Cane Garden Bay is well sheltered behind the higher land of Tortola and consequently the breeze here is gentle. However, when anchoring a steady breeze in one direction is probably optimal, to keep you set and reduce swinging. This morning however, we finally completed a 360 degree pirouette and like Mike & Jean in Jeannius decided to reanchor as the new position was too close to other boats / hazards.
We pulled in along the beach where there is a narrow strip free from mooring balls, alongside Mike & Jean. We were at least nearer the dingy dock.
We did a bit of Skyping home today and found out that my parents own travel plans are coming to fruition at last as they now have an accepted offer on their house. First stop this summer will hopefully be a tour of the UK by narrow boat, I’m really excited for them and hope they enjoy life on board as much as we do.
It being Sunday night and as we are now locals to Cane Garden Bay it was time for the Elm barbecue. Mike, Jean, Kevin and I head out to get our usual table. Though tonight we’d brought the padlock and locked up the dingy
It was another a good night at the Elm and the Elmtones were joined this week by a shaggy haired, gravelled voiced guitarist who brought some new songs to the repertoire. The audience was split on his performance however, Mike and I felt his voice was not as strong as George’s, but Kevin was really impressed. Although, we were all sold on the saxophonist who joined them for some later tracks who really added to the sound.
I should also mention the locally famous Shadow, a 6’4” Rastafarian who provides the dancing accompaniment to to band every week, much to their amusement at times, they were especially impressed with his toe touching move which in such a tall man clears the floor. He also feels that it is his duty to dance with all the ladies present, mostly being drunken charterers he is fairly successful. I’m ashamed to say I hid behind Kevin when he came to our table and Jean had to step up, being a regular she had little choice and she managed Shadow’s extravagance beautifully.
Unfortunately, when we got back to the dingy dock the excitement of the evening was literally deflated when we found that the wind had shifted round and trapped our dingy under the dock puncturing one of the tubes. Kevin and I dragged it up the beach, luckily right beside the dock. We have 2 metres of 6mm chain attached to the steel painter loop on the dingy bow which is the right length to lock the dingy to the stanchion when hoisted on the davits. It usually has the effect when we tie to the dock using the line attached to the end of the chain of holding the dingy just off the dock. The dock is in a poor state of repair with boards missing on the walk way and the steps / sides just jagged wood to the waterline. Every time we come back to the dock we will see at least one of the Moorings or Sunsail dingies trapped underneath.
Tonight because we’d seen the theft the night before we locked the dingy up, which shortened the painter and held us too close to the dock. We moored downwind to hold us off the dock, but that had shifted a full 180 degrees whilst we were at the barbecue. The other option is a kedge anchor off the back, which we hadn’t done as we never bought one, having no integral box in our dingy to lock / hide it away. In the Cape Verdes we’d had the only thing not locked down -the davit shackles, stolen out the dingy. Luckily, Mike and Jean gave us and the dingy a lift back to the boat and we hoisted it up on the davits to await repair the next day. Kevin pulled the outboard and although it didn’t start it wasn’t too wet and he was confident of fixing it the next day.
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