A LOVE-ly Meeting with S/V Makai

Moonrise as we dinghy in to the SCYC

Moonrise as we dinghy in to the SCYC

The weather goddess must have received roses, chocolates and jewels for Valentine’s Day as she happily calmed the winds and waves by late afternoon. A dry dinghy ride in to the SCYC was assured and we would have our “prepared by someone else” dinner treat.

To make our day even more special s/v Makai anchored off the YC which meant we’d finally get to meet her five-person, one dog, California, catamaran crew. S/v Makai is a blog follower who had some questions when the time came to make their dinghy chaps. Jackie is such a talented seamstress that she could make these monsters blindfolded! Eric told us that he’d found our blog when searching for East Coast cruising info.

The crew of s/v Makai knows how to pose for a fun photo!

The crew of s/v Makai knows how to pose for a fun photo!

We shared stories (there’s always much more than we each have in our respective blogs), met the fantastic home/boat-schooled trio and hung out in the bar area while they ate and we waited for the late dinner bell to ring.

A special first course and ladies received a rose and chocolates

A special first course and ladies received a rose and chocolates

Saturday was a fundraising event to benefit the library, the cay’s oldest building. Bake sale, flea market, raffle and lunch- right off the town beach. Cruisers, vacationers and private home owners made tracks for food.

Outside the library/oldest building on Staniel Cay

Outside the library/oldest building on Staniel Cay

A stop at Burke’s Blue Store yielded a few items on my grocery list and those coupled with what Isle’s General had; hey we’d be good for a few more days!

Burke's Blue Store at Staniel Cay

Burke’s Blue Store at Staniel Cay

Make that very good what with the treats we scored at the bake sale. One item I’d never heard of but will definitely add to my recipe collection, is cookie-brownies. Take brownie batter and put a scoop into a cupcake paper liner then plop a spoonful of chocolate chip dough in the middle and bake. These were delicious and all mine as they included walnuts 🙂

Bells Island Deja Vu

A front usually brings rain, wind and a temperature drop

A front usually brings rain, wind and a temperature drop

Wednesday found us anchored behind Bells Island (some charts say Bells Cay) awaiting the arrival of a cold front that would bring up to 25kt winds out of the SW to West. With some exceptions, most of the Bahama islands and cays offer no west protection during the clocking winds that often occur when a cold front passes over or comes very close to your location. Last year just after Valentine’s Day we hid here from a front, and now here we are again.

We had plenty to keep us busy all day Thursday: defrosting the fridge was tops on the list, backed up the laptop to the hard drive (way overdue), cracked open our coconuts and baked coconut bread (near perfect loaves this time), baked chocolate macaroons and got frequently distracted by the T-storms that passed by- rain, lightning, thunder- quite the show every time.

Two cuties- Russ tries to imitate the cute coconut face

Two cuties- Russ tries to imitate the cute coconut face

I prepped photos for the blog but that’s about all the blog work I could do.  Entries are way behind because lately I either haven’t had good enough cell service to tether, no WiFi or just been having too much fun to spend time in front of the laptop.

Getting a blog post ready to publish requires more steps than your favorite lighthouse.

  • download photos from camera, crop and fix as needed, label and add tags
  • select the ones for the blog and make them “smaller” for easier uploading
  • open Firefox and WordPress and upload the chosen pics to the media library
  • close Firefox,open IE and WordPress and copy and paste the text from Word
  • select photos from media library and hope they go where you want them
  • proofread, edit the publish date to be close to the event date, add tags
  • click Publish and then review the suggested corrections, etc
  • OK now click Publish again and this time the post is done and published

All these steps rarely occur during one session and if the internet connection isn’t lost once or twice during the process I feel luckier than a lobster in the Land and Sea Park.

Friday we sailed 15nm south to Staniel Cay where we’d spend a couple of days and meet up with s/v Makai.

Little Halls Pond Cay is owned by Johnny Depp

Little Halls Pond Cay is owned by Johnny Depp

We left Bells Island by rounding it counter-clockwise and looking right, a bit north of Bells, we could see the privately owned Little Halls Pond Cay. We’d thought we’d watch a Pirates movie, but alas, our other family pirate member has the DVD.