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Diane's DiarySeptember 10 Saturday The wind was much calmer the whole day today- around 15 knots and this is just the perfect amount of wind. We get a good breeze so it's not hot on the boat and plenty of amps as the wind gen seems to like this speed. However, at 7pm the wind increased back up to 16-18 knots and the wind gen started acting up again so Larry had to feather it- too bad as we were going to watch another movie too we had so many amps. We ran the water maker for 2 hours this morning and than left to go snorkeling. The water near our boat is green again- think it may have something to do with the tide but we're not sure. Last year it was blue but this year the green comes and goes. We went snorkeling from 11-12:30pm. It was OK- not as rough as previous days but the water was somewhat cloudy. I finished book number 11- Heat Islands. It was OK, interesting but certainly not the best book I have ever read. Anyway, we had loads of amps so at almost 4pm we watched the Disney movie "Treasure Island" based on the book by Robert Louis Stevenson. The book is certainly a classic but the movie was not up to the usual Disney greatness and it was only just fair. I would definitely trade this DVD. I made some black beans partially following Maria Elena's recipe but it didn't come out all that great. Anyway, we had lots of amps after we finished watching the movie so we ran the water maker for another hour until the wind increased and we had to feather the wind gen for the night. September 11 Sunday I made some bacon and eggs for breakfast and some bread this morning. The high voltage went off at 6:30am so I got up to shut it off, as Larry didn't hear it as usual. The high voltage alarm went off at 7:30am so we started running the water maker than. We ran the water maker until 9:30am when the tank was full. We went snorkeling to the outer reef near the old wreck in the water and it was very good. We saw 4 small moray eels and a huge lobster. Wish we could have gotten the lobster- we definitely need to get a spear gun to get these wonderful lobsters and other good fish! I found 4 conch but only two were large enough to keep. Larry opened them up in the dinghy when we got back to the boat so they wouldn't make a mess on Destiny. I got a crink in my neck from snorkeling in shallow water- this happened to me last year also. I had to lie down for a while and take an Aleve. I skinned the 2 conch we got and we had one for dinner along with some soup. We ran the water maker 3 different times today so ran it for a total of 3.5 hours. A few more boats came into Barlovento today so there's a total of 9 boats here however the nearest boat to Destiny is about a mile away. We thought for sure someone would come join us in the blue hole but thankfully no. I started reading book number 12- Angel of Death by Jack Higgins. I like this author a lot and have read a number of books he has written. September 12 Monday The wind is up again 20-25 knots from the E-SE today and the weatherman said it would be the same tomorrow. It's just too windy to snorkel out again. My neck still hurts and I have a headache so I really didn't want to snorkel today anyway. I finished book number 12- Angel of Death by Jack Higgins. I usually like this author but this was not one of his better books. It was fast reading and entertaining though. After lunch we watched the DVD "All Quiet on the Western Front" we got from Whitecap. At night we watched an old Indiana Jones movie-The Last Crusade- definitely a very good movie. We had to keep feathering the wind gen all day long and kept it feathered over night. September 13 Tuesday The wind has definitely abated. It was down to around 15 knots this morning and by the afternoon had decreased to around 12 - 14. I made corn muffins this morning and they came out great. I increased the baking powder in the recipe by another tsp and they rose more - don't know if the baking powder is as strong as we have at home or maybe it's just old but the recipe definitely needed more of it. We ran the water maker around 2 hours until it was full. Since I didn't take a shower yesterday and we didn't go snorkeling, we used a lot less water yesterday than a normal day. We went snorkeling around 10:45 but because it was still blowing strongly at that time, we feathered the wind gen as it was still freewheeling some. We parked the dinghy behind the wreck in the water but near the last reef closest to the blue hole. I found a conch, brought it back to the boat, went back out to the reef another way and found a whole bunch of conch! There was at least 20 conch! I picked out 8 really large ones - giant conch - some of the largest we have seen. After snorkeling, we went back to the boat and Larry opened them up in the dinghy. It took him about an hour to open up and clean all 8 conch. We had a late lunch and I spent the rest of the afternoon skinning all 8 conch- it took me about 2 hours! Larry said it gave me something to do. Now I know those of you at home can't imagine spending hours finding, opening, skinning and pounding out conch all day but this is some of the ways we spend our time on a cruising boat. Anyway, I don't really mind as I love conch and we normally don't see them very often. We can't buy it anywhere as there are no stores out here and we haven't seen any fisherman to trade with. I ran the water maker until it was full, another 45 minutes but before Larry took a shower so we ran it 2 hours 45minutes