continued... We quickly got the dinghy down, got the snorkeling gear out of the lazarette, suited up and hopped into the dinghy. Here was a shot of the rock called The Aquarium.
There were moorings on the southwest side of the rock, which was the main snorkeling area. We attached to the mooring, which already had several other dinghies on it, and hopped in.
Sunrise on Tuesday, March 24
First thing this morning, we went to the airport to say goodbye to Tiki Tour’s guest, Angela (who was going home) and their crew member, Keira (who was going on a short trip). They unloaded the luggage at the dock, but we weren’t allowed to leave our dinghies on the dock, so we beached them and walked over to the airport.
Group shot before they boarded the plane.
Continue readingSaturday, March 7 – Friday, March 13 — This week has been fun. On Saturday, we taught March Dragon and the boy from Driftwood, Jake, how to play D&D. In the evening we went over to Traveler. On Sunday, Tiki Tour anchored in a different part of Staniel. We did a D&D session with March Dragon, then all the teens (including Tiki) went over to the beach.
Cette semaine était amusante. Samedi, on a appris D&D à a March Dragon et au garçon de Driftwood, Jake. Dans la soirée, nous sommes allés sur Traveler. Dimanche, Tiki Tour s’est ancré dans une autre partie de Staniel. On a fait une session de D&D avec March Dragon, puis tous les ados sont allés à la plage.
Saturday, February 14 – Friday, February 20: This week has been fun. On Saturday, we moved to Hog Cay. Once we got there, Mom made some food, then we went to shore with the other families. On Sunday, we headed over to the beach in the afternoon again. When we got back, we moved to a different spot in the anchorage that was more protected.
Cette semaine était amusante. Samedi, nous sommes allés à Hog Cay. Quant on est arrivé, maman a cuisiné, puis nous sommes allés à terre avec l’autre famille. Dimanche après-midi, nous sommes allés à la plage. Quand nous sommes revenus, on a bougé à une autre partie dans la zone d’ancrage qui était plus protégé.
Friday, June 20 – Sunday June 22 — On Thursday, we’d mentioned that our speeds inside the Gulf Stream were incredible. Eric had had calculated that if we could maintain a speed of 10.2 knots, we’d get in a full day ahead of schedule, so he’d increased RPMs to 1750 to get us up to 10.2 knots. Then our speed picked up even more, eventually getting to 11.7 knots!
After that peak, our speed slowly crept back down, and by 0800 on Friday, we were doing 10.4 knots. While the extra speed was exciting, we were on track to arrive in the middle of the night, so Eric dropped the RPMs back down to 1650 for a daylight arrival. At 1650 RPM, we were still doing a blazing fast 8.8 knots! The speeds continued to slowly creep down the rest of the day, and by 0800 on Saturday. we were down to 7.1 — which was still a great speed.
On Saturday, the speed slowly crept back up. Eric kept reducing RPMs to keep us on track for a daylight arrival. By midnight on Saturday night/Sunday morning, we were doing 9.3 knots at 1500 RPM! On Sunday, our speed was a yo-yo, but we were still averaging a fast enough speed that Eric continued to gradually reduce RPMs to 1425 — and we were still averaging 5.5-knots at 1425!
On Sunday evening at about 2000, Eric changed our course to avoid the shipping lanes in the Chesapeake Bay. The new route added more miles, which was fine as we needed to arrive later, anyways. Once he’d re-routed us, he increased the RPMs to 1650.
On Friday, for most of the day, the sea conditions were the same as they had been on Thursday: 2 -3 foot swells at 5 -6 seconds with 1-2 foot wind chop. But on Friday evening, we were hit with a squall at about 1830. It was ominous on the radar.
The wind went from nearly dead to strong in an instant, and the seas rapidly worsened. We’re pretty sure it rained a little bit. But it passed relatively quickly, and all went back to being calm almost as fast as it had picked up. We could see the silent lightning from the storm for a long time after it had passed.