Wednesday 21 November, Bermuda day 1, St.George: Take it easy, we are on vacation now!
We went to bed with the loud sound of ripples lapping on the stern. But who cares? We are not moving! And we fall asleep the second our heads hit the pillow.
Bright smiley faces are looking back at us from the mirror when we wake up in the morning, after a full nights sleep. Bright day today, although clouds seem to be gathering over the horizon. Again, who cares about clouds? We are warm, and we are not moving!
Even before breakfast, Glen goes for decks inspection in day light. Last evening, when we were motoring into the waves coming the last mile into St.Georges, lots of water was sloshing all over the deck, and even on the aft deck it was several inches deep. As a result, one of the aft lockers got a fair amount of sea water inside. So jobs start already (did you actually believed us when we said we are on vacation?), emptying the lockers to dry out. Good news is one large bucket got most of the water. Bad news is the shore power cable was swimming in that bucket. So now it rests in the galley sink, soaked in fresh water. Fingers crossed we save it.
We have a nice calm breakfast in the cockpit, in t-shirts and with coffee! After 4 days of no coffee, you can imagine how happy I must be just by smelling it!
Then it’s relaxing time, replying to emails and messages. It’s like being away from work for a few days, coming back to lots of emails to catch up with. Actually, not quite the case. 5 days away from our previous jobs would have meant 1000 emails, for each of us. Today we only have 44 and it’s a pleasure to tackle them. And we are very pleased with all the views on our blog and interaction. We really feel like we are gaining a whole new bunch of friends via this media.
Mid morning the rain starts so we continue to stay aboard, “relaxing”. After another nice coffee Glen tackles the forward cabin where water entered through the deck vent. On investigation, looks like not much entered, and the beach towel we put in there got most of it. Unfortunately our new beach chairs also got wet. We threw the old ones out because they were so rusty. We don’t want the same thing with these ones, thank you very much, so they are taken onto the dock, wiped down and the metal parts sprayed with T-9 antitrust.
Every now and then a local, all rather rough looking with colorful Rastafarian hats on, stops to chat. All friendly but somehow you feel they have another agenda. Or maybe we are just totally tuned to American behavior now, where there is no agenda other than genuine friendliness. Well, mostly, the obnoxious guy in the Uber in Boston excluded. We could have happily thrown that character to the sharks!
We are moored on the town dock right opposite the customs house of St.George, which is continuously busy with arriving yachts. Bermuda is like a transit hub in the middle of the Atlantic. This time of year, most south bound yachts transiting New England to Caribbean stop here. Then in spring the opposite, yachts come north from Caribbean stop in Bermuda then either go east to the Med or west to USA.
We continue to keep busy on board, pottering inside and on the decks, interrupted quite often by the rain showers. Not enticing to go for a walk, and quite content to have a chill out day not having to rush anywhere.
After our very late lunch we go for a short walk to stretch our legs, just along the pontoons and King’s Square. Perfect timing, in-between showers, and watched a beautiful sunset Caribbean style, setting among rain clouds.
Then back on board I attack a new video (the yard time in Herrington) while Glen carries on with admin on the internet, catching up on news from family, friends and replying to our social media comments. An enjoyable and relaxing evening. So enjoyable that midnight found us awake, again.
But tomorrow it will definitely be a vacation day. We will be tourists and go explore the surroundings!