Sailing around the World ( presently in the Coco's Keeling Islands )
A Lady
Stephen Hyde
Fri 24 Sep 2010 03:20
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THURSDAY 23rd
SEPTEMBER 2010
We all got out of the scratchers early as we were
taking the twice weekly ferry from D.I. ( Direction Island ) to Home
Island,
In fact 1/2 the fleet got the ferry , which arrived
at the jetty at 08.30hrs on the nail.
Neil dropped us ashore to catch the ferry as he was
remaining on the boat at D.I.
The Ferry was an Aluminium standard type motor
launch, but had jet propulsion, mostly because of the shallow nature of the
whole Lagoon.
We arrived at Home Island 25 minutes
later.
Skipper, Aileen and Terry walked south to " Oceana
House ", not very far as it turned out. This house was the original
residence of the
Clunie Ross Family who originally owned and ran the
Islands up untill the 1950's when the Australian Gov. bought them out for
$6,000,000.
The house is now owned by LLoyd & Avril, we met
Avril on the Ferry a couple of days ago on our way to West Island, and she
invited
us to visit their place the next time we were on
Home Island. So here we are ....................
The place is in an afull state, a fine big
residence of a colonial style. but left run down over the years by different
owners
and now Lloyd and Avril were in the process of
renovating the place. Ohhhhh MG, what a job they have on their
hands.
We spent an hour talking to the 2 of them, and got
a facinating storey of how they came to buy the place. Of course most of
the exotic plants
that were in the grounds of this house , are now in
the grounds of other houses. and their biggest problem is stuff getting nicked
every time they
go away to Australia for a
while. And these are Muslims living here, so stealing
and robbery is commonto all religions.
Later, when we were finished at the house, Aileen
walked back to the village, and Skipper and Terry did a walk around the whole
Island,
an interesting thing , we came across a good number
of chicken farms on our walk, and yet they import all their eggs from
Australia
and as a result are about six times the price of
eggs anywhere else. and a head of luttice could cost as much as
$15.......
Anyway, the place is still beautifull, it is still
another paradise, despite the few little things. We love it
here.
Midday. Skipper and Terry returney to the
Village, where skipper posted some photo's on a memory stick to " Oyster Marine
"
which hopefully they will publish in their next
Magazine,
The return Ferry to D.I . was at 2pm , so we
collected all our pre ordered food, fruit and veg from the
supermarket
and carted them down to the Ferry pier.
Skipper then ran back to the fish tackle shop to
get some swivals, and even though this whole operation was fast, the Ferry left
without him.
It pulled out as he ran down the quay wall, waving
like a lunatic, but off it went, bye, bye,
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh feck! what now,
no more Ferrys to D.I. untill
Saturday. wahhhhhhhh.
Next thing............. " Hellow Stephen
" two of our German friends from DESTINY had travelled up to H.I. and were
now about to return to the boats,
timing is everything,... " Ahh you miss
ferry, vould you like lift back to A Lady " Would
I blooming what ! Thanks lads, and all aboard their
rib and had a pleasent trip back to the
boat..
We then spent the next hour or so storing
away all the goods and making the boat ship shape.
Aileen, Terry and Neil all went ashore for the
daily swim on the Island, under the shade of all those beautifull Palm
trees, swimming with the
little Black tipped sharks............
Meanwhile the skipper cooked the corned beef for
tonights Dinner. We have Dave and Sue from " Voyageur " and
John and Jenny
from " Tzigani " joining the 4 of us for dinner
tonight, at 6.30pm
Dinner tonight :- Starters,
prawn cocktail and Melba toast,
Dinner, Corned Beef and cabbage with creamed sweet
potatoes and normal potatoes mixed .
desert, Aileens boat made Coffee and Walnut
cake,
Not a crumb left, so we assume all enjoyed the
feast, not to mention the wines and coffee's
22.30 hrs, Our guests departed in breezy
conditions and got soaked going back to their boats. the rest of the night was
extreemly windy, with matching rain for good measure.
The scratchers
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Thats all for now.
Signed :- Stephen
Hyde ( Skipper )
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