding hill of sand, only to find he was not there again. The third time was a charm, and he had pictures to verify his victory. I love my brother, but I sure do love to kid him. This was priceless!