Getting out today was a sailing trip to Jost Van Dyke island. Hoping for more wind to make up for yesterday, but it was not looking to promising. Our hop to the island was in eyesight. "You, mean that bar of sand about 2 miles away"? That's hardly worth putting pants on for.
We put up the sails when we got out of the bay and started a run downwind to the island. We were cooking about 1.5 knots in a breeze of 8 knots. "I can dog paddle faster than this". We let this go on for 45 minutes and again had to say, "Motor On". We brought the sails back in and sputtered for the mile distance.
Sandra has been getting more snorkeling done for the next 4 lifetimes. We grabbed a day-ball and hung out for an hour while she, Alexa and Dillion flip flopped around a small reef area called Diamond Cay. I caught up on some Chronicle writing and had a PB&J sandwich. They snorkeled back to the boat, and we powered another 400 yards to pick up our first "Reserved" mooring ball. So far, we've been picking up "First Come, First Served" balls, but we were told this area was going to fill up fast.
After we got on to our nightly mooring ball, Sandra and Alexa wanted to go over to a place called "The Spit". It's just a pile of sand surrounded by water with two palm trees. I motored them across the bay (maybe a half mile) to the spit. Another day the anchor and everybody but me was off doing the little mermaid. The limit of these is 90-minutes, so I didn't have long to wait before everyone was back on board.
Then, all it took was a 400-yard motor to the real ball we would be using at night. Diamond Cay was nice, there was a small restaurant in the bay called "Foxies". We dinghy'd to the place, made reservations for 6pm, grabbed a couple of road soda's and did a little walk to the "Bubbly Pools". It was a neat formation where at high tide the water rushes over rocks and forms a pool on the other side. We, of course arrived at low-tide, so were able to view the empty pool and ponder to our imagination what it must look like when it's something to see. I guess this is what YouTube videos are for. We ended up turning back in order to make our reservation.
We had a couple of drinks, fish and tacos for four (Final Bill: $280.00). Oh well, we can always eat crackers for lunch tomorrow. We played hearts at night. It was our second night really. We have still not finished a game before someone taps out, and then we all follow suit.