A Lady - Sailing around the World,

Sailing around the World,

A Lady

Stephen Hyde

Sat 14 May 2011 22:46

THURSDAY 12 MAY 2011

Well, this morning was just beautifull , clear blue skies full of chattering gulls looking for their early

breckfast, mostly at the expense of the Pelicans,

Its facinating to watch the pelicans flop ungracfully out of the sky into the sea to collect their fish , and usually

accompanied by Gulls trying to pinch their catch,

Aileen took off early to St. John's , meanwhile Ian and Skipper motored 20 minutes in the Rib

over to the Cat Club Marina in Falmouth Harbour to collect the emergancy Pass port, it had eventually arrived at

" Antigue Rigging" the trip was fairly bumpy and we observed many Turtles on the way, but at least it was dry and sunny,

we had lunch in Falmouth Marina before returning to English Harbour , topping up the rib's feul tanks with 20L of gas ( petrol )

and heading out to " A Lady " at anchor in the outer harbour,

Ian hauled Skipper up the mast once more to finish fitting the " loud Hailer" a difficult enough task as the boat was continually

rolling in the swell, imagine trying to connect all the electrics while trying to hold onto the mast with your legs at the same time.

when it was finished we tried it out and walla!............ it worked perfectly, ohhhh, happy bunnies again,

Then in relaxed conditions, we scrubbed down the Starboard deck , well Ian did most of the scrubbing while skipper

did the puffing and panting, well someone has to do it , right or as our Black taxi driver in Montserrat used to keep saying

in his deep southern accent " Posativee Maan " we can still hear him and repeat the _expression_ all the time to ourselves,

Later, we went ashore and had a few beers with Tom & Aileen, who had returned from her travels, then the 3 of us returned

to the boat and had roast chicken with creamed potatoes, and baked beans, simple and good,

We had an early night,

FRIDAY 13th MAY 2011

Skipper & Ian had an early swim, mind you everyone is up and about at 06.00hrs around here, as is the case in almost all the

places we visited on our trip around the world,

Then skipper checked his emails etc, still hoping that Michelle would have sent something, Skipper obviously said something that

got her knickers in a knot, and its still knotted, ahhh well , thats bleedin life, you cant please all the people all the time.

Aileen went ashore to get her hair done, Ian did some packing before we squeezed the " Parasail " down the hatch into the forward

cabin, Thats the first time that sail has ever been brought indoors, other than for some emergancy repairs,

That " Kite" has served us well, but as our trip to the states will just have the two of us on board, we will most likely NOT

use the sail again for a while, a long while.

Ian helped by skipper looking on, scrubbed the port deck today, and it all looks good,

When this was finished,we both went for a nice cool swim , actually its interesting here, the air temperature is 81 degrees F

and the water is 82 degrees F , but the water still feels nice and cool, or at least you dont burn in the water,

This was followed by an " A Lady" special G&T before going ashore to say goodbye to Ian, who has his emergancy passport

stitched to his backside for safe keeping , however, all goodbye's are sad affairs, but they always come , thats life.................

Later, Aileen and skipper met Tom and we toddled across the lawn to the friday night fish BBQ, and it was very good,

with lots of Rum and Thing, ( thing being a mixer )

but the weather was not looking good, lightning flashing away over the hills indicated what was comming down the track, yes,

more RAIN on the way, and murphys law, it just started to pour out of the heavens as we got into the rib,

We got saturated by the time we got back on board, but we dried ourselves and listened to some music while watching the skies

outside continously light up with lightning,, ohhhhhhhh what weather,

SATURDAY 14th MAY 2011

we had a late morning, like 07.30 get up. but the rain had stopped and at least the saloon windows did not leak as much as they did ,

so all the " Duct tape" worked to some extent, which is a bonus.

After the usual swim, skipper had to bail out the Rib once again, this is becoming very repetitive , but at least its dry and sunny, but

the weather forecast is not great, and we have a good swell in the harbour giving a nice rolling effect to all boats,

We hopped into the rib and motored ashore for a full " English Breckfast" at the lord Nelson's Hotel , the place closes tomorrow for

the season, so we decided to try it out, Ohh so funny............. this pretty little Humming bird flew onto our table, hopped up

onto the jar holding the sugar saches, pulled out one onto the table and kept picking it up and dropping it in front of skipper.......................................................open it you ejitt ! ............. so skipper did just that and straight away he scooped

up all the sugar with his long hooked beak , said thanks to both of us and flipped off away across the garden happy with his

injection of sugar for the day,,,, well we were gob smacked to say the least ! did you ever ................

We did a bit of scouting around before returning to the boat, Skipper polished up some of the S.S fittings on board while the First mate

got some washing and sun bathing done,

We relaxed and took our time with all the bits we had to do including looking closely at our dates for going up to N.Y.

and onto New Hampshire for late July........ gosh, where does time go !

dinner tonight on board will be Meat potatoe cakes, and if skipper has his way, baked beans, and an early night,

You have it all there for now.

signed :- Stephen Hyde ( Skipper 0