Thursday, May 28, 2020

Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, USVI
18.20.016 N
64.55.440 W

Look, everybody keeps posting math problems on facebook like it’s a game.  If you need help with your kids’ homework, just say that. 

I thought I’d throw in an extra post as its raining here and there’s nothing else to do.  I could have conducted another school session but its also rather dark and since I can see the amps myself, there’s no reason to antagonize the amp Nazi by turning on all the lights; so, we’ll wait until this squall passes and (hopefully) the sun comes back out.  The electronic devices are already charged, so we’ll call it a movie day. 

The last couple of days we’ve kept busy alternating our normal routine with school work, swimming lessons, or incorporating the two together.  Like:  running the water maker with a lesson on permeable and impermeable membranes and calling it a science lesson.  After reviewing the summer lessons in Savannah’s book, I’m reminded of the show called “Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?”  So, I’ve added learning how to use a dictionary as part of the curriculum; just to make sure we’re all on the same page. 

We’ve had word that Texas Crewed made it to Grenada but they had to motor sail the whole way to make it in their allotted timeframe as the wind was too far forward to get the most use of the sails.  They reported back that the growth that developed on all of our anchor chains and nylon bridles over the past few months smells “like a dead body” after a day in the sun.  We had already been discussing the best way to clean them before bringing them back on board.  A wire brush to the anchor chain might clean it up but we are at a loss for the nylon bridle that keeps the strain off the anchor windless is just as bad and there are 2 lengths of them.

Gerry on Opal isn’t happy with his new refrigeration system this week and having the techs come back out for analysis.  I don’t fully understand the problem except for the rattling bit; something about how long it runs versus how long it takes to cool down and--its rattling. 

This week was laundry week, so Savannah got a lesson in her new reality.  Unless its on the water, we have to walk or take a taxi or safari bus to where ever we go.  We walked to the laundromat, I stayed there while she rode the safari bus with Papa to the “big” Kmart.   When they couldn’t find what they were looking for, returned to the laundromat before deciding to take a chance at the “little” Kmart up the road a piece which was another walk.  There they were able to find a junior sized life jacket for the dinghy.  We already have an inflatable life jacket with built in harness for her for our transits but since the Coast Guard are still patrolling the harbor on a daily basis, thought this would be a good idea. 

We had a bit of excitement about an hour ago.  A boat ahead of us (that looks like a pirate ship) dragged into another boat ahead of us during the storm (Dale had clocked the winds at 37kts at its highest point).  As it happened to us in George Town back in January, the boat that had been hit immediately started screaming for insurance information before the pirate ship had even gotten their boat under control.  We became aware of the commotion when I kept hearing shouts, which I thought were coming from behind us.  Thinking that it was another vessel’s crew venting their frustrations (there are a lot of people getting tired of being cooped up for so long), I turned to come back in and saw the two boats ahead of us coming at us.  Thank heavens the pirate ship had already started their engines and had started pulling away.  They had gotten pretty close.  I really felt bad for them because I remember how I felt when that happened to us.  The biggest difference is that here we’re anchored in 30’ of water; a lot easier to drag here. 

As a follow up to our dragging incident in George Town, I had always suspected the reason we had dragged in such shallow water after sitting for a couple of weeks, was that one of the water taxis that sped through the anchorage had come too close to us and as a result, their wake unsettled us.  We learned a couple of months later, that one of the water taxis actually hit a dinghy and killed a man.  Its awful that it takes something like that to bring the issue to the authorities even though many of us had asked that the owner to request his taxis to slow down through the anchorage. 

Guess that its for now, I need to go check on a little girl bouncing on the trampoline. 

Finally, I went outside to check on my plants.  I felt something cold and wet on my arm.  I looked down and saw a mosquito using a wet wipe before it bit me.