We experienced our last night in the heat and the early morning ritual of closing and opening the hatches when the squall passes by. It wasn't a particularly strong wind day, so we felt we timed it right for our 10 days. On this day it was decided we needed to be near a beach for the last day; and one close enough to the marina where we could get the boat in by 3pm. You see, we are scheduled to catch a ferry the next morning and then our flight back to the states.
We cross the channel under motor from St. Peters to Tortola Island and found a nice little cove to hang out. Everybody went swimming and hung out on the sands except for White Whale Williams, who was more than comfortable catching a little shade.
I shuttled Sandra over to some rocky shore where she wanted to get snorkeling. She didn't see much, so we hike up a nearby hill and found a French Restaurant at the top. Nice spot to be French.
We went back to the boat and gathered up the crew. Sometime, behind my back, a mutiny occurred. They wanted to grab lunch at the French Restaurant. Hmm, it was only Sandra and I who knew about this place. I was able to do some back of the napkin calculations and determined Sandra led the revolt.
It was 12:30, and I was getting a little nervous that we were pushing the envelope to make it back in time. Once thing I found with the French is they do not rush their meals. Sometimes you could spend 2 hours on the appetizers alone. In any case, we were hiking back up the hill to surrender to them (What a ironic reversal).
We sat on a nice circular patio and looked over the south side of the BVI's while we had small plates. We finished up, dinghy'd back to the boat and motored off back to the Marina. Sailing was done, it was now the start of the cleanup, organization and preparation to leave the next day.
We didn't have to motor long before rounding a point and moving up through the channel markers which 10 days ago we were going out through them. We called in to the charter company where we were arriving. A dingy with two guys approached us from a distance, and when close, one jumped on and took the helm. They prefer us novices do not bang up their boats while getting back to the slips. He motored us to a fuel dock to top of the tank. He spent considerable time pumping every drop to the rim of the nozzle intake. All this for 5-liters of diesel (remember, we fueled a couple days prior).
He backed us into the slip, and the crew sinched the lines. We immediately configured for shore power. When all hooked up, we turned on the air-conditioning. You wouldn't believe the sighs and ahhhs.
We ended up at the slip for a few hours waiting for the "Debrief", where inventory was performed, and questions of how the boat operated. It was a long wait for 20-minutes of debrief.
On the last night Dillion and Alexa wanted to treat Sandra and I to dinner. We walked down the crazy road where we first came off the ferry and arrived at a nice Italian Restaurant. We stuffed ourselves and went back to sleep under the shut hatches and the blasting A/C. First night I used a sheet for warmth.