May 24 - 31, 2001 -- Rodney Bay and on to Bequia

Today, we headed in to Rodney Bay to check out the yacht chandleries and hard ware stores. We discovered last night that the light switches we have on the boat can be purchased here. Being European switches, we have been nursing the old ones trying to buy a little more time out of them until we got down here and were able to get replacements. Since we have 2 that are dying, we wanted to find some replacements. First, we stopped at the Bread Basket for a breakfast of Croissants and muffins. Then we walked down to the combination yacht chandlery and hardware store where we were able to find most of the things we needed. On our way back, we stopped by the Rodney Bay Chandlery and found the exhaust blower that we have been looking for! We also found out that if we have our ship's papers, then we would be able to get our supplies duty free, so we headed out to the boat for them. On the way, we ran into Dan and Jan. We decided to look around the mall together. So, while they headed on to the dinghy dock, we headed out to the boat to get our ship's papers. We met at the dock and headed off to the mall. We wandered around the shops there, and then hit the super market. In celebration of the fact that we were finally able to get Enchilada sauce again, we invited Dan and Jan over for dinner. Then we headed back to the boat without stopping to get the bilge blower! We had a great dinner and a fun evening. On May 25, we all went in to get our clearance papers to move on to Soufries, one of two national parks here. Unfortunately, because we cleared in without doing a 72 hour clear out, we could not clear out today for tomorrow. We would have to come back to clear out in the morning. Mutual Fun arrived, and while Sojourner and Mariah were attempting to get their clearance papers, we had drinks at the marina bar. Sojourner was able to get their pass for Soufries correctly dated since they did a 72 hour clearance. Unfortunately, Mariah was stuck in the same boat as us. That evening, we went out to dinner with Mariah and Sojourner to Snouti Agouti. It is a little bar and restaurant on Pigeon Island. The food was pretty good, and the company was delightful. On May 26, we learned that the tropical wave was due to hit our area in 12 hours. It was reported that it would bring winds of 20 knots with gusts as high as 35 knots. Rather than move to Soufries, we decided that we would rather trust our ground tackle rather than a mooring ball so we stayed. Mariah and Sojourner moved on to Soufries. I headed back to Customs to clear us back in. The customs guy took our form and noted on it that we were unable to leave due to the Tropical Wave. With that, we were cleared back in to St. Lucia. After I returned to the boat, Kokopelli called us. They just arrived from Martinique after also having a boisterous sail, though not quite as boisterous as ours was. We headed over to visit with them and catch up on where they have been and how their trip was going. We returned to the boat, and after dinner flipped on the TV. We receive a few channels here, and discovered that one of the channels that split its time between several stations was UPN tonight. We were able to watch the final episode of Star Treck Voyager! On Sunday May 27, we started out the day with a few boat chores before heading over to visit with Kokopelli again. While we were there, we ran into Mutual Fun, so we all headed to lunch together. After lunch, Mike and I headed back to the boat for a nap. However, instead, we headed over to Mutual Fun to take a look at their Pactor IIe problem. We checked everything out and there appeared to be a wire short somewhere. So, after tracing out the wires and reconnecting them, things worked. However, it was getting late so we only taped them together which didn't work. Finally, we headed back to Nightwinds for a quiet dinner and a relaxing evening. I took the opportunity to write logs. On Monday, May 28, we headed back over to Mutual Fun to clean up the rewired connections we did for them yesterday. We performed several tests; unfortunately they didn't work out. We headed back to Nightwinds and spent the afternoon on the boat. On Tuesday, May 29, we worked on the main saloon air conditioner problem. We tried to track the problem down based on an email we received, but wound up having to call Merrill Stevens for more information. With a little bit of help, we were able to diagose the problem and are looking for a new relay. We headed into town where we ran into Island Spirit. We caught up with them on our various adventures and had lunch at Pizza Pizza. It was a great way to spend the afternoon. On Wednesday, May 30, we moved the boat down to the Pitons. It was an easy motor with an exciting end! As we came up to the mooring area, we discovered that the mooring pennant is too short for us to attach our bow line to from the deck of the boat. 'Fortunately' there was a boat boy there that helped us get our boat hooked up to the mooring pennant. We spent the afternoon playing in the water and relaxing on the boat. On Thrusday, May 31, we moved from the Pitons to Admiralty Bay, Bequia. We slipped our mooring at 0900 GMT in 10 to 15 knots of wind with a weak tropical wave approaching. We turned towards St. Vincent and motor sailed in 4 to 6 foot seas and 15 to 20 knots of wind. We had a few minor rain showers and a few light squalls. However, we managed to avoid the worst of the wave and were comfortably anchored in Bequia by 1800 GMT. The anchorage at Bequia was poor. It took us several tries to get our anchor set, and then it was set only because it had caught on a big rock! We dropped the dinghy and headed into town to clear in. Afterwards, we wandered around the town abit before heading back to the boat for dinner.