I promised myself I wouldn't mention Knots, Islands, Reefs or Snorkeling. However, what was not mentioned occurred just the same.
Can you really trust a weather guy these days? I'm starting to believe that this must be a career based on religion and not science. To start, we spent a night in nice White Bay on Guana island. It was nice, sure. Except for the howling winds and waves not predicted for the day. I suppose that was a saving grace, as we moored on the very edge of the "R"-word (reef). I spent the night agonizing whether the boat with spin 360 degrees and we'd find ourselves high ground. Fortunately, this did not happen.
This plan today was to get to Cooper Island and hang out to enjoy the sun, bars and "S"-Word (snorkeling). Weather report was supposed to be an easy day. We even thought it would be nice to jibe down to the watering hole. Turned out, the weatherman’s prediction took a turn for the worse and we had 20 "K"-word (knots) winds. We had to motor about an hour through a channel before we were able to put up sails. And yes, today was the "R"-word (Reef 2). We had to take the wind exposure down quite a bit. So, we did. And we learned a thing or two about keeping the battens out of the Lazy-Jack lines; so, we wouldn't rip the mainsail again.
Off we go! We arrived at Cooper Island in less than 2 hours. It was fast and bumpy all the way. We were glad it was short, since we had no more desire to be out in that mess for the day. We ended up racing to the mooring field to pick up an anchoring ball before others who were attempting the same. We got the last of (3) balls, so felt fortunate.
From there, we went ashore and had a beer at the only place who had an IPA (On Tap!). I did shuttle Sandra out to a point on the "I"-word (island) to do a little "S"-word (snorkeling). She enjoyed that before we headed back to the resort to have another beer and relax a bit before heading back to our boat to make dinner. We ran into a fella who saw my "Offshore Sailing" cap I was wearing. Turns out he used to teach at the sailing school, but now hires out as a captain for private chartering. We grabbed his contact information, as he may be a guy we go too to upgrade to Catamaran chartering.
Back at the boat we had leftovers from yesterday, which really hit the spot. Outside the wind is howling strong, and the rain is periodic. This was probably the best day to not do sailing and just recoup some energy.