Friday, February 26, 2010

A day in the life of Tobago Cays

Hi all. We’re still in Tobago Cays and having a grand time. Today we started our day with fresh croissants (Jen’s was plain while I and Quinn indulged in chocolate filled) and a local papaya we brought with us from Bequia. Walter, our boat vendor of choice, stops by every afternoon to get our order and then delivers them around 7AM. He is a very nice guy and we’ll have a photo posted with the next update to the web site.

After breakfast we piled into the dinghy and motored over to the reef that protects the anchorage and snorkeled for almost 2 hours. Quinn is getting quite good with the snorkeling and I seldom need to give him any help at all. He still wears his lifejacket while snorkeling as he’s not comfortable being out in open water without it yet. It won’t be long though. He is experimenting with diving below the water like Daddy does, but doesn’t get far with the lifejacket on, of course. The snorkeling was very good, although the coral shows a lot of damage from being scrubbed and coated with sand by a recent hurricane. We saw lots of fish and on the way back to the boat we saw a couple of large sea turtles. It is no wonder they have been hunted to near extinction. Their shells are incredibly beautiful.

After the swim I lounged in the cockpit finishing up a book while Jen gave Quinn a hair cut on the transom steps. Many of the folks on the boats anchored nearby were quite amused as Quinn stood naked on the steps while being rinsed clean of hair trimmings and singing at the top of his lungs “I’m washing the stink off my BUUUUUTTTT, I’m washing the stink off my BUUUUUUTTTT!”.

After the haircut and lunch, it was naptime for all three of us. Jen and I woke up and played a few games of cribbage while snacking on some yummy French cheese and the baguette which was delivered this morning. Quinn woke up and joined us in the snacks and did his usual puttering about the boat before dinner. Suddenly we heard his panicky “Daaaaady!!!!” cry which always means he’s dropped something overside. This time it was his sweat rag, which he’s become quite fond of. Easily retrieved, and the unplanned swim was refreshing after a hot afternoon on the boat.

As we had snacked quite a bit, we decided against the fancy duck dinner Jen was planning. Instead she whipped up some pork and beans. Tomorrow we’ll have the duck.

After dinner Jen worked on the photos we took while snorkeling today and Quinn and I played a few hands of UNO. To his delight, he beat me 3 out of 4 games. As Quinn was getting ready for bed, Jen noticed that we are now pointing northeast instead of southeast. Not a problem other than there is a boat on a mooring ball close to where we’re anchored and with the change in wind direction we’re way to close to them. I pulled in a little scope as the wind has settled and we don’t need so much chain out, but it’s still too close. Tomorrow first thing we’ll haul up the anchor and move over a little.

Randy and Susan left the anchorage yesterday to return to Bequia where they will pick up a couple of friends who have flown down for a visit. We expect them back here Monday or Tuesday, but no firm plans have been made. All three of us enjoy their company quite a lot so we hope they can make it back down here before it is time for us to move on.

Life is good in the Tobago Cays. We look forward to sharing some of our photos when we get high speed internet access back in Bequia or St Vincent sometime next week.

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