Wed, Thursday and Friday – 7^th, 8^th and 9^th March

Now Jo has departed, no excuses, I am back on the blogging.

Wednesday afternoon and the last two days have been spent traversing the lagoon in the dinghy and trekking around getting all the other jobs and purchases done that we didn’t do last time.   Most annoyingly we didn’t buy a new and very grand Dan buoy last week as we  wouldn’t have time to fit it (having been in a ‘real’ sea across the Atlantic, I became very aware that our rather weedy Jon buoy would be less than useless and have been admiring the stonking great Dan buoys carried out here – for the uninitiated, these are markers that you toss in the sea next to your man overboard to help relocate them once you have the boat under control) and now we are back, the chandlery offering an amazing price (possibly the wrong price?!) has sold out.   After extensive research and discussions about their next container delivery dates, we bit the bullet and bought more expensively.   Yes it might be cheaper in the US but we might need it on the way there…… (Rob here: Why am I nervous about that comment?)

A further irritation is that we failed to organise anyone to come and re-gas our fridge and check it out for presumably a leak – now they are too busy, but we hadn’t realised that the company was at the end of the dock we were berthed on which meant he probably would have fitted us in.   So this will have to wait until the Virgin Islands now unless something else comes up.

We spent much of Thursday dumping stuff on Nezih’s boat in the marina for security as we marched off to various shops to add to the pile.  I cut the Treadmaster to titivate our passerelle (also recognisable as a plank) and prevent the new locker lid in the dinghy from scorching our feet, or being a death trap in rain  on Lagoon Marina’s dock, as Rob is always rather nervous of me welding a Stanley knife on our teak decks.   We also went and hassled the poor canvas man for delivery dates.   Rob at St Maartin Sails and Canvas has been very helpful in repairing our cockpit cover, deck screen cover and is also making up covers for our new gas bottles, a shoe store (for those that don’t know me, I have a total neurosis regarding cockroaches so shoes only make it as far as the pushpit on our boat in case they are liberally depositing dreaded eggs  - one day I hope to be a grown-up), and a rather over-engineered high-wind wind scoop for the forepeak.  Rob is actually from West Mersea and this together with his interest in our new gas bottles seems to have bonded us, and he is really helpfully squeezing us into his busy schedule.

Friday has been much of the same.   I got my hair cut.   This is always an exciting venture as you can only plunge into a saloon with hope.   Here there is far too much choice; usually there is only one hairdresser if at all.   The French girl who cut my locks this time did agree it was a rather unusual cut last time being twice the length in patches… so she offered to cut it all to one length, and boy is ‘cut’ the right word:  it is short even for me!   She then glued it position so I emerged as one of those un-PC dark coloured toys we don’t mention any more.   Obviously we rushed straight back for me to wash it despite the shortage of water – first wash was in lagoon water to save our stocks!

All our rushing around is interspersed with visits to the wonderful La Sucriere patisserie or Lagoonies for Rob to update his emails and work.   We are hoping to visit Philipsburg by bus before we have to leave (there seem to be extra charges applied if you stay for more than a week) but tomorrow there is the fresh produce market in Marigot and a yachtie flea market and we are also hoping that Owen off S/Y Magic will come and cast some fairy dust over our SSB radio, so we shall have to wait and see.

Incidentally before we set off to Anguilla we did a big shop at Le Grande Marche, sadly much of the vegetables and fruit rotted in the first few days.   Anything that has been refrigerated out here has to continue in the fridge and even then tends to go off, hence the required market visit.   Particularly as the market is in the French half where they take their food oh so more seriously.