Never Give Up!

The past few weeks have taught me just how determined Bob is to get to Cuba.  There have been a number of setbacks, and I thought the jig was up yesterday morning…and again this morning….but NO!  Yesterday morning we still had no boat insurance in effect, and I cannot possibly describe how persistent Bob has been at working through this.  Insurance is a long, boring story, so I’ll skip it.  I’ll only say that it was yesterday afternoon when things finally fell into place.

I will also skip the details of learning that we should have had a 6-month course of Hepatitis inoculations that would include Hepatitis A which can be a problem in Cuba due to bad water and fresh produce–along with a course of medicine to prevent cholera. The doctor at the Georgetown Clinic said her family goes to Cuba all the time and never takes these precautions.  Bob was just fine with that…  Me, not so much!

So, this morning was farewell to Georgetown!  Last night we enjoyed a gathering on Monument Beach, affectionately called ARG (alcohol research group) and said our goodbyes to cruising friends.  I sure wish someone were going with us, but no one got their paperwork in order like Bob…no surprise!

This is the sunrise panorama that Bob took on our penultimate day in Georgetown.  These last few days have been the calmest days I’ve ever spent anywhere in the Bahamas!  Almost like the gentle summer days on Long Island Sound.

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I took advantage of the calmness to work on my latest tapestry.  Bob took a photo of me working, but I cannot access it right now.  Just one of the many small frustrations of living off the grid!

So we left Georgetown at dawn this morning (about 6.15 am), and headed out the inlet toward the northern tip of Long Island.  It wasn’t long before our plotter which shows our charts, our location (GPS), and radar and AIS malfunctioned and quit!  Well, again, I tell you I gave up.  I thought for certain this was it and we’d be heading back into the harbor.

Not so for Bob.  He took apart the housing that holds these electronics and began to see if he could deduce what was wrong.  After a good hour’s effort he called Raymarine and spent another hour on the phone following a techie’s instructions.  Bingo!  We were back in business.  Now we are rapidly approaching sunset and have motor/sailed  70 miles, out of our 350 mile passage.  We are just off Clarencetown at the southern end of Long Island, and tonight we will head offshore to Great Inagua.  We need to maintain speed of 6.5 knots or more in order to get to Great Inagua before sunset tomorrow.  So far, so good.

Tonight Bob and I will spell each other in 2 hour watches, with some overlap time at each change.  There is a small swell this afternoon that is making me a bit green, and writing this post isn’t helping!  Hopefully I’ll do well overnight.

Our friends George and Nancy, aboard Trumpeter, say we must get to Great Inagua in time to go ashore tomorrow because there are so many parrots on the island!  They say that you hear lots of parrots calling when you go ashore and then soon after see them in all the trees.  There are also flocks of pink flamingos on this island.  That’s why we are determined to keep our speed up!  Next stop after that is Cuba!  Hoping for a gentle passage…

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