today. We had a big treat today! A school of dolphins passed close to Destiny leaping and doing tricks in the air. They were obviously fishing but what a wonderful site to see! Just marvelous! We had seen them last year also. Unfortunately, the dinghy was hauled up for the night so we couldn't just jump in with them or we would have. Also, they were moving pretty fast as they were obviously chasing fish. It was just a wonderful site to watch them! I hope we get to see them again. September 14 Wednesday Steph returned to Mima in Curacao today from the US and we spent a long time speaking with her on the SSB this morning. She told us all about Hurricane Katrina hitting the US and it sounds pretty bad. I really feel terrible for all those who lost their lives, homes and businesses. She said it would take 3 months to pump the water out of New Orleans. Unbelievable in a country as developed as the US that this could take so long to clean up! The authorities should be ashamed of themselves. She even told us Chavez donated oil to the US since many of the oilrigs were damaged from the hurricane. I bet that was a big public relations coup for him! The high voltage alarm went off at 7:30am so I got up to shut it off and started running the water maker. We ran it for 3 hours and it still wasn't full! I think Larry uses a lot more water than I do - especially since he insists on cleaning the snorkeling equipment every day! We went out snorkeling at 10:45 this morning to another spot on the outer reef but I didn't like it, as there were no conch and a big barracuda about 5 feet long kept following me the whole time. We did find an unusual conch that we didn't take as we have enough right now. It was very unusual and rather small. We looked it up in our fish book and found it was a milk conch, which the book said is uncommon. We had conch ceviche for lunch but we both didn't care for it. I don't know why- we like ceviche with other fish but the conch didn't seem to cook well here. I am low on lemon or lime juice so maybe we'll just have to wait till we get to Bonaire and I'll try making it again with more lemon juice and try cutting the conch smaller. For dinner I made conch chowder and conch stew. I had never made either of these before. We loved the chowder- definitely a winner but both hated the stew. Oh well, we have lots of conch to experiment with. Our favorite dish is still conch fritters made with beer batter and Creole seasoning. Anyway, I finished book number 13, The Conspiracy Club by Jonathan Kellerman - one of my favorite authors. The book didn't have his usual cast of characters, which I missed, but I still enjoyed it anyway. He is one of my favorite authors. I worked on my logs some in the afternoon. Since last night the wind has been E-SE-NE, less than 15 knots, which has been perfect for the wind gen. We ran the water maker for another 2 hours in the afternoon until the tanks were finally full so we ran it for a total of 5 hours today. We had so many amps we got to watch some more TV! We watched the DVD movie Titanic again- I just love that movie but Larry said he is sick of it, as we have seen it several times. Anyway, just as we were finishing the movie around 10:30, the wind picked up to around 18-20 and the wind gen started freewheeling again so Larry had to feather it for the night- just when we were getting some good amps too! The wind did die to around 15-18 during the night but the wind gen was already feathered for the night as we were in bed. September 15 Thursday The wind is back up today- from the East at 15-20 knots. Since we had lots of amps, I decided to do some more laundry. It's best to keep up with it whenever I can, as I never know when we'll have sufficient water to do laundry. While I was doing the laundry, Larry cleaned the entire water line and the chain. We hadn't done it since Carenero a few weeks ago so it was growing a lot of grass. It took me almost 2 hours to do all the laundry trying to use as little water as possible. We ran the water maker 4 hours and 15 minutes but the tanks still weren't full when we turned it off. We went out snorkeling at 2pm to the same reef where I caught all the conch the other day. I got 7 conch today but all weren't nearly as big as those I got the other day. We got back to the boat and Larry opened up all 7 while I started skinning them - I got 5 done before I quit for the night. We had leftover Creole sauce with sausages for dinner- just great! We have so many conchs that I had to take some meat out of the freezer to use so I could freeze some of the conch. The freezer is now full so no more conch unless we can eat it within a few days of catching them. We love them a lot but I just can't eat them every day! September 16 Friday The wind had decreased during the night but the wind gen was feathered so we stayed even on the percent the batteries were charged. I skinned the 2 remaining conch after breakfast. We were going to leave for the small island but wanted to wait until the sun was high enough to see the reefs well. We left the blue hole at 10am and I know I will miss this place - it is definitely one of my very favorite anchorages. We had not run the engine at all for the almost 2 weeks we were out here so Larry just wanted to motor to the island- about 5 miles away, running the engine so he could make sure the batteries got fully charged. We ran the water maker from 9:05am until 1:20pm- 4 hours and 15 minutes until the tanks were full. I did laundry yesterday so I used a lot more water than normal. We arrived at the anchorage at 11:40am. Unfortunately, there was one other boat in the anchorage - we were hoping to have it to ourselves too! Anyway, we lucked out and they left shortly after we arrived - maybe they didn't want company either! I made some conch fritters for lunch and than fried up some meatballs. It was really hot as there wasn't much wind. The wind was SE so we were protected from the swell by the island. We went snorkeling at 2:30 right off the boat but the water was green and murky so not very good. We did see a very large school of maybe 12 huge midnight parrotfish- I love to see them! After, we went for a short walk, swim and showers on the beach- and other things that I will leave to the reader's imagination. Just remember we were on a deserted beach by ourselves... We had a wonderful dinner of spaghetti and meatballs- we haven't had this in a long time so it was great. I wanted to leave tomorrow for Sotavento but Larry wanted to stay another day so we will. September 17 Saturday We're still at the little island on Barlovento. We had a slight northerly swell last night- not too bad but enough that it woke me up several times. The wind was from the East but than shifted back to the SE, light around 10 knots. I finally got back to sleep. We went for a long walk around the island this morning from 10-12:30. We took a swim and showers on the beach afterwards. This afternoon we'll pull the dinghy engine and all the stuff inside the locker and stow it all away. We ran the water maker until it was full but this only took 1.5 hours. We use a lot less water when we can shower on the beach because then we only need to do a quick rinse when we get back to the boat. Since we aren't getting many amps, I was using all the spare coke bottles I had filled when we did have lots of amps. I used this water to replenish the water, ice tea and crystal light drinks. When we get a lot of amps again, I'll replenish these water bottles. Unfortunately, Larry must have used a lot of water rinsing off all the stuff in the dinghy, as the next morning the water tank was less than three quarters. September 18 Sunday The wind was up last night from the SE howling away. It must have been around 20 knots as the wind gen was acting up again and we didn't get any amps in all night. We started this morning with the exact battery percent as last night so we didn't gain or lose anything. The wind was still from the SE 15-18 this morning and I thought we would have a nice sail since we weren't directly downwind again. However, the seas were still up- 5-6 feet and some to 7 feet so the boat was rocking and rolling again. We put the jib up and motor sailed, as we had to charge the batteries. We left at 8:30am right after Larry finished doing the Safety and Security net. I didn't feel so great on the passage- I wasn't seasick yet but I wasn't feeling great from all that rolling around. We were also running the water maker to fill the tanks back up again. We arrived at the south end of the island around 10:30, 11am at the west point of Isla Larga and then it took almost an hour to get into Mangrove Bay. We saw 2 other sailboats going in so we followed them but then realized they were going out onto the reef. The Guardia was calling on the radio. At first I didn't think they were calling us but when I heard the other 2 boats respond I followed them and they were getting asked questions by the Guardia so I knew they wanted to speak with us also. I called them and spoke to them although their Spanish was difficult to understand - it could have been just hard to follow them on the radio though. They were very polite and wanted to know where we had come from, going too, how many people on board, etc. They asked if we had been there before as they thought they remembered our name and I said we had. After a while they called back with someone who spoke English. They were all very nice and it was a pleasure dealing with them. The said to stay as long as we liked- very nice! There was no other boats in Mangrove Bay and we are well protected behind the little island - so much so as we are too close and not getting enough breeze so we decided to move back some. It was very windy in the bay and full of whitecaps so not a good day to go snorkeling. We ran the water maker for 4 hours until the tanks were full and even another half hour later in the day when the high voltage alarm went off. Just as we were eating lunch, sure enough, another sailboat came into the anchorage. Thankfully, they didn't anchor close and only stayed the night. They left early in the am around 8am or so and we didn't think that was too smart as the sun wasn't high enough to properly read the reefs at that time. We thought maybe they were just trying to get to Bonaire so left then but no; they were just going to an anchorage north of here. We didn't think that was to clever leaving when they obviously couldn't see the reefs well but they probably figured they were following their GPS course in so what could go wrong? I made spaghetti sauce and we had spaghetti and meatballs for dinner. At 6pm, it was as if someone just turned off the wind as it really decreased to about 10-12 knots from the NE. We did have enough electricity to watch a movie though so watched an old Indiana Jones movie. We hadn't seen it in a long time, the movie must be around 20 years old but they are still as good as ever and we both enjoyed watching it.
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