Saturday 23 Nov, HHN day 43: Yes, we are still here! Water level, or lack of it, thwarts departure plan. But our day turns into good fortune.
We promptly wake up with the 6am alarm. But when Glen glances through the window, he is looking up at the dock. What the hell? And sure enough, the instruments show 2.4m. We are sitting on the bottom, again. There is no way we can get out of here till later in the morning. So back to bed we go, somehow relieved we don’t have to move right now.
During breakfast we analyze PredictWind and tides and debate whether we should push ourselves to leave at 11am, or postpone till tomorrow. We are back into the cruising decisions mode. Once again, a joggle of factors to consider in the navigation decisions process. Like: water level to exit the marina; where we will anchor the next night; what will conditions be to round the Hatteras etc. We could still leave today at high tide, but there will be a big front blowing through tonight with forecast 35kt gusts. Not the conditions you want on your first night on anchor!
While we were contemplating on our options, we have a knock on the hull. Ken, our friend from Herrington Harbour South (fellow Hallberg Rassy owner) comes baring gifts: Panama pilot book and charts and a bottle of wine. We are so very moved with the kindness of people here.
Back to our Navionics and weather prediction, decision is made: we leave tomorrow morning just before high tide. It will be blowing 20knts which is good for sailing but not great to edge our way out in the shallow channel. Fingers crossed it will be ok. At least we get another night snugly on M-dock. We might even entertain ourselves with some TV this evening.
And just as we feel relieved we don’t have to rush to do anything, we receive an email that our tracking device, a Delorme InReach, has been sold on Ebay. Oh! We even forgot we still have items listed to sell on ebay. While our current device is still working just fine (real time tracking, texts over satellite and an SOS system) the newer version has the added ability for 2-way communication with emergency services.
So the rush is on again! A quick check of the prices online, then off to West Marine to strike a deal for a new device. Luckily, not only West Marine has all the InReach models on stock, but they already have discounted prices to match the best online. So no need for the intended bartering and we walk out with a new device, very nicely priced. Wonderful. This is the first of several positive karmas for us not departing this morning.
Back at Cloudy Bay, I start the new device’s activation and sync process while Glen prepares a box to ship the old one. No time to waste. While activating the new device, we start thinking about getting the SAR and Medivac packages also. Documents are downloaded and we will be reading through T&C in the coming days.
On the way back from taking the old Delorme to post, Glen notices 6 wine bottles in a nice wooden box sitting next to the “recycling” dumpster (where cruisers leave unwanted stuff for other cruisers to have). And on a closer look they are all unopened. 6 bottles of Italian wine ranging from 2002 to 2006 vintage, and other than a bit dusty, all seem perfectly fine. Well, that’s interesting – we’ll take those thank you very much! They will either be very good wine, or bad wine that we make Sangria out of, or gone-off wine that we will dump. An all-round no-lose situation! And while there, he noses into the dumpster to see most of what we put there yesterday has already been taken. And oh, there is a new shiny looking thing there too, a brand new Lamicall laptop support. “Just what Oana was looking for” he thinks. He arrives back at the boat baring gifts, looking very pleased with himself!
Early afternoon it starts raining again. Luckily, we have zero intention to do any jobs outside. Or any serious jobs for that matter. We remain in the warmth of the saloon catching up on admin – banking, emails, all these things that we need internet for.
Few days ago we inquired with Pantaenius what policy costs we will face once we move into the Pacific. And today we received the answer. In short: a huge premium increase. Nearly 60% more than we paid for our current cruising region which itself had doubled since our European region policy. Not to mention that the terms of coverage for lightning strike have changed. From zero deductible to GBP10,000! They are a very good company and we are happy with their instant reaction every time we had claims in the past. But we feel it is time to shop around and find a less expensive full coverage insurance. Our policy ends in May, so we do have some time to ask around.
In the evening, we continue our chill-out by watching a new series of Jack Ryan on Amazon Prime. What a pleasure to sit and be entertained for once. Is this how normal people live? 🙂
The predicted windy weather tomorrow may make us regret our lovely calm day today, but it’s been worth it, to be relaxed for a change before the next phase – cruising!