Monday, March 30, 2020

Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, USVI
18.19.985N
64.55.545W

Yesterday, as planned, we dropped our mooring ball at 10am, motored out of the anchorage, hoisted sails and sailed, yes I said sailed, back to St. Thomas.  We dropped anchor almost exactly 3 hours later.  There was a moment or two when we saw speeds of 7 kts but generally, it was 5.5-6 kts most of the way.  It was the second day of never dropping the dinghy, so on the whole, nothing much to write about.  A beautiful day and a delightful sail.  We did see Rum Truffle heading out of Charlotte Amalie just as we were entering and learned that they were on their way to Cruz Bay in St. John.  We said that we’d try to catch up with them in a couple of days. 

Today, Dale and Gerry started the day by detaching our mutual propane tanks and took off across the harbor to have them filled.  Our’s were at less than half full but not nearly empty yet.  However, as we have no idea as to what the future holds for us at this time, its best to be as ready as possible.  As you can see, they were greeted by one of the locals who showed a great deal of interest in them. 

Dale called the chandlery to ascertain whether our batteries had arrived and learned that although they had arrived on Saturday, they had not been released from customs as yet but were expected to be delivered to the store tomorrow afternoon. 

We did lower the dinghy today and headed into the nearest grocery store to pick up milk, bread and the essentials of life, like potato chips while Dale headed straight for the post office to pick up his meds.  However, as we passed by the marina that houses all the mega yachts, Dale called their office (as they are social distancing) and asked if we could use their fuel dock to load the batteries onto the boat.  They agreed and said to let them know when. 

Later, while putting the groceries away, Gerry consulted the internet to see if we could go to one of the local restaurants this evening for take-out and downloaded the limited menu they’re using so that we could place check marks on our selections.  Apparently they haven’t updated their website this week.  When we walked to their location to hand in our selections, they were closed.  OK, next choice.  Wendy’s is on the corner so we were happy to see that they’ve fixed the problem of only having take out at the drive up window and were granted entrance into the inner sanctum to order.  We asked the manager how things were going and he was happy to say that he’s only lost about 20% of his business but was concerned that he was informed today that things are to remain the same until the end of April.  Whoa!  That’s the first we’ve heard of this.  We were half expecting another couple of weeks but certainly not another month. 

We gathered our bags of sandwiches and found a picnic table at the marina to discuss our options.  We know of a couple of islands that are open in the direction that we need to travel.  However, that means that we’d have to skip several in the hopes that we can “Q” flag it though.  That entails traveling island to island without ever getting off the boat and anticipating that they would allow us to anchor for the night before moving on.  Nicky and I are of the same belief that if we are going to be stranded somewhere, this is the place to be as we are within walking distance of a grocery store, a laundry, a couple of take out places, the hardware store is just a “safari” ride away and there is a hospital in case of emergency.  As Opal is Australian flagged, Gerry is adamant that he has paperwork detailing their check out as well as their check in, so that he can prove where he’s been and for how long, if ever questioned.  Dale just wants to go to Foxy’s one more time.  None of us wanted to crush him by saying Foxy’s probably isn’t open now. 

We ended the day on Opal with a sundowner making plans to shop at Home Depot tomorrow and possibly hitting another Sams/Cosco type of store on the way back. 

No one knows what the future holds, certainly not us, but hurricane season is just around the corner, so we’re going to have to do something and rather quickly.