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Published: March 20th 2008
We are still in St Maarten. It has just been over two weeks since we arrived back from Mexico and time has flown. It has been two weeks of hard work getting Woodsia in ship shape for her voyage. Our days start at 8am and are lucky to finish by 6pm. It has been hot sweaty work but we are slowly getting there. Achievements to date include;
• Install of a new hot water system
• Cradle for our 10 man life raft (bloody heavy)
• Steal work for solar panels and radar (we can also use to winch dingy from the stern)
• Install of solar panels and solar controller (we now have enough power to support a small country)
• Radar
• Extra Battery
We have made some great friends that have made the experience bearable. Lyn and Bruce kindly adopted us on the first day and took me provision shopping and were a wealth of knowledge. Jeff and Merlyn are skippering a 66f Oyster back to New Zealand (they also did the trip last year on their own boat) and Greg who has been an extra hand.... also a regular at the dinner table. Greg is
also heading to Oz and is thinking of doing it solo so we will be most likely do the trip in convoy.
Des and Liz Lord arrived in St Maarten last Sunday (9th March). As expected they where a great help. Unfortunately we didn’t get to sail to St Lucia. They hired a car and got to see some of St Martin. They took us to a lovely French restaurant in Marigot. We also went out with our neighbors for some wicked Indian in Simpson Lagoon and spare ribs another night. We escaped for the weekend and anchored in Friars Bay (on the French side) for some relaxation. The weather was gorgeous and we had a lovely sail. I even made bread which turned out to be a great success.
We dropped Liz and Des off at the dock on our return and bid a sad farewell. We will probably be here for another week organizing a spiniker pole, hatch covers, service auto pilot and anchor.
We are thinking of changing our route and heading north west to the Virgin Islands (British and US)for a couple of weeks before heading south to the Panama where we want
to explore the Sand Blast Islands. They are beautiful and unspoilt. The decision is partly due to safety (less risk of pirates, speed (lost some time getting stuff done) and we can also pick up our deflag paperwork on the way.
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Tania
non-member comment
Awesome
Hey guys - what an awesome trip you to are having so far, am sure the thought of working a nine to five is an all to distant memory. As for the rest of us it is still hot here, we have the easter weekend coming up but have been advised by my doctor to cut out as much sugar as I can whilst carrying so I guess Darrin and Zariah will have to eat all the eggs themselves! Love Tan